Bullet trains making long trips can shave quite a bit of time off the total ride (as well as avoid some wear and tear on braking and fuel on acceleration) by whizzing past stations and using pods to transfer passengers on and off. Cool or dehumanizing? I think it only feels off-putting because it’s new, but it does feel a little like we’re serving the tech rather than the other way around (cf. cars and their infrastructure):
The narration is in Chinese, but the concept is pretty well explained visually for those of us who are unlearned.
Clever, clever humans.
That reminds me of the Skyhook from the end of “Thunderball”:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MBssigGUYFg