ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on revolutionary changes: the more dramatic instances of rapid shifts from prevailing to new mobility patterns. There have been two kinds of change in human mobility since hominids began exploring the African savannah: incremental change and revolutionary change. The chapter deals with a transport revolution motivated by the belief that Britain’s industrial revolution was generating more goods movement than existing roads and canals could accommodate. A key element of mobility change was the adaptation of transport technology invented for military use—jet aircraft—to yield dramatic performance improvements in an existing mode. The considerable growth of freight transport made conditions ideal for developing new transport capacity. A different kind of transport revolution occurred during the Second World War, when the US suddenly restricted the production and use of automobiles and the expansion of its road network in order to accelerate military mobilization.
