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Gadgetbahn is a neologism that refers to a public transport concept or implementation that is touted by its developers and supporters as futuristic or innovative, but in practice is less feasible or reliable, and more expensive than traditional modes such as buses, trams and trains. It is a blend word of the English word "gadget" and the German word Bahn, meaning "railway".
The problems about cost effectiveness and reliability can be researched with system that were actually built. The Heathrow Ultra pods report that the elevated guideway did cost £30 million for 3.8 kilometres instead of the projected £3 million per kilometre. The study on the Detroit People Mover shows that cost per passenger mile exceeded $3 while Detroit's busses operate at $0.82. Problems with the reliability can not only occur as extended teething problems but also with the limited supply of maintanance parts for the specialized vehicles. Studies on the Mumbai Monorail problems led to abandon all other monorail projects in India.
When proposing an evelated guideway system to avoid the cost of an underground deployment, systems get easily called gadgetbahn when an elevated railway on standard gauge tracks and light rail tram vehicles would have been feasible as well. Comparing the mentioned Mumbai Monorail with the elevated Mumbai Metro shows that construction is not much different as both use pillars in the central median of main roads to ease development in an existing urban environment.
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