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Monorails are often seen as gadgetbahns – a technology that might be cool on the surface but in reality impractical for a true rapid transit system. But one city seems to have cracked the code to successful monorails – Tokyo.
Special thanks to @lkstrknb for all the beautiful monorail footage used in this video!
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Ever wondered why your city’s transit just doesn’t seem quite up to snuff? RMTransit is here to answer that, and help you open your eyes to all of the different public transportation systems around the world!
Reece (the RM in RMTransit) is an urbanist and public transport critic residing in Toronto, Canada, with the goal of helping the world become more connected through metros, trams, buses, high-speed trains, and all other transport modes.
22 Comments
monorail:😤
JAPANESE monorail: 😁
I was wondering, what is your opinion on personal rapid transit (ex: jpods or Spartan superways)?
The best way to make sure that a monorail doesn't suck is to not allow politicians to 'help' with the design, construction, or route.
I'd be interested in how these trains can be evacuated in an emergency.
Shounan monorail is another interesting monorail in Japan. It uses overhead tracks, and is a single track line, and has a tunnel. It was made by Mitsubishi.
Yes for Olympic legacy transit. Sydney 2000. The Airport Line plus the Olympic Park Station with it’s Spanish Solution platforms.
Almost like you can do monorails if you actually do the effort and planning that any mass transit system requires…?
Isn't this a repost? I'm sure I've watched you explain the service pattern of Haneda's Monorail already.
In fairness, myself and many others do in fact enjoy going down a slide.
Oooo I do like those diagrams
reesce, i don't know who you are but you have to like slides.
Imo there is another type of monorail that, unless built somewhere without ridership, is automatically good. High speed maglev, for the simple reason that it provides a service normal trains simply cant. In addition to that the benefits of a maglev get more pronounced as speed increases (energy and noise savings) while the drawbacks are partialy shared by regular high speed rail, the more the faster it goes (expensive dedicated track, high cost, few companies make them)
Want Mumbai monorail
I never thought I'd see "gadgetbahn can be good' on this channel. Now to watch it.
Great video. Nice to see a transit Youtuber talk about monorails for more than just a cheap joke. But I really don't see the sense in the 'you have to go down a slide' argument I keep hearing. Elevated light rail (along with having bigger, uglier elevated structures that block more light), would seem to me to have the exact same problem. How do they evacuate those? And is it really less distressing to the average passenger?
It's a bit unfair to call it a gadgetbahn: There are 10+ lines in 3+ countries using Hitachi rolling stock, which to me sounds like a pretty well-developed transit system. It really just feels like 'it's different from rail so it's bad'. If the monorail episode of the Simpsons was about rubber-tired trains instead, I feel like people would be more likely to dismiss them in the same way.
In Bangkok they are building some mono rail lines.
Because of the frequent flooding subways are not really a option.
And Mono rails are less a eye sore then the skytrains.
Would have love if you have tackled the economics of this line, how much it had cost to build and how much it costs to run, to know if the technology it uses (ie, monoraill! MONORAILL!!! … and now everyone reading this has the Simpsons song in their heads) has a negative or positive impact.
To be fair about "monorail are not standard", most of urban transits are tailored to their particular needs, some on a per-line basis, and it's rare to have a standardized thing. Even railways are different between countries, and having trains capable of running on different overhead wires power supplies and signaling system is very specific and expensive (and that's why planes and trucks here in Europe wins everything when a border crossing is needed).
Anyway, Japan makes cool stuff and at this point to keep up on the world, they should build transit systems based on giant four-legged cat-shaped MechaBus.
I've ridden the Haneda monorail – it works, it's clean and efficient, it gets you to your destination. The older trains were a bit luggage-unfriendly, the newer ones are better. However there is one thing in it which sucks regally, and that is Hamamatsucho station. The fact that it connects only to JR is a bummer, because it adds one more transfer if you need to get on to the Metro. OK, Daimon station is close to Hamamatsucho, but you need to get out of the station to transfer, a bummer again. If only they would extend it to Shimbashi….
First step to building a successful monorail: Build it with the intent of transporting the "public" to major destinations and NOT just some billion dollar vanity project by "experts"
Reese – you know my all time favourite – Wuppertal.
My favorite Monorails Are the ones from Disney. Fun fact those Monorails have Horns that make a deep note
Most trains in Japan express services, at least on lines heading out of Tokyo to more suburban areas. In fact, they run MULTIPLE express services, a lot of line diagrams/schedules have like 5 parallel lines running, because there's a bunch of variants of express service.