UK: UrbanMass has announced plans for a demonstration installation of its Floc concept for driverless electric pods which would use existing roads to collect passengers on-demand, and then ‘flock’ together as trains on dedicated elevated tracks.
A demonstration system is planned to open at the National Railway Museum’s Locomotion site in Shildon in 2025. UrbanMass envisages developing 10 networks worldwide by 2030, starting with the Ugandan capital Kampala and also targeting UK cities including Bristol, Liverpool, Cambridge, Oxford and Cardiff.
Its proprietary Duo Rail track technology is designed to be faster to construct and have a much smaller physical footprint than conventional metro, light rail and tram projects, with the company claiming it would have 50% of the cost of a conventional urban rail corridor and could be deployed in half the time.
An ability to use roads as well as the dedicated tracks would enable Floc to provide high peak capacities of up to 16 000 passengers/direction/h on busy routes, as well as economically viable services on less dense corridors or during off-peak times.
The Shildon installation would include crossings of a road bridge, an existing railway line and a public walkway, and have three stations at ground level, above-ground and at the point where pods to transfer between the street level and elevated tracks.
UrbanMass has signed partnership agreements with Grimshaw architects and WSP, and says it has received interest from investors for its Series A-capital raise.
