West Palm Beach could become the next testing ground for driverless transit. Glydways, a California company that builds autonomous-vehicle transit networks, has pitched Palm Beach County on a system of self-driving cars running along a dedicated, partly elevated roadway between Palm Beach International Airport and downtown, a roughly four- to five-mile link the company says could be operational within five years.
County commissioners are expected to take up the idea on July 7, when they will decide whether to direct county administrators to explore the project further. Glydways submitted an unsolicited proposal in May for what it calls an "airport connector," pitching it as a direct, on-demand connection between the airport, which is set to be renamed Donald J. Trump International Airport, and downtown West Palm Beach.
The concept works less like a train than a private car service on its own track. Rather than making scheduled stops, each vehicle would carry passengers directly to their chosen station, using dedicated pathways to move over or around regular traffic. A company document outlines a route running north from the airport along either Australian or Congress Avenue, with stations proposed at the convention center, CityPlace, the Brightline station, the county courthouse, the NORA District, and the city's Historic Northwest neighborhood.
Brian Gettinger, Glydways' senior vice president for growth in the Americas, said the dedicated paths are far cheaper to build than rail, making them more practical as public infrastructure, and noted that the short distance between a downtown and an airport that sit just a few miles apart makes elevated roadways more feasible here than in many comparable cities.
Because the service would charge fares, Gettinger said, local governments could potentially partner with private investors to build it and reduce the public cost.
West Palm Beach would not be the company's first airport project. Glydways is building a half-mile network in southwest Atlanta connecting the airport's people-mover to a convention center and sports arena, a pilot for a larger planned system, and is developing a network linking the airport to downtown in San Jose, California.