China leading the way in high-speed rail; Virginia Tech ID students present concepts to US Transportation Association
Posted in: UncategorizedIt looks like the future of high-speed rail lies in China, which has both the geographical footprint to warrant it and the political will to embrace it. According to an article in The Economist, in the massive track-laying project China is currently undertaking, they’ll have 8,000 miles of high-speed track ready by 2012–three years ahead of schedule.
I love high-speed rail, but have cynically given up on the U.S. ever embracing it.
Two men that have not given up on it are Ron Kemnitzer and Bill Green, ID chair and ID associate prof, respectively, at Virginia Tech’s School of Architecture & Design, College of Architecture and Urban Studies. Kemnitzer and Green tasked four senior ID lab teams to come up with designs for high-speed passenger trains, in hopes of boosting U.S. interest; they presented their designs to the American Public Transportation Association’s annual meeting.
Click here for the PDF of the presentation, or click here to see web-based descriptions and images of the concepts.
Post a Comment