In October 2000, there was a high speed derailment just south of Hatfield, some 27 km north of London. It happened around 12:30. Tragically, four people were killed.

I heard about this within half an hour of it happening - in my hotel in Washington DC.

By 12:30 that day, four people had died on Britain's roads. I can only say only this because, on average, 10 people die each day and statistically more do so after noon than before.

The train crash led to major chaos on Britain's railways. It led to the collapse of Railtrack. It also resulted - as all railway accidents do - in two major enquiries and a published report with many recommendations based on lessons learnt. At all stages it led to near world-wide near saturation coverage in all media.

The fatalities on the roads, by contrast, just led to an inquest. One or two may have hit the local papers. No enquiries, no published report, no lessons learnt - even though, because railway accidents have been painstakingly investigated since the 1840s and all low-hanging fruit has long gone, it would be easier to learn from road accidents.

I deplore this bias.

One thing it does do is give people an unbalanced view of the world. It is quite possible that, as a result of media coverage, people conclude that it's unsafe to ride trains and go by car instead - witha significantly higher risk of accident.

I also deplore the practice - especially in North America - of reporting something under the headline, "Train crash" when actually it's an idiot in a car thinking he can outpace a train approaching a level crossing.

How about some balance in reporting?

Sadly, unlikely. Railway accidents are news because they rarely happen: car crashes aren't because they happen much, much too often.

In 1990 there was an analysis of front-page reporting in the New York Times. This showed that there were 1.7 murder stories for every 1000 homicides, 2.3 AIDS stories for every AIDS death, 0.02 cancer stories for every 1000 cancer deaths and 138.2 plane crash stories for every 1000 aircraft deaths.

Balance in reporting?

In the January 2009 issue of the "Journal of Air Transport Management" there is a useful article on the possible impact of the EU's Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS).

It looks at the options for (in particular) long-haul airlines based outside the EU reducing their ETS costs by making a stop on the way.

For example, if Singapore Airlines flies direct from Singapore to Frankfurt, it will effectively pay an emissions charge for the entire flight. If however it flies via Zurich or Istanbul, it will only have to pay the charge for the shorter legs - between Zurich and Frankfurt or Istanbul and Frankfurt. So the ETS cost/passenger will be about 15 - 18 Euros less for those routings.

The article also shows the relationship between flight distance and the distance the aircraft actually flies at cruise altitude - its most efficient altitude.

For flights between 188 km and 312km, the aircraft is only at cruise altitude for 21% of the time. The rest of the time it is either climbing or descending. Between 313 km and 437km, it's at cruise altitude for 30% of the journey: this increases to 40% for flights between 563km and 687km. At 876km, it is 45%.

So only on relatively long journeys - where time makes flying competitive with rail - does an aircraft fly at cruise altitude for more than half of the time it's in the air.

Capgemini, the international consulting and technology company, has issued a brochure describing its Mobility Service Provider concept, which will soon make optimal use of technology to ease intermodal travel.

They believe that in the very near future we are likely to be using some kind of information and communication device to handle all of our travel arrangements.

Suppliers will be able to manage the full travel chain, and will be able to facilitate provision of information and tickets. Prices and deals will be geared to the needs of individual travellers.

As examples of intermodal travel chains as they exist today they cite the Paris - Brussels code-share and the UK website http://transportdirect.info.

They believe that transportation companies and online service providers are likely to be the leaders in this field.

The brochure can be found on Capgemini's website.

Bombardier Transportation and the German Aerospace Centre DLR are cooperating in research to create the next generation of high speed trains. These are expected to be more efficient and even more climate-friendly.

DLR (Deutsches Zentrum fur Luft- und Raumfahrt) has a unique range of research tools including tunnel and crosswind simulation facilities. Crosswind dynamics are thought by DLR to be particularly important for the double-deck high-speed trains they plan to develop.

See DLR's website for more information.

After a long stay in the United States, I always feel that, if I see another sign saying, "Don't Walk", I'll scream! Because I do walk, and I do cross roads where and when I feel like it - and not just where and when some sign tells me I can!

