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Monorails of North America
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Newark International Airport,
New Jersey
If Tokyo-Haneda is the prime good example for monorail, unfortunately Newark's monorail is probably the opposite. It started out as Von Roll's most extensive system to date. During construction, Von Roll sold its monorail technology to Adtranz. Adtranz came in and "didn't like what they saw." Major modifications were made including the design of completely new switches. The end result was a system that cost more to build than was charged. Within a few years, Adtranz built a 1.6 km extension of the airport monorail to a new Amtrak station on the heavily traveled Northeast Corridor. The monorail now carries passengers between parking lots, rental car facilities, three terminal stations and the rail station on the Northeast Corridor. Adtranz has since been acquired by Bombardier, and no Von Roll-based technology monorail has been built since, yet the Newark International Airport Monorail has become a hit for those wishing a rail connected flight to or from the area. An average 23,000 on-airport passengers ride the monorail each day, and an additional 10,000 use the monorail for connections to and from the nearby rail station. |
