High speed rail is a beautiful thing — it’s low emissions, efficient, social, comfortable, and, of course, fast. It has my vote (hands down) for the most viable sustainable transportation solution for the increasingly oil-strained future.But we don’t seem to care much for trains here in the United States (aside from the East Coast corridor, at least). No, rail too often turns into a political issue — which is why governors in states like Florida and Wisconsin have rejected funding for high speed rail projects.But what if we just considered for a second what a lovely prospect a rail corridor that spanned the entire nation would be — both symbolically and practically? It might look something like this, if we managed to get politics out of the way long enough:That’s a commercial for a brand-new rail line in Japan (it debuted the day before the quake struck) that runs from the very top to the very bottom of the nation. A call was put out to Japanese citizens to come down to the track on its inaugural run — and as many as 15,000 people did just that, turning out to celebrate the event. Again — it’s a beautiful thing.
To paraphrase Jess Zimmerman, who points us to the story over at Grist, I longingly look to the day that such a show of unity and enthusiasm for such a modern and pragmatic transit solution might grace American shores … but I’m not holding my breath.Follow the Utopianist on Twitter and Facebook.