Deep Thinking is really needed now

So often the stupidity of one system reaches a point that it collapses and while everyone jumps that way there is very little thought given to what the new thing aught to be. Some things like the Computer or the Internet could hardly have been imagined, but others like cars or public transportation had patterns set hundreds of years ago. (there are many others like Education, Government,Business/trade.. a very long list but I want to look at private/public transportation at the moment). We have built a civilization on sand, and the foundations need rebuilding if it will survive.

The Automobile culture, built of cheap oil, narrow goals of next quarter profits, with designs sold as sexual adequacy rather than transportation cannot survive in its present form, but the alternatives are resisted because they are much less pleasant and turned to only in necessity. While there is a real need to rethink the Automobile culture, to say nothing of years overdue to even rethink what an automobile should be, we have a golden opportunity to rethink from scratch what public transportation aught to be. Right now it is based on an 18th century model that people avoid if they can, and is relegated to poor folk who have no other choices.

To make the leap into something that would all but replace private transportation it would need to be all the good things cars are and all the good things trains are. It must come when you want and go where you want. It must be both able to take hundreds of folks but not run empty when those hundreds do not show up. It must get you quickly to where you want to be but if it stops at all the other places it cannot be quick. You need to go the shortest route but also any route, and of course the advantages of trains of low fuel consumption, no need for parking, and no need to drive.

What I wouldl propose I call Ultralight Rail. Rather than huge trains there would be small very light weight cars that would run on a single rail and get its electric power from the rail. Because the cars would be smaller and lighter the rest of the infrastructure can be smaller lighter and therefore cheaper than would be necessary for train systems and since it would be mostly overhead it would not interfere with existing infrastructure.

Computers are the answer that was not available very few years ago when all the other systems were built. By making the cars small and computer controlled the need to pack everyone into huge trains goes away. With an artery and capillary system vehicles could travel close together at high speed but each car could have different start/stop points either around a corner or to a different city, traveling up to 200mph in stretches of main arteries.

By making the car able to hold small vehicles like power chairs, bicycles, Segways, etc it would make door to door transportation fast and reliable. By each car being separately targeted, it would go the most direct route as fast as possible without stopping along the way. By only coming when called it would hardly ever run empty, but be able to handle large crowds with multiple cars, and of course as it would not sit by waiting it would get constant use and therefore replace many more cars that spend most of their time parked.

There is much more that such deep thinking could produce, what is needed most is a path that such things could be accomplished, not only for this bust so much more, that will be the real measure of this administration.