However, the command is justified, as shown by a recent report, "Dangerous by design". This can be found on at Transportation for America's website

It shows the most dangerous places in America for pedestrians - starting with Orlando, Tampa and Miami, tourist resorts which surely ought to know better!

The measure - the Pedestrian Danger Index - is the pedestrian fatality rate divided by the percentage of the population walking to work.

Remember - Don't Walk!

I heard two presentations at the Transportation Research Board's annual meeting which together suggested that maybe you shouldn't fly between Boston and Philadelphia.

The scheduled flight time is 90 minutes - which sounds a lot for 280 miles, 450 km although it is actually 300 km/h. An aircraft cruises at around 850 km/h: Eurostar's maximum is 300.

Those 280 miles are statute miles: the great circle distance in nautical miles apparently is 240 (no confusion intended!). According to an FAA speaker, planes on that route fly an average of 100 miles more than that - because of air traffic management issues. So you're getting 42% more miles than you paid for!

And an MIT speaker had a published analysis of taxi-out times - the average time from the plane pushing back from the jetway to it actually taking off. Boston was one of 5 airports where this was over 20 minutes (indeed, at New York JFK it's 37 minutes).

So the combination of long taxi-out times and indirect routings leads to the slow service.

And the whole thing is leading to something analysed in the Wall Street Journal on 4th February - in an article by Scott McCartney entitled, "Why a Six hour flight now takes seven". With the aid of a 1996 OAG timetable, he looks at flight times 14 years ago - and most are shorter than today.

Let's suppose you were in downtown Philadelphia around 10 in the morning. Conceptually you could catch the 10:15 Acela and be in Boston South Street - pretty much downtown Boston - at 15:20. Five hours, five minutes.

Alternatively you could catch the SEPTA train to the airport - that'll take around half an hour. Allow an hour for security and check-in, so you ought (again conceptually) to be able to catch a flight at 11:30 at a push. That gets you to Logan airport at 12:54 (all being well). Allow 20 minutes for disembarkation, 20 to get to Airport station and another 20 to get downtown - you're there at 14:00. Four hours instead of 5.

It's your choice!

In one of the Committee sessions I attended at the Transportation Research Board annual meeting, in an exuberant moment someone used the word "Oodles" - meaning lots and lots!

It's a bit archaic - it was used years ago, but not much now.

Amid some amusement, it was defined by a mathematician as "10 to the many"! (Sadly, the software I use for this blog won't allow me to superscript "many" which slightly spoils the effect).

I was impressed by a recent piece of research by the Center for Transportation Studies at the University of Minnesota. It looked at the impact of the Hiawatha Light Rail line, running south from Minneapolis to Minneapolis-St. Paul airport and the Mall of the Americas.

"The Hiawatha Line: Impacts on Land Use and Residential Housing Value" by Edward G. Goetz, Kate Ko, Aaron Hagar, Hoang Ton, and Jeff Matson, was published in February 2010 as Report no. CTS 10-04.
It can be found on the website of the Center for Transportation Studies at the University of Michigan

Three major questions are investigated -
what were the impacts on property values of proximity to a Hiawatha line station,
how have land uses changed around stations, and
what are the impacts of the stations on the level of housing investment within the corridor?

All of these were answered positively.

The line runs through diverse neighbourhoods.

Homes within half a mile of a station increased in value more than a control set of homes - although the impact is greater where the stations are more accessible. On the east side of the line, the 4-lane Hiawatha Avenue, fringed by a strip of industrial property, pushes residential areas away from the line.

Significant new housing construction has occurred in the catchment area of the line.

It's a good study showing that there are trivial negative effects on houses very close to the line and significant positive ones on others nearby.

I sometimes commute on the Jubilee and Bakerloo Lines of the London Underground.

If I have to stand on the former, especially at this time of year, "straphanging" is a nuisance. The poles and grab rails are COLD! They are of uncoated metal with a high thermal conductivity!

