I've been hearing about personal rapid transit for a while now, and last week I finally got a glimpse of what the highway-in-the-sky system would be like.

Personal rapid transit is a Jetsons-like network of small, lightweight, automated transit vehicles that provide on-demand, nonstop rides via an elevated guideway.

Each car, holding up to three adults or 650 pounds, allows riders to travel directly to their desired destinations without stopping at every station like traditional transit system. With an in-vehicle switch, the vehicle exits the mainline via a rail that enters the passenger's pre-chosen station.

"PRT has the potential to get commuters and other travelers out of their cars — not by asking them to make a sacrifice, but by simply giving them a public transit system that meets their needs as well as cars do," says a brochure prepared by Citizens for PRT.

Driven by electric motors, PRT has the potential to end our reliance on foreign oil, organizers say.

Taxi 2000 has built a demonstration model, a 60-foot long guideway with a prototype vehicle, at its headquarters in Fridley. The model will undergo weeks of testing before the public will be allowed to take a 45-foot trip on the line, which is 3 feet off the floor. Its system is called SkyWeb Express.

Inventor Ed Anderson said personal rapid transit will revolutionize urban transit because it provides all the benefits of car ownership and transit, but it's cheaper than heavy or light rail. Heavy or light rail equipment requires a heavy, more-expensive roadway.

An 11.3-mile, 31-station PRT system envisioned for downtown Minneapolis would cost $95 million to build and would generate enough in fares to make a profit, compared to the $675-million, 11.6-mile Hiawatha light rail line. Fares would be comparable to conventional mass transit fares.

With conventional transit, people wait for vehicles; here the vehicles wait for passengers. The computers can reroute empty vehicles so that a vehicle is always awaiting passengers.

Advanced Transit Association evaluated 14 PRT systems under development and concluded, "We have no reservations about Taxi 2000's ability to perform as advertised."

Personal rapid transit was conceptualized in the 1950s, and as you can see, researchers have had a hard time taking it from the idea and study stage to full implementation.

"When I started, I thought we'd accomplish it in a few years," said Anderson, who was a professor of mechanical engineering at the University of Minnesota when he got involved in 1968. The University of Minnesota owns key patents on PRT.

Now that he's ready to demonstrate the fruits of his labor, he said, "It's like the Wright brothers flying the first plane." Nearly two dozen Minnesota companies helped build the prototype.

The idea created a lot of buzz early on — Congress required what is now the Federal Transit Administration to study an automated system, and the Minnesota state Legislature in 1974 made a similar requirement of the Metropolitan Transit Commission.

But researchers came up against rail forces and traditional transportation allies, who convinced decision-makers it wasn't viable. "People would say PRT is not proven. It's just an idea," Anderson said.

Things haven't changed much over the years. I was looking for inspiration when I showed some colleagues architectural renderings and asked what they thought PRT looked like.

"It looks like a massive waste of taxpayers' money," one colleague said. Others just laughed.

Jeral Poskey, director of business development for Taxi 2000, said he wasn't surprised. He runs into skeptics all the time, even some within the transportation field. "This is a big change and it's hard to visualize," he said, which is why he gets people to imagine PRT on a small scale, starting out at an airport. That's doable, right? Now, imagine the airport's system expanding out.

Even skeptics in the transportation field concede that once a system is up and running, it would take off, Poskey said.

PRT has its fans at the Legislature — Anderson has talked with some about bonding for a demonstration — and even Gov. Tim Pawlenty has talked about it as an alternative.

PRT has come close to implementation — it was planned for Rosemont, Ill., a Chicago suburb, but was called off. Three years ago, Anderson set out to build a prototype himself. It gained steamed when the late A. Scheffer Lang, a nationally known transportation engineer and researcher, lent his prestige and expertise to PRT in the late 1990s. They raised $680,000 to build the prototype.

Anderson is hoping to raise enough money to build a test track. "Beyond the test track, the applications are endless," Anderson said. "This is a major turning point in urban transportation. It's been held back like a pressure cooker."

For more information, log on to www.taxi2000.com.