Leeds 'H-Bahn'?

[Kenton Schweppes]

Where as we know Leeds lags behind other big cities close by, Manchester and Sheffield, in terms of a 'rapid transit system' and the 'trolley bus' idea is in the pipeline, but what about a 'H-Bahn' type system?

A Leeds professor has mooted the idea of the 'H-Bahn' for Leeds citing it to be more cost effective than the 'trolley bus' project and other various benefits over trams and the trolley bus.

It would be a great way of linking areas of 'high traffic' together with the city centre, places like Elland Road, The White Rose Centre, Leeds/Bradford Airport. The more I think about it, the more it's growing on me. It would be the first of it's kind in Britain although Germany has a couple of these systems, Dortmund has one as does Wuppertal, in fact Wuppertal have had theirs for over 100 years.

docs.google.com/file/d/0B8aHDmtcwr3-aXgta0ZhU09MeW8/edit?pli=1

www.facebook.com/pages/The-Leeds-H-Train/685896068110034

[davopazza]

Aug 3, 2014 10:44:11 GMT 1 Kenton Schweppes said:

Where as we know Leeds lags behind other big cities close by, Manchester and Sheffield, in terms of a 'rapid transit system' and the 'trolley bus' idea is in the pipeline, but what about a 'H-Bahn' type system?

A Leeds professor has mooted the idea of the 'H-Bahn' for Leeds citing it to be more cost effective than the 'trolley bus' project and other various benefits over trams and the trolley bus.

It would be a great way of linking areas of 'high traffic' together with the city centre, places like Elland Road, The White Rose Centre, Leeds/Bradford Airport. The more I think about it, the more it's growing on me. It would be the first of it's kind in Britain although Germany has a couple of these systems, Dortmund has one as does Wuppertal, in fact Wuppertal have had theirs for over 100 years.

docs.google.com/file/d/0B8aHDmtcwr3-aXgta0ZhU09MeW8/edit?pli=1

www.facebook.com/pages/The-Leeds-H-Train/685896068110034

I like the look of that and having a brief read of the paper is quite interesting. I did question about platforms in which The author does answer. One idea I came up with, they could create a station in headingley on the first floor of the arndale centre potentially as it was mentioned in the paper about second floor stations.

[jdodger08]

After a brief read of the paper I could see this working for Leeds, a less intrusive system would work for everyone I think. And what a spectacle it would be to see these flying down Briggate

[Bradford Traveller]

not read the article but have been on the "hanging railway" of Wuppertal.
Apart from a small stretch near the no. 603 trolleybus terminus (LOL) it runs above the river, thus saving land use, so an equivalent here would be above the Aire.

[Kenton Schweppes]

It need not necessarily be 'high' in the sky either. If you google 'H-Bahn' some of the images show it operating just above ground level.

I do think it would need to have more capacity than the two carriages the German system operates with as well but on the whole it does seem a plausible answer to Leeds' problem. I don't think Metro will abandon the trolley bus plan now though.

I do wonder if this has been put to Metro for them to look at. I know which system I'd rather have, trolley bus or H-Bahn....H-Bahn everyday.