If the monorail has a bad name, simpsons may be responsible. in episode In the film, which has been praised for its hilarity since it first aired 33 years ago, a con artist shows up in Springfield and convinces the town to build just such a transit system, which turns out to be not only suspiciously unnecessary (at least in young Lisa’s judgment), but dangerously shoddy. I grew up in the Seattle suburbs and saw this movie. Seattle endured a bitter and prolonged debate over whether to build its own rudimentary monorail system (a World’s Fair product like the Space Needle), but ultimately chose not to. Concerns were constantly raised, rightly or wrongly, about the noise and darkness that would result from widening the wide elevated line on which the railroad ran.
But what if there was another way to build a monorail? What if, in fact, it could run over land like a traditional two-rail train? That was the idea in the mind of Lewis Brennan, the indefatigable Irish-Australian engineer who is remembered today for inventing the wire-guided torpedo in 1877.
If things had gone differently, perhaps he would have been more remembered for inventing the gyro monorail, the subject of the film. Primal Space video above. In the design that Brennan built and operated, the vehicle balances itself on a single rail with the help of a pair of rotationally powered gyroscopes to prevent it from tipping over (and can keep spinning for 30 minutes in the event of a power outage to allow safe evacuation), and can run faster and take tighter corners than any train the world knows.
Brennan’s Gyro Monorail was unveiled to the public at the 1910 Japanese-British Exhibition in London, giving 50 passengers at a time the opportunity to ride in a circle at 20 miles per hour. Interest in this product sparked a small boom in gyro-stabilized children’s toys, but it was never actually applied to real-world transportation systems. Around the same time, a German group released its own version, and over the next few decades there were further unsuccessful efforts in Russia. The engineering involved was impressive, as explained in the video, but it was also a bit too complex and expensive for its time. Development of the new German people App-ordered autonomous gyro monorail system It was announced just a few years ago. Given that production could start as early as 2032, we may soon hear the chorus of “monorail, monorail, monorail” or, more accurately, “monocab, monocab, monocab” again.
Related content:
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New York City Subway Ride: Watch Vintage Footage from 1905
Why America’s public transportation sucks: 4 videos tell the story
A Harrowing Test Drive of Buckminster Fuller’s 1933 Dymaxion Car: The Art of Scary Riding
Based in Seoul, Colin Mbemust write and broadcastIt’s about cities, languages ​​and cultures. he is the author of the newsletter books about cities books as well Home page (I won’t summarize Korea) and korean newtro. Follow him on the social network formerly known as Twitter. @Colinbemust.
Source: Open Culture – www.openculture.com
