Transport systems

We always notice the extremes, the exceptional, and this is the case in relation to transport. It is the fastest car, the highest flying plane or biggest ship that attracts the headlines and our attention. But in mass industrial society it is increasingly the case that standardisation of design and regularisation of the operation of autonomous units, and not individual performance, determines overall socio-economic development. The functional but ugly model T Ford rather than the elegant e-type jaguar most influenced the development of automobiles, the Boeing 747 and not the Concorde that of mass flight. Despite an apparent slow down in developing supersonic transports or alternative fuel cars, these things will eventually appear if enough resources are dedicated to them. But they will not be the main change in relation to transportation in the 21st century. The main change will be how new information and communication technologies are utilised to systematise the movement of increasingly numbers of increasingly mobile transport units.