By contrast, the poles and rails on the Bakerloo Line trains are coated and are much warmer to the touch.

Does it matter?

Does customer comfort matter? Does it matter if people are tempted not to hold tight because it's actually uncomfortable to do so?

Are there other examples of where a little thought would have made a difference?

While addressing a session of the Transportation Research Board's annual meeting in Washington DC last month, Federal Transit Administration Administrator Peter Rogoff was asked about Federal agencies looking at using international contractors. He said, "We are looking for a complete and unquestionable compliance with Buy America for recovery dollars".

While I am personally unsure of the precise implications of that, it doesn't sound good on a number of levels.

It restricts the flow of ideas to those which have been already taken on board by American industry - which is sad, because there are other good ideas out there too. So Mr. Rogoff may well get less for his dollars than he could.

It may mean paying more.

The Administrator was keen to suggest looking at alternative revenue sources: he could equally look for lower costs, which produces the same effect on the bottom line.

I remember reading about a case where a State deliberately did not apply for Federal funding for a project because they would then have had to comply with Buy America rules: the savings they made by buying abroad were large enough to mean that they didn't need the Federal funds!

If I wanted to buy a large commercial aircraft, I'd certainly look at the US company Boeing. They specialise in large commercial aircraft: one can assume that they are pretty efficient at making them and the price:value mix is pretty good. If on the other hand I wanted to buy a signalling system for a high speed railway, I wouldn't look to US companies. They do not specialise in this area and I'd assume that they had a large learning curve to climb - at my expense. So why not "Buy best"?

At a higher level, Tom Friedman, the New York Times columnist and author, made two wise observations in this context (and I paraphrase fairly widely).

First, he described a call centre which had been off-shored to India. But because the staff there used IT and communications equipment designed and engineered in Silicon Valley, it was valuable - the guys in India were doing what they were good at, as were the guys in California. To put a software designer into a call centre would be dumb.

Second, he commented on the effects of the inability of Pakistan to sell cotton t-shirts to the US market - only the raw cotton, because of Buy America considerations. It meant that they got less for their crop than they would have got for finished goods - so they were less affluent. How much impact does the resultant poverty in Pakistan have on Afghanistan, drugs and the safety of America?

Buy America? Bye Bye America?

French and Spanish railways are considering a high speed service between Paris and Madrid, to start in 2012. Journey times will be between five and a half hours and six hours, depending on whether the trains run non-stop or call at Lyon and Barcelona.

Someone is assuming people will travel by a non-stop train for five and a half hours - fascinating.

In the past, it has been conventional wisdom that the break-even point for any city pair is three hours - over that journey time, more people will use plane than train. Three hours is about the minimum time it takes you to get anywhere by air - you have to get to the airport, go through security, board, taxi, fly, disembark, go through arrival procedures and then get to your final destination.

There are exceptions to the three hour rule. Paris - Perpignan and Tokyo - Hiroshima are the examples quoted where the rail journey is four and a half hours and yet more people use train than plane (although certainly in the case of Perpignan, a factor is the infrequent flights).

But, interestingly, in China the Beijing - Shanghai high speed line is being built - and there are plans for non-stop trains, taking 5 hours. So despite major improvements to Beijing Capital Airport and both of Shanghai's airports, it is still being assumed that there is a market for a 5-hour non-stop train. Fascinating.

Part of the reason may be the difference between the quality of the time on a train journey and on a plane journey.

If you decide to fly, your journey is very broken up - you never have much time anywhere, and when you do, you are restricted as to what you can do.

If you use a train, by contrast, your journey is pretty uninterrupted. You get on the train and the rest of the journey is yours - you can get in a lot of productive work!

So train travel time has a positive value: air travel time is a cost.

I was glancing through the details of a conference on passenger processing and check-in just now.

The topics covered by the speakers included things like "Continuous improvement in passenger journey experience", "Putting the passenger at the heart of the capital programme" and "User-friendly has arrived".

The final speaker has a different message - "Make your kiosks pay".

There are no prizes for guessing that the speaker is from Ryanair.