k5jm
When Yuba plays the Rumba on his Tuba...
- Joined
- Dec 3, 2007
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- 6,257
Flying back from WDW Monday and I was able to complete my trip on a Disney Ride 800 miles from WDW.
Houston Airport System
Advarion Incorporated - NJN
There are eight trains, with three cars each, still rolling on two miles of track, deep underneath the passenger terminals of George Bush Intercontinental Airport, (IAH).
Back in 1981, Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck and the Mayor of Houston were all there when a company run by the Walt Disney group drove their pioneering new train onto the tracks at Bush Airport for the first time. At that time, it was a $14.5 million dollar system, running on impressive state-of-the-art technology.
Frank Gates remembers the project from the beginning when he was working for Walt Disney Productions and he laughs a bit as he re-tells the story about how it all started. Gates says a Disney executive who kept flying through Houston got annoyed because the airport train system then was constantly breaking down.
“The guy told the director of the Houston Airport System at the time that he would build a train system free of charge and guarantee it would run properly 99 percent of the time,”says Gates. “Then he told them if it doesn’t run like that, you don’t have to pay a penny for the system.”
Gates, who is now the support manager for both the above and below ground train systems operating at Bush, says back then the airport system couldn’t take the deal, but a project was quickly developed and put up for bid. In about two months Disney won the bid. That’s when Disney formed the WEDway Transportation Company, which stood for Walter Elias Disney’s way of transportation, according to Gates.
“I think everybody felt like they got a good deal,” he says, “nobody was balking that it was going to be a Mickey Mouse train.”
The train project incorporated some unique technology such as linear inductive motors, a passive system, said to be extremely durable, loaded with horsepower but more cost effective than the more traditional rotary motors. The train system also used the extruded pipe process, where heavy gage pipe was molded and forged to form the track.
According to Gates, who says engineers on the project were called, “imagineers,” back then, the idea behind using the extruded pipe process was that “they wanted a strong material that would endure a million miles of traffic.”
Disney got out of the business back in 1984 and sold the patents of its monorail and other people moving systems to Bombardier, who went on to build or install virtually the same underground system in Washington D.C., connecting the U.S. Capitol building with the Dirksen and Hart Senate buildings.
Bombardier also built a monorail system in Las Vegas and the above ground train system at IAH.
Advarion Incorporated - NJN
There are eight trains, with three cars each, still rolling on two miles of track, deep underneath the passenger terminals of George Bush Intercontinental Airport, (IAH).
Back in 1981, Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck and the Mayor of Houston were all there when a company run by the Walt Disney group drove their pioneering new train onto the tracks at Bush Airport for the first time. At that time, it was a $14.5 million dollar system, running on impressive state-of-the-art technology.
Frank Gates remembers the project from the beginning when he was working for Walt Disney Productions and he laughs a bit as he re-tells the story about how it all started. Gates says a Disney executive who kept flying through Houston got annoyed because the airport train system then was constantly breaking down.
“The guy told the director of the Houston Airport System at the time that he would build a train system free of charge and guarantee it would run properly 99 percent of the time,”says Gates. “Then he told them if it doesn’t run like that, you don’t have to pay a penny for the system.”
Gates, who is now the support manager for both the above and below ground train systems operating at Bush, says back then the airport system couldn’t take the deal, but a project was quickly developed and put up for bid. In about two months Disney won the bid. That’s when Disney formed the WEDway Transportation Company, which stood for Walter Elias Disney’s way of transportation, according to Gates.
“I think everybody felt like they got a good deal,” he says, “nobody was balking that it was going to be a Mickey Mouse train.”
The train project incorporated some unique technology such as linear inductive motors, a passive system, said to be extremely durable, loaded with horsepower but more cost effective than the more traditional rotary motors. The train system also used the extruded pipe process, where heavy gage pipe was molded and forged to form the track.
According to Gates, who says engineers on the project were called, “imagineers,” back then, the idea behind using the extruded pipe process was that “they wanted a strong material that would endure a million miles of traffic.”
Disney got out of the business back in 1984 and sold the patents of its monorail and other people moving systems to Bombardier, who went on to build or install virtually the same underground system in Washington D.C., connecting the U.S. Capitol building with the Dirksen and Hart Senate buildings.
Bombardier also built a monorail system in Las Vegas and the above ground train system at IAH.
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