PRT – Personal Rapid Transit

Ah, the PRT ;) Apparently it is pretty famous in the circles of public transportation nerds. A while back, a friend who works for the Department of Transportation asked where I had gone to college, and when I said WVU, you should have how wide his eyes got. The first thing out of his mouth, with much awe and reverence I might add, was, «You’ve ridden on the PRT?»
«Ridden it, my friend, I practically lived on that thing» Yup, it is open to the public now, and I’d have to say one of the more unique things you can do while your in Morgantown.

I loved the PRT! It was confusing at first — we couldn’t figure out if we were supposed to pay… but once we were on, I literally felt like I was @ Disneyland :)

I am a transit nerd. I spend an inordinate amount of time reading, thinking, talking, and dreaming about transit in all parts of the world.
So I was a bit disappointed when I showed up in Morgantown, currently home of the world’s only operational PRT system (read up more on this here if interested:
), to discover that the system was closed for the day (
).
PRT is unique: people ride in «personal» transport pods, usually containing 4 seats, on special guideways which take them around a town, an airport, a hospital, or whatever the point of interest is around which it’s constructed. My understanding is that you stop where you need to stop, and bypass where you don’t need to stop. I was looking forward to seeing the sights of Morgantown from my comfortable Jetsons-​esque pod at the bargain fare of 75 cents. But I showed up on the wrong day, I guess. A Sunday in summer in a predominantly college-​oriented town is not the right time to expect things to be open. Even the local transit system, apparently. I definitely agree with the first reviewer here in saying that an expansion should be considered to make it more attractive to the whole town, not just the university crowd.
Since I didn’t get to ride, my review is based mostly on the aesthetics of this operation, and not on its functionality. The station I visited kind of reminded me of the ugliest of aerial BART stations here in the bay… the ones built in the early 70s which show a relish for extensive concrete use, and metals that are rusting and dripping their oxidization onto the dreary gray support structures below (
). No coincidence that the station was completed in 1972, the same year BART opened. That was certainly an era of short-​sighted urban planning. So it’s not a pretty system. But I can’t judge too harshly if it gets the job done of transporting the local populace. And it gets extra points for doing it in a novel way.
I don’t ever plan on returning to Morgantown, but hopefully, if I do, I’ll get to ride this landmark transit system.

The PRT system is truly unlike any other I have seen. The closest resemblance I have for it is that of an airport tram, taking you from terminal to terminal. It starts off on Pleasant street and has several stops along the way going up to the Evansdale campus. It was originally put into place for students, but is open to the public. The wait for the cars is usually pretty short, and there are covered places to stand to keep you out of the weather. Even if you don’t need it for transportation’s sake, it’s a neat thing to do during the fall. Take a trip from one end to the other to see some amazing views of gorgeous Morgantown. The only reason for 4 stars instead of 5, is I would like to see Morgantown get more involved with the PRT system (currently run by the university) and expand it across the river into Westover, and even down to the new University Town Center. There is no reason why this couldn’t be a mass transportation unit as opposed to just for those who live in town and on campus.