Baby Bullets
Sometime last year the local San Francisco Bay Area press enthusiastically reported the start of the new "Baby Bullet" commuter trains on the Peninsula between San Francisco and points south several times a day. These technological marvels are capable of "speeds up to 79MPH"! Phew, Wot A Scorcher!!!OK, a (slow) step in the right direction, but if these trains are the answer, what's the question? How to keep stumbling blindy towards a transport solution that is neither intensive nor extensive, that consists of little warring fiefdoms that resolutely refuse to cooperate, and that doesn't work for the vast majority of Bay Area residents?
To get from where I live to where I work by public transport (a distance of about 40 miles as the crow flies), in this most public transport-conscious part of America (2nd only to NYC, I suspect), I'd have to change transport modes at least five times -- and none of the six or so organisations involved honours the others' tickets or coordinates their schedules.
In fact, in this miraculous age of Baby Bullets and BART, it would take me more than 3 hours in each direction to do the trip by public transport (I've tried it -- the first time, I didn't even get halfway before I had to give up after four hours), and about $15 in tickets. It takes as little as 45 minutes by car, rarely more than 70 minutes.
(Part of California).
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