Slidewalks were originally proposed as transportation systems in the 1930s, but were superseded at the time by automobiles and the Interstate Highway system. Their degenerate descendants are the “people movers” one sees in many airports, which are basically just flat escalators, with all the maintenance issues that entails.
A slidewalk system allows for the movement of people and light cargo at highway speeds without requiring two-ton vehicles to carry them, and thus is vastly more energy efficient than current systems. They work by using large numbers of parallel axes with small interleaved rollers on them, controlled by a computerized network of sensors including pressure switches so that only the rollers directly underneath orA slidewalk system has several “lanes”, with acceleration/deceleration strips between them. The outermost lane runs at 4mph, and can be boarded anywhere along the line, with no need for transit stops. If you’re going more than a very short distance, you can move across to the acceleration strip, on which each successive roller rotates slightly faster than the one before it, until you are moving at the 20mph of the intermediate lane and can step across onto it. And the same process repeats onto the 60mph express lane, for longer trips. The express lane also has seats available. in immediate proximity to a passenger are actually under power. Unlike the escalators mentioned above, they are a modular system, such that if something malfunctions that small section of roadway can be removed and replaced, and taken back to the shop for repair.
A slidewalk system has several “lanes”, with acceleration/deceleration strips between them. The outermost lane runs at 4mph, and can be boarded anywhere along the line, with no need for transit stops. If you’re going more than a very short distance, you can move across to the acceleration strip, on which each successive roller rotates slightly faster than the one before it, until you are moving at the 20mph of the intermediate lane and can step across onto it. And the same process repeats onto the 60mph express lane, for longer trips. The express lane also has seats available.
Safety is assured because everything around the passenger is moving at the same speed as the passenger. Blowers are provided to move the air around the passenger at their speed also, to prevent them from having to face a 60mph gale for their entire trip.
The planned slidewalk network would include lines along the current locations of I-5, I-84, I-405, and State highway 26, with an additional tic-tac-toe grid downtown on Burnside St., Jefferson St., 3rd Ave., and 10th Ave.