Light Rail and Terror

It seems that when terrorists want a target, they look to mass transit. Witness the carnage in London today. CNN story.

The other place that comes to mind is Madrid's Atocha Station. Ame & I passed through Atocha five weeks before the bombings that hit there when we went to visit Alex. On my last trip, I avoided Atocha. It's a known target, after all.

What seems clear is that busses, trains and rail stations make for excellent collection points for terrorists who think in terms of assembling the most human targets.

Jarvis Medhurst told CNN: "I was working at the Tavistock Hotel and the bus exploded literally 40 meters away from me. There was a massive explosion and a
cloud of smoke, and then when the smoke stated to die down, you could see the wrecked bus, which was on fire.

"There were bodies everywhere. Heads and bits of bodies, heads and arms and legs all ripped away.

and

Another man, clearly shaken by his experience, described being on a smoke-filled carriage on the same train, he and his fellow passengers afraid to try to leave the train.

"We were all trapped like sardines waiting to die," said Angelo Power. "I honestly thought I was going to die, as did everyone else."

A police spokesman urged Londoners to "stay where you are."

"There's no way to travel around London at the moment," he said.

Isn't it the point of public transportation to eliminate congestion? Well, thanks to reliance on public transportation, London is frozen.

These events provide yet another very sensible reason for opposing public transportation. While 1-3 people in a car is fuel inefficient, it is very efficient in making commuters less appealing as targets for would-be terrorists.