Tuesday, May 22, 2007

The new city-spacewagon for delegates

Yesterday, I spotted a message that's trivial at first sight, but is a really important development for the international convention world, in my opinion. Lately, I 've been confronted a lot with endless traffic jams in convention cities worldwide. Sometimes I was stuck in traffic in a city centre for a whole hour, sometimes even longer. How do congress delegates get to their meeting place on time, I thought. It's a big problem and it seems like everyone is afraid to talk about it. It's a big problem where many delegates are confronted with and no solution is in sight. But is there a solution to it? Maybe! At this very moment UITP (The International Association of Public Transport) is holding its 57th Congress and Exhibition in the fair centre of Helsinki. A study group is going into the future of the bus: a kind of high-speed train or space wagon in the city, a fast, comfortable vehicle that's environment-friendly and transports people super-fast from point A to B.

I can imagine that a lot of convention bureaus are dreaming of that kind of 'New Future (Congress) Bus', or 'f t r' (short for future), as this concept by UK's FirstGroup is called. It breaks away from the traditional categories of transport planning - the train, the tram, the bus, the car. Car users in cities therefore have to make the switch! It is anticipated that First in York will be running the 'ftr' on Service 4 next year! I would be the first to use this new StreetCar when I'm attending a congress there. And I would like to ask the study group 'Bus system of the future' of UITP what they came up with. To be continued!

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

This really IS the future. Still looks a little bit science fiction but I'm looking forward to this new era of transport.