Talk:SkyTran

I am annoyed that a number of people's contributions to the SkyTran and then Unimodal pages seem to have been deleted without a trace -- SkyTran gave only a cryptic delete notice that didn't link to any details, and Unimodal (where SkyTran had been moved) now only links to the alternate disambiguation of unimodal function. I believe strongly that SkyTran is one of the most positive technical developments in today's world -- not only is it 200 MPG, but it solves the problem of urban transportation congestion (and thus encourages planet-friendly dense cities) better than any other I am aware of. Global warming and all the misery caused already fighting over increasingly-scarce oil make these attributes we cannot dismiss lightly.

SkyTran is also not a frivolous or amateur affair. Its inventor Douglas Malewicki is very well qualified to design highly efficient small vehicles: he has a Aeronautical Engineering MS from Stanford; his previous inventions include human-powered vehicles , two Guinness world records for fuel-efficient "California Commuter" cars (ca. 155 MPG gas and diesel), light aircraft for Cessna, and many more. See his [board member bio at CarbonAngel for these and many more examples. Doug applied for his first patent on SkyTran 18 years ago; he has spent almost two decades fighting to get it accepted; the world does not have a surplus of such people and achievements.

Finally, what are the transportation design qualifications of the people arbitrarily deleting this material? It's true that his original, detail-packed web page has been temporarily password-protected (probably for commercial reasons), but his company Unimodal's is still up and gives the basics. I have put a number of external references into this version; so no one can say it is unverifiable. A quick Google will provide many more examples -- this invention is real, and it's finally getting traction. Please respect a brilliant inventor and a tremendously promising system; add to this article whatever positive or negative points you can document, but please don't delete it again. (A technical point: SkyTran is the invention; Unimodal is the company; each should have a page -- combining them makes as much sense as moving all the MS Windows pages to a Microsoft article.) --Howie Goodell (talk) 06:56, 26 April 2008 (UTC)

It's been more than a decade since SkyTran was announced to the world, but as of today (April 27, 2008), there is no demo system.

No money? Ask Paul Allen for it. He personally funded the winning entry for the X-Prize. I'll bet he'd be willing to help here as well.

JUST DO SOMETHING!