Time for Old Technology

In a commentary in today's Financial Times, Guillaume Pepy, CEO of SNCF, the French railways, says, "What is at stake here is the sustainable development of Europe." He is referring to the need for continued progress toward the creation of a unified, high-speed passenger rail network across the continent. Here in the US, we are decades behind but the challenge is similar. Unfortunately, we seem committed to the unsustainable combination of individual transportation and suburban sprawl. Techno-fixes like hybrid- or hydrogen-powered cars are not the answer. We need to return to the proven technologies of the late 19th and early 20th centuries when widespread, efficient light rail (interurban) and heavy (commuter) rail systems were built in most American cities and surrounding regions. See Fred Jandt's blog in Mass Transit magazine for a good discussion of how President Bush misses the point (no surprise there) about the importance of sustaining and expanding existing mass transit systems.

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