MonoMetro

MonoMetro
Industry Transport planning and system manufacture
Founded 1997
Headquarters Headquarters: Blackwood, Wales
Key people
 Gareth Pearce
Website http://www.monometro.com/

MonoMetro is a transportation planning company formed in 1997 to promote a new design of suspended narrow-gauge railway. Its main activity has been to promote this as an answer to London's congestion problems, but interest has also been shown in the system by other cities. MonoMetro claims its system would be cheaper to introduce than a tram as it would not be necessary to divert or strengthen sewers along its route and that it is also superior to monorail systems.

The system infrastructure costs calculated on mean fabricated tonnage of steel and construction quantities reference a twin track system with a parallel platform station located every 750 metres. Costs including planning, required Acts of Parliament, professional and tendering costs, electrical supply costs and street diversion costs for central London implementation were estimated at £15 million per kilometre (2005 estimate).[1] Costs outside London must be based on approx 1000 tonnes of fabricated steel per km plus the local cost of planning etc. By comparison to tramway implementation MonoMetro costs around 60% of the cost of building a tramway. The difference however is that MonoMetro is a mass transit system offering 20,000 passengers an hour capacity, trams offer 3000 - 7000 passengers an hour capacity.

Technology

The paradigm precedent for MonoMetro is that of the Wuppertal Schwebebahn, but the technology of MonoMetro is quite different. The trains are suspended from six-wheeled bogies (or trucks [North America]) running along a narrow gauge pair of rails; MonoMetro is thus a railway and not a monorail. The rails have a concave cross section and the wheels a corresponding convex profile. The vehicle load hangs centrally from a pivoting joint located at the intersecting radial load lines of the wheels. According to the patent "[t]his configuration moves the pivot point away from the wheel-track contact point (as in the Wuppertal Schwebebahn) to the point of intersection of the radial loads through the wheels. There is no torque acting on the bogie frame causing loss of contact with the track raceway as would happen if the load and bogie assembly were rigidly connected". The patent compares this to monorail technology that instead require a much heavier guideway and heavier bogies to overcome torsional forces and also need complex superelevation to provide passenger comfort on corners. The patent says propulsion will be provided by linear induction motors.[2]

The rails have special end junctions and are laid along continuous rubber cushions along the beams, held in place by regular (Pandrol) railway torsion clips.[1] No details appear to have been published as to how track switching is effected.

The continual infrastructure of beams and columns is entirely constructed from steel.

Visually the columns have three distinct components:

The essential difference between MonoMetro implementation and that of trams is the microsurgical construction limited to a local opening in the groundscape, creating the appropriate foundation type with foundation cap level with the ground ready for standardised fixing of the KIB.

The KIB section is lightweight hollow pre-fabricated from steel plate with specialised internal divisions that is easily manoeuvered on site. The ring bolting to the foundation cap is slightly above the ground surface keeping the bolts dry and visible for inspection. Once bolted into place the KIB can be precision levelled and then concrete filled giving the mass required for impact resistance to collisions. Collision impact resistances satisfy regulations for civil structures adjacent to the full range of transport vehicle carriageways.

After securing, the KIB ring bolt aperture receives a sacrificial urethane deflector profile designed to absorb the primary energy of impact through the vehicle chassis. There are four different deflector skirt profile types for differing locations appropriate to varying traffic speeds. These urethane skirts are also colour coordinated for visibility or aesthetic toning within the precise urban location.

The middle section of the column above the KIB has two sections:

The column head offers a pair of fixings to which single or paired butterfly arms are attached using the same column for single track or twin track beams. The column remains the same for both types. The butterfly arms are reslilently connected to the column head using well proven SPS elastomer technology. Entirely concealed fixings give a seamless architectural appearance, uncluttered by the nuts and bolts normally associated with civil engineering structures. MonoMetro is civil engineering architecture.

The junction between the butterfly arms and supporting beams is designed to allow for the principle degree of freedom of the beam, longitudinal plane rotation as the primary movement to be accommodated between the beam and column. The fixing is also designed to resist torsion and the longitudinal force of acceleration and breaking. There is also load sharing along the beamway that increases redundancy achieved with a patented consecutive beam junction that damps low frequency oscillations and distributes attenuated loads forward and backward along the beamway so a number of columns resist loading at any one time.

