Governor Abbott’s first visit to College Station in about a year was to be part of the unveiling of completing a new project by the Texas A&M Transportation Institute.
What is called a freight shuttle system can load and unload shipping containers and semi-trailers powered by electric motors at one-third the energy required by diesel trucks.
The A&M system and private investors hold 17 patents on the vehicle.
The Port of Houston announced it will do a feasibility study to deploy the freight shuttle system.
Click below for comments from speakers preceding a test run of the freight shuttle system:
From the Texas A&M Transportation Institute:
Texas Governor Greg Abbott on Friday helped unveil a new mode of transportation and applauded the partnership of university research and industry investment that made it possible.
Abbott was joined by Texas A&M University System Chancellor John Sharp in rolling out the autonomous Freight Shuttle System (FSS), which operates on its own guideway using single, remotely controlled transporters carrying truck trailers or shipping containers, powered by linear-induction electric motors. It’s the product of “exemplary collaboration,” the Governor noted.
“For more than a decade, Texas has been the number-one exporting state in America, and freight movement is vitally important to our state’s economy,” Abbott said. “As the product of innovative research at the Texas A&M Transportation Institute, the Freight Shuttle System will help ensure that we are able to meet our growing demand for efficient freight movement in Texas and ensure our long-term prosperity.”
Sharp emphasized the A&M System’s commitment to public-private ventures.
“Our System universities are places where brilliant ideas emerge as visions, and our private investment markets are places where those visions can be transformed into commercial reality,” Sharp said. “Freight Shuttle International and the Texas A&M Transportation Institute are showing us today how such partnerships can transform our state’s future.”
The first commercial example of that transformation, officials said on Friday, could be underway soon at the Port of Houston Authority (PHA), where increased container traffic has grown even greater since the expansion of the Panama Canal. PHA Executive Director Roger Guenther said that PHA officials and officials of Freight Shuttle International, LLC (FSI) have agreed in a recently signed Memorandum of Understanding to work together to evaluate options over the next few months for deployment of the FSS at the port. PHA and FSI will announce more details of the agreement on Monday.
“The FSS is the result of more than a decade of research at TTI,” said TTI Agency Director Dennis Christiansen. “The technology has produced 17 patents held jointly by the A&M System and FSI.”
Researchers say the FSS borrows the best characteristics from both truck and rail transport, and uses only about one-third the energy required by diesel trucks. Additional benefits of the FSS
include:
Zero point-of-service emissions – dramatically less pollution than from trucks.
Reduced roadway congestion.
Reduced potential for truck-related highway crashes.
Improved delivery time reliability.
Reduced infrastructure damage.
The FSS is being introduced at a time when the freight industry faces mounting challenges – strained rail and roadway system capacity, environmental concerns, and a chronic shortage of truck drivers, to name only a few.
“The industry cannot thrive without augmenting our existing transportation system and fundamentally changing how we approach freight movement,” FSS Inventor and FSI Founder/Chairman Steve Roop says. “The Freight Shuttle System is designed to blend into today’s intermodal network, integrating proven technologies with novel patented designs into a new mode of transportation.”
From Governor Abbott’s office:
Governor Greg Abbott today attended the launch of the Texas A&M Transportation Institute’s Freight Shuttle System (FSS). The FSS allows cargo to travel on elevated platforms at sea ports, border crossings and other heavily congested areas in order to expand shipping capacity, expedite trade and reduce congestion on highways. Additionally, the FSS will enhance road safety, improve efficiency and significantly lower emissions and pollution. Governor Abbott was joined by Texas A&M University System Chancellor John Sharp and Port of Houston Authority Executive Director Roger Guenther for the announcement.
“As we march forward into the heart of this century, Texas is fast becoming known as the home of innovation, and Texas A&M is demonstrating the central role that universities play in advancing that innovation,” said Governor Abbott. “The Freight Shuttle System is another way that Texas is using emerging technologies to meet the increasing demands of the 21st century economy. I’m proud to join with Texas A&M as it once again reveals more than what we are today – it reveals what we can achieve tomorrow.”
Freight Shuttle System Facts:
• At full capacity, can transport more than 300,000 tons of goods each day in each direction
• A single guideway can transport over 8,600 shipments each day
• Will use one-third of the energy used by heavy-duty diesel trucks at one-sixth of the cost
• Can move truck trailers and domestic intermodal containers up to 53 feet in size
• Transports shipments on elevated guideways for distances up to 500 miles
