PRT stands for Personal Rapid Transit. It is a type of transportation system that aims to improve mobility in our cities.
A short description would be: "a system comprised of small electric vehicles running completely automated on elevated guideways. They provide taxi service , non stop from origin to destination without any transfers".
You can find more information on PRT on the internet. Pr. Jerry Schneider’s website at http://faculty.washington.edu/~jbs/itrans/prtquick.htm has a nice introduction.
The article on PRT at Wikipedia is also a good introduction.
Hermes is a concept of a PRT transportation system.
Hermes simulator is a program that presents the service that a Hermes system , or another PRT system closely resembling Hermes, can provide to a given area. Simulator's ultimate goal is to provide another argument for PRT systems as a solution to the mobility problems our cities face.
The main purpose of Hermes Simulator is to simulate its CONTROL LOGIC, i.e. the performance if its synchronous central controller and other control strategies such as empty vehicle management, station operations, storage depot placing e.t.c.
On the other hand it does not provide great detail on the PHYSICAL CHARACTERISTICS of the network, i.e. guideway width, curvature and slope, vehicle size or actual speed (in simulator speed is steady for all guideway segments something which is NOT required for the real system).
Since all PRT systems are not the same , here are the basic features of Hermes:
VEHICLE :
GENERAL SYSTEM :