The beamway is an advanced torsion resistant macro-cellular constructional assembly achieving longitudinal structural continuity with a patented junction between consecutive beam modules. The assembly delivers entirely accurate constructional alignment overcoming any variations in fabrication tolerances and longitudinal and torsional structural continuity at the same time as allowing longitudinal expansion and contraction through environmental temperature ranges. This continual beamway structure breaks free from the need of regular column spacing, this escaping the "post and lintel" characteristic common to all other beam carried transit structures. A permissible span of up to 33 metres under dynamic loading allows for optimising the spacing between columns for convenient ground positioning to avoid foundations clashing with sub-ground services. The design flexibility of irregular column spacing minimises visual impact and obtrusive collisions of the column footprint with existing urban features on the ground minimising the need for costly relocations whether it be a telephone box or an important data carrying fibre optic cable.[1]

MonoMetro 2012

Monometro 2012 is the name given to MonoMetro's plans for a "New Regional Metro" called for in the British Government's 1999 white paper. Initially, following winning of London's bid for the Olympics the Chairman of the Olympic Committee Lord Coe wrote to MonoMetro with enthusiasm for implementing MonoMetro as part of the 2012 Olympic project. However a later communique asked for MonoMetro to "try to understand" that MonoMetro would be excluded. The Olympic Committee has been unable to clarify what it wishes MonoMetro Limited to "understand".

Computer aided solid model engineering design drawings for MonoMetro were precision assembled on location within an ordinate studio model of the urban streetscape of London and animated to show the precise spatial impact of implementation. The views are technically accurate precise views of the engineering set in virtual reality and merged with views of the actual places in various locations of the planned system within London. This extremely accurate prediction is Engineer Expert evidence that is wholly reliable in the Courts for Legal purposes. The views are chosen to demonstrate specific views that cover a range of location types from crossing the Waterloo Bridge structure to passing through the east west transepts of Brunels Barrel vaulted Paddington station. The routes of MonoMetro pass through urban corridors that are able to permit implementation, that is in terms of space and environmental planning sensitivity. Contrary to alarmist assertion there has never been any intention of running MonoMetro through locations lined with historic monuments or buildings of architectural significance such as Regent Street or across the frontage of the Palace of Westminster. Further still views of Engineer Expert evidence taken from the animation can be seen at their website.

The Company is currently in deadlock with the UK Government over the breaking of EU Law regarding Statutory Assessment of Candidate Technologies for public transport systems. The UK Government refuses to disclose before the UK Parliament an important Statutory Assessment of MonoMetro carried out under the instructions of then Prime Minister Tony Blair in 2002. Reasons given in Financial Times interview with Transport for London's Managing Director for the Rail division cite fear that revealing the assessment contents will deter policymakers to implement a political decision to build an expensive railway through London.

MonoMetro argues that choice of technology for any public transport project should be Due Process driven so that choice of the technology can be weighed against a raft of considerations that will deliver best value for money.

Previous Government abuses of due process have ended up in the Courts.[1]

Cardiff line proposal

In March 2011 reports indicated that the Cardiff City Council held discussions with MonoMetro about the construction of a line from Cardiff Central station to Mermaid Quay. The line would be privately financed and was supposed to be a demonstration of the technology.[3][4] There are no reports of further progress on this proposal and it was not included in the plan for a Cardiff light rail system.[5]

Mecca Metro Masterplan

MonoMetro developed a masterplan for the Mecca Metro and some reports indicate they had signed a "Development and Delivery" contract to work on the project [6] and web reports indicate they were due to supply trains for the project.[7] However the first line was constructed with conventional rail technology by the China Railway Construction Corp Ltd and it appears MonoMetro was not involved. Despite this the master plan drawn up by MonoMetro was cited in January 2012 as the "Future Network plan for Makkah Metro" at a conference on Middle East Rail[8]

External links

References

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