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TriTrack Guideway Grid

How the Guideway Grid Works:

The Quick Answer:

A computer advises the driver of the best path to take, and the driver then decides whether to follow that route or not. The only merging is on the ground, and you have to come down to the ground to make turns.

The Detailed Answer

  • Grid Layout

    Each blue line on the map represents several lanes of TriTrack guideway. There are lanes for each direction, and multiple lanes in each direction. TriTrack cars only get on a guideway at the beginning and only get off at the end. Once on, there is no merging, there are no exits, and there are no turns.

    To get where you want to go, the lanes are made up of sections of guideway that are each different lengths. One lane will be the 'short' lane, with guideway hops that are only about 1-2 miles long. Another lane will be a 'medium' lane, and there will be a 'long' lane that goes from the center of town non-stop to the edge of town.

    To make a turn, you hop down off the end of your guideway, then hop up on the adjacent guideway going in the new direction.

    Why?

    By making each track one way only and eliminating merges, the system is kept very simple and safety is greatly increased.
  • Getting Where You Want to Go

    It is the driver's responsibility, with advise from the on-board computer, to choose the appropriate set of guideways to minimize the number of hops to get to their destination.

    A central computer cluster will talk to the guideways and to the cars. It will keep track of how many cars are on each guideway, as well as their intended route. With this information, it will advise each driver of the optimal path to take. The driver has the option of following the advise of the computer or not.

    This mixture of optimized flow and individual freedom will allow for the feeling of freedom that cars possess now.

    Why?

    One drawback of buses and coupled trains is that the individual has very little control over where the train stops. Suppose a train passenger suddenly remembers the dry cleaning is ready, but the train is already moving. They have to complete that full leg of the journey before they can backtrack, or else do without.

    By providing full freedom at the end of each hop of the journey, the most choices will be maintained. The computer-optimized solution will just be a suggestion. If most people use the recommended route, traffic congestion will be minimized.

    By keeping the traffic flow evenly distributed across the entire service area, there will be no concentrations to cause traffic problems. Even when you drive on the ground, there will be less traffic because through traffic has been taken out of the mix.