Although various Personal Rapid Transport systems (PRT-systems) have been proposed and investigated by different companies and different researchers over the previous\ decades, yet no PRT-system has been realized that confines to the definition of a PRT. From a literature review it was found that limited attention has been given to the relationship between PRT design variables and performance indicators - such as the (average) waiting time for passengers and the network capacity. This paper investigates, by means of micro-simulation, the feasibility of a circular PRT-system that connects the campus of a university with the main railway station. Main features of the applied simulation tool are described, as well as the performance indicators used. For three hypothetical traffic demand patterns (morning/off/evening-peak) the application of a PRT-system is analyzed. The analysis shows the impact of vehicle size and top speed on the quality and efficiency of the system. Conclusion is that there is a trade-off between user quality (expressed as average waiting time at stops) and the transport system exploitation costs (expressed as average occupancy of the vehicles and vehicle-kilometers driven).
Samenvatting