Problem 3: The route

When you're attempting to cart a heavy, lengthy monorail beam across the country strapped onto three rail cars, it would be nice to have a reasonably straight route to work with. Of course, such as route didn't exist between Washington and Florida.

To navigate the winding circuit, the flat-bed rail cars were fitted with swiveling pivots at each end to enable them to negotiate curves.

Problem 4: The accidents

The clever use of pivots ensured that most of the monorail beams arrived safely in Florida. Most of them.

Two trains derailed, landing in ditches. Not surprisingly, the freight bill alone was enormous - some $980,000, more than $6 million in today's money.

Problem 5: The swamp

As well as getting the beams to Central Florida, Disney also had to contend with a major issue that would affect almost every project at Walt Disney World - the soggy ground. The resort was located on a sprawling, 25,000-plus-acre patch of swampland. Despite the construction of more than 50 miles of canals to control water levels, things were still a little damp.

To compensate for the lack of support from the ground itself for the super-heavy monorail beams, the columns that support the circuit were reinforced. The tapered concrete columns were placed approximately 110 feet apart, with sets of six being post-tensioned together to create a single, 600-foot-long structure.

A lasting success

Despite the difficulties building it, the Walt Disney World Monorail has proven itself to be a popular and genuinely useful element of the resort. It is now one of the world's leading monorail systems, carrying more than 150,000 passengers per day across a combined total of 14.7 miles of beams.