Building a High-Speed Society: France and the Aerotrain, 1962-1974

摘要

During the 1960s, the French engineer Jean Bertin developed a mode of high-speed transport with government support. It would be known as the Aerotrain. The logo on the front of the train-an "A" suspended above a stylized track-signaled that it moved on a cushion of air. As such, it expressed the application of advanced technology much desired by France during the 1960s (fig. 1). Here, I build on the work of such historians as Robert Gilpin, Gabrielle Hecht, and Michael Bess, who have stressed the role of technology in the reshaping of French national identity after World War II.