High Speed Fail

There’s a great debate happening at the moment on the infrastructure circuit. Champions of high-speed rail (standing atop hollowed-out cabooses while hollering into train whistles) want to accelerate into a track-heavy future. As is often the case, the experts are going about it all wrong. They are caught up in the romance – wondering why planes never got the same troubadour treatment by artists of the day (excluding of course Steve Miller’s obvious aerial obsession). Lonesome whistles are one thing, while propellers and turbines are obnoxious symbols of the new age. Trains evoke a simpler time, of soot and soot-covered balladeering hobos, committed to a lack of hygiene rendering them incapable of touching a piece of sheet music without leaving streaks of grime.

All of this is to say that in 2021 we should not be focused on speeding up our trains. On the contrary, we should adopt a more reasonable goal. Like slowing down our planes. I’m not suggesting that cross-country trips should be accomplished via wagon train and a few dozen oxen. Nor am I arguing that a trip to LAX is incomplete without a cannibalization flirtation somewhere northwest of Lake Tahoe. But what’s wrong with the trip taking a little longer? 

 

We’re greedy, shamelessly greedy. It wasn’t too long ago when the buzzing sounds of a dial-up modem signaled cyber velocity. Now, it’s a tortoise-like reminder of how spoiled we’ve become when a webpage fails to load in a split second. But why can’t we adjust to a different, more leisurely pace?

We can. And if I have anything to say, we will. Let’s set a federally enforced speed limit, standardizing national travel so that no mode of travel is any faster than the next. That goes for bikes, trikes, and yikes (unicycles). This way, however you get around comes down to taste, rather than efficiency. If it’s too difficult to fly planes dramatically slower, fine – they have wheels, don’t they? Steer those jumbo jets out on the highway and bus it out to your destination. Just because something can fly doesn’t mean it must. Penguins come to mind, though I don’t think they can actually fly. But try telling that to their flapping friends. Like a fish who doesn’t swim, they’ve made quite the comfortable life for themselves. And, as a matter of record, they can swim – quite well, in fact.

In a perfect world, running would be outlawed, since walking is a viable and safe alternative. With a little time and lots of lobbying from Washington, perhaps we’ll get there. But for now, we must take our victories wherever they come. Having trains and planes that top out around 25 MPH is one such win.