In this universe, human knowledge of FTL travel far surpasses their knowledge of terraforming. This is the only known exoplanet that has the potential of becoming a second earth. There are small settlements housed in domes on other planets/moons, but they're used only for research and mining. The terrain varies across the planet, but all the settlements are located in the mountains.
What's the nature of your public transit system? The problem with public transit in smaller communities tends to be population density - in order for our current models of public transit to be cost effective, you need to have a fair number of people travelling to more-or-less the same place at more-or-less the same time. Is your future system going to have similar limitations? Without the masses of people travelling together, public transit wouldn't likely be much more efficient than private transit. Maybe your guys could ride bikes or other environmentally friendly but still independent transit options? Or modified Segway-type vehicles- they could ride them onto mass transit for the main portion of their travels, then zip off independently at either end of the route?
This may have been answered already: but what is the main motivation behind using public transportation? Is it important to the story for the transportation to be public, or would it be for environmental or economic reasons?
For public transport, I was thinking about a solar-powered cableway system. Solar power has become efficient enough to allow anyone to use as much electricity as they want. Private transport could use a bipedal segway or horse-like robots that allow people to traverse rough terrain. Cars have been obsolete for over a century due to the vertical nature of earth's cities. Also, parking takes up too much space.
For solar power, I'm not sure whether solar power would be sufficient to power a cable car. One problem is the atmosphere. The atmosphere of a terrestrial planet absorbs and distorts a great deal of light, which decreases the output that can be achieved from a solar panel on the planet's surface. Generally speaking, if you need enough power to run a motor, you need a power source that turns a motor to generate its power. The common link between how coal, nuclear, hydraulic, geothermal, and even wind power plants all work is that the power is generated by spinning something, either through steam from burning fuel (radioactive elements, coal), or natural forces (steam, water, wind).
Modern solar panels are only capable of utilizing a tenth of the power collected from sunlight. Advances in solar technology could potentially make this efficient enough to work.
It may be a moot point. I've done some quick research and it seems common for these cars to be powered externally. A traditional cableay car doesn't have any power at all, but instead is moved by the motors on either side. Subway cars are powered by a rail rather than an engine in the car itself. The cars could probably be powered by the main power grid, or just use solar power for the lighting only (which definitely would be feasible, even with current technology).
I meant that engine that runs the cables could be powered by solar energy. Good point about the internal lighting of the cable cars being individually powered.
Hi Jannert, Actually flying comes with (air) roads. There are many airports that don't have control towers. And many planes that don't have radars. They operate safely because there are specific road (air) rules that all pilots must obey. They dictate approach heights and the directions in which you circle an airport as you prepare to land and take off etc. This would be no different. And in fact it would be safer since computers are perfect at following rules and if every flying car has a computer, you can't cross one another's flight paths. Cheers, Greg.
I would imagine buildings would be closer together and there would be a lack of roads. The buses and transit systems would either be underground at key points or in key points where they are accessible from a large area. Just my view.
