Here's a look at the glorious future monorails offer...

This train was part of the SAFEGE suspended monorail, built in Saran, France in 1959 and discarded a mere decade later. Since that picture was smuggled out of France, the train remains have been recovered and transported to an abandoned military base, where they are under close guard by government officials. (More pictures of a SAFEGE train in disrepair here.)

Deceptively futuristic looking images, common with monorail propaganda.

When operational (or at least as operational as monorails can be) the SAFEGE was featured in the 1966 film Fahrenheit 451 (see right) in order to give both the film and the SAFEGE an air of near-futuricity. Director and crypto-monorailist François Truffaut had the driver crouch down while filming its scenes so as to give viewers the false impression that it operated automatically.

Oddly, French directors seem to have some special connection to the monorail proponents, the significance of which I haven't yet determined. Last April, Seattle's KIRO TV learned that French director Olivier Venturini would be flown into Cascadia to produce TV ads for a $1.3 million pro-monorail propaganda campaign for the extension of Cascadian monorails. When a KIRO investigative reporter tried to ask him questions about the ads he refused to talk, clearly hiding some agenda.

The French were suckered into adopting monorails in the late 1950s, but ended up throwing them away when they became disillusioned with the constant spontaneous combustions and elephant accidents. Ten years -- and who knows how many dead people and circus animals -- from now, will Cascadia's proposed national monorail system end up strewn along the I-5 corridor, providing taxpayer-supported housing for raccoons?

Thanks to "Frenchy" in the guestbook for bringing this to my attention.

While monorailist literature insinuates that they are a futuristic technology, monorails are actually archaic devices that predate the airplane. Case in point: the Schwebebahn in Wuppertal, Germany. This suspended monorail was built in 1901 and is still in operation -- thanks to the backroom influence of the Monorail Industry -- even though it exhibits all the dangers common to monorails; there have been train collisions, trucks hitting piers, and four people died in 1999 when a train derailed and fell into the river. However, even in the storied annals of monorail dangers, the Schwebebahn manages to impress with an incident involving an innocent baby elephant named Tuffi.

Tuffi's daring escape from the clutches of dastardly monorailists.

On July 21, 1950, the 3-year-old elephant, enslaved by a cruel circus-director/monorail-fanatic named Franz Althoff, was forced to board the Schwebebahn as part of an ill-conceived monorail propaganda stunt. Tuffi had suffered through many degrading stunts in the past -- Althoff had her driving streetcars and marching through department stores -- but she balked at riding on that dangerous contraption (the Wuppertaler Todesfalle as it was secretly called by locals). One and a half minutes into the ride, Tuffi freaked out, no doubt sensing something was awry with the train (in other words: normal monorailular operating conditions). In her instinctual desperation to escape death and with no other safe means of egress, she smashed a hole in a side window and, rather taking her chances with the Wupper river 5 meters below, bravely leapt through.

Tuffi was not seriously injured in the fall and was unfortunately recaptured shortly after. There's no telling what would have happened if she had stayed in the train, which was understandably stopped after experiencing an unexpected elephantine defenestration. Perhaps the train would have derailed or spontaneously combusted. We will never know for sure, but it is highly likely that the actions of this monorail-doubting pachyderm might have saved the lives of the human passengers.

(Of course, had this monorail been constructed over city streets instead of a river, as many monorails are or are planned to be, she would have been killed and probably have taken out some pedestrians and small cars too. When will people learn what even baby elephants seem to understand: monorails are a menace.)

Photos from the incident:

• Colorized photos.
• Images from a newspaper report.

Thanks to reader Crosbie for bringing this to my attention.

Monorails have emerged as one of the most important issues for Cascadian voters. To help inform people on this often complicated issue, ZPi presents two contrasting view points in the ongoing Monorail debate:

POINT: Monorails Are A Danger To Society

Lyle Zapato, Concerned Citizen

I have mentioned some of the dangers that monorails pose to both passengers and innocent bystanders in previous entries in this space, but I have only surveyed the tip of this iceberg of public endangerment.

For those not following the debate, the known dangers of monorails include: spontaneous combustion of flammable monorail components in fire-accelerating open air; mechanical debris (possibly flaming) falling or even flying off and hitting pedestrians, cars, or nearby homes and businesses; precipitous, and likely deadly, drops for inattentive monorail passengers or those trying to escape flaming cars; monorail tracks that entice children to climb and walk along them with no way of escaping should a train approach (by contrast, surface train tracks allow one to walk safely to the side); increased chance of collateral deaths from chemical or biological attacks due to lack of individual pneumatic encapsulation of passengers; and potential for runaway monorail trains -- unbuffered by pneumatic pressure -- to collide, knocking one or both trains off their rail and onto helpless people below, before bursting into flames. Again, these are just the known dangers -- we can only wonder at what other dangers monorail researchers are keeping from the public.

It's just common sense that placing tens of thousands of pounds of heavy, highly combustible machinery over people's heads while moving at speeds in excess of most surface traffic is a recipe for disaster. So why do they insist on doing it? Monorail enthusiasts imagine a Cascadia converted into some sort of "monorailtopia". They started in Seattle, and now they want to branch outward, sending their elevated tendrils into our neighborhoods with no concern for the safety of our children, senior citizens, or pets. (If dogs chase after elevated monorail trains while craning their necks upward, might they accidentally fall into open manholes and die? Has this issue even been studied properly in the rush to monorailize our nation?)

Although they don't advertise the true extent of their agenda, it is obvious that the monorail proponents' ultimate goal is to link Cascadia to Disneyland -- where Imagineers have already established a monorail hub near their Simulacra factories -- which would allow trainloads of New World Order agents to pour into our nation unchecked. We have to ask: Are the monorail proponents in league with the NWO or merely their unknowing pawns?

