St. Pancras, the Champagne Bar and the Terminator

It is just sooo civilized.
The newly restored St. Pancras Station is just magnificent. A great mixture of new and old. It brought high-speed rail to the heart of London making Paris just over two hours away. The highlight, is though, Europe’s longest champagne bar, lining the platform. Sipping blubbly and munching on a twenty pound plate of tiny but tasty snacks. Truly, traveling does not get any better than this.

Contrast St. Pancras to the fatally bland Terminal Five at Heathrow. I suspect that it caused a world-wide shortage of white paint. I would have hated to see what the old terminal was like. Just try lining the runway with any type of bar.

Train stations can be truly beautiful buildings at the heart of a city. Airports tend to be monstrosities sucking the soul out of cities and anyone unfortunate enough to be stuck in one for any amount of time at all.
So, St. Pancreas pretty much is the peak of civilization while the Terminator was trying to end it. Fortunately, Arnie as governator seems to be moving in the other direction. Not that I agree with him on everything, he has cut transit funding but, hell, I don’t agree with myself all the time. He was against the bullet train before he was for it. His priority a year ago seemed to be spending money on roads and not rail. I suspect high fuel prices changed all that.

He is now a supporter of the $10 billion high-speed rail initiative before California voters this November. He even broke his word not to sign any bills until the legislator approved a budget to approve the bill required to move the initiative forward. It is often great that politicians don’t follow through on everything they say.

The facebook group has over 30,000 members. I suspect it stands a good chance of passing due to high fuel prices and enthusiastic Obama supporters who are likely to support rail and transit. Still, it is a good idea to encourage your friends in the Golden State to vote for it. It would be great to experience 
This vote is critical as it will mark the start of the movement in the States away from cars and planes which are destroying the economy, the environment and cities while providing people with an increasing miserable transportation experience.



San Francisco’s high speed rail station, Transbay Transit Center will be the first grand rail station built in North America in a century. Hopefully they figure out a snappier name though.

I am convinced that the best way forward is to provide people with great transportation experiences that are also environmentally friendly. Who knows, maybe the platform in Frisco will be lined with a champagne bar or even better, a brewpub serving a great porter.
Cheers!!