Seattleites have always been on the front lines of this battle to secure Cascadia from the threat of monorails. Once again they are called upon to do their patriotic duty by recalling the monorail with a vote of YES on I-83.

COUNTERPOINT: Mr. Zapato's Anti-Monorail FUD

The Monorailist, Monorail Activist

I must call on Mr. Zapato to cease his anti-monorail FUD. Yes, I said it: FUD. Mr. Zapato is trying to spread Fear, Uncertainty, and, yes, even Doubt, about the most awesome and elegant method of transportation ever devised by Modern Man: the Monorail.

This technological wonder, riding a slender thread of concrete held aloft as if yearning to touch the heavens, winding its way through the metropoli of Mankind's destiny -- of Mankind's destination! What dreams may it hold? What hopes does it carry? Is Fate its captain, or is He merely lounging in the snack car? Equal parts Enlightenment and Romance, Power and Grace, Bus and Train -- uniting all paradoxes into one glorious balance and thereby transporting us to a realm where futurism collides with magical realism, reifying the very Soul of Man in the form of a streamlined metallic tube. No mere people movers are these!

Instead of acknowledging the Monorail's many technical innovations, creature comforts, and its undeniably potent aesthetic grandeur, Mr. Zapato chooses to hyperfocus on and exaggerate a few aberrant incidents that have occurred over the course of the Monorail's long and storied history -- incidents that are nearly all due to lack of maintenance as a result of anti-monorail sentiments that have been fomented by the likes of Mr. Zapato and his Pneumaticist cohorts!

You see, what the public isn't being properly informed here on this biased website is that Mr. Zapato is only against monorails because his organization has developed an "alternative" system of transportation involving pneumatic "tube pods" -- as if you could call such a gaseous pipe-dream a real alternative to the sleek, modern experience of monorails!

If we as a Society -- as a Species, as the very culmination of Life on this planet -- are to mature -- to transcend our present state of existence -- and take our place among the advanced peoples of the Galaxy -- to be born again as Star Children, eyes opening on a New Dawn -- then monorails are inevitable. Is it going too far to suggest that monorails might be the Singularity? Perhaps. But it is the logical next step in our evolution and we cannot risk not taking it. However, instead of advancing forward with the certainty fitting our eons of history, Mr. Zapato would have us retreat -- to revert to a state not unlike that of the primordial tube worms. We are better than this; we will be better than this.

I strongly urge the people of Seattle to take a bold step into our Future by voting NO on I-83. Remember: Vote NO to say YES to monorails and NO to pneumatic tubes and YES to the Transcendence of Humanity -- for Tomorrow and Forever!

Seattle monorail tracks remain empty months after fire. Note scorch marks on pillars.

It happened again.

On Wednesday, the Las Vegas monorail system was shut down following an incident in which a 60-pound, 20-inch tire flew off a Star-Trek-themed train and crashed into the parking lot of Harrah's Casino. Against all odds, no one was killed, maimed, decapitated, or ended up flattened with cartoonish tire tracks running down their middle.

This is the second time since the opening of Vegas's monorail that monorailular debris has endangered the lives of elderly gamblers, drunks, and prostitutes: a drive shaft fell off a train back in January -- fortunately when they were testing the system, so no one was impaled. In another incident last month, a monorail worker mistakenly opened the doors on the wrong side of the train, exposing passengers to a precipitous and deadly fall. Even the most optimistic monorail apologist must admit that it's only a matter of time until Las Vegas sees mass casualties from their monorail of doom.

But this is all the norm with monorails, which are an inherently dangerous form of transportation. You may remember back in June I reported on the blazing inferno suffered by the monorail in Seattle, which is still closed for repairs. (I have since gone and examined the incident scene myself and can report that fire damage is still visible.) Unlike the safe and efficient Inteli-Tube Pneumatic Transportation System*, monorail systems place dangerous, rickety equipment high over people's heads, surrounded by ample and uncontrollable supplies of combustion-aiding oxygen, all the while hoping that passengers don't accidently step out the wrong side and go splat. How long can monorail proponents continue to gamble with people's lives?

* The ITPTS was developed by Lyle Zapato & ZPi Laboratories.

(Fire enhanced by ZPi for dramatic effect.)

Yesterday, a Seattle monorail caught fire -- the blue one, to be precise. No one was seriously injured, but the incident only further highlights the inherent danger in monorailular transportation methods, that of spontaneous combustion.

Some in the Republic of Cascadia -- mostly Federalists -- are pushing to have our entire nation monorailized. However, in their irrational zeal to chase after some failed 1962 vision of the future, they are overlooking a much better and safer solution to our nation's transportation problems: the Inteli-Tube Pneumatic Transportation System.*

The ITPTS is immune to the sorts of uncontrollable fires that monorails experience. Because pneumatic tubes are designed to create pressure differentials to push the personal transportation pods through them, they can be easily depressurized in an emergency to quickly extinguish any fires. Let's just see the monorailists try and depressurize Seattle! Furthermore, instead of oxygenated air -- which acts as a fire accelerant and through which monorails have no choice but to travel -- pneumatic tubes can be pressurized with inert gasses such as argon to completely eliminate the chance of a fire starting. None of these safety benefits have any effect on commuter comfort since passengers are safely sealed in their pressurized pods.

How many more monorail fires do there need to be before Cascadians realize that monorails are dangerous and that pneumatic tube transportation systems offer us our only hope, for both the future and today? If you ask me, one is already too many.

* The ITPTS was developed by Lyle Zapato & ZPi Laboratories.