Transportation Resources: Video and DVD

"Using archival footage, beautifully crafted contemporary animation, and interviews with astute cultural observers based outside the U.S., this program examines the implications of our love affair with the car. Viewers learn how, in just over a century, Henry Ford's innovations completely transformed human life, so much so that in some areas of the world cars seem more important than human beings. In the West, for example, an estimated sixty-two percent of urban space is now devoted to roads or car parks. Meanwhile, the average American home features a garage that would dwarf most bedrooms. The film also illustrates that devoting so much public and private space to an inefficient form of transportation has radically altered our relationship with the environment. " 56 minutes

"Living in a world of cutting-edge technology hasn't eliminated the need for turning out-of-this-world concepts into real-world products and then delivering them exactly when they're wanted. This program spotlights three professionals in manufacturing-a robotics technician, a machinist, and a chemical technician-and three professionals who help get products from point A to point Z: a quality manager, a distribution manager, and a dock supervisor. Correlates to all applicable National and State Educational Standards including the NCLB Act." 19 minutes

"For thousands of years, travel by foot, horseback, carriage, and sailing ship were the only ways to get around, setting the pace of society and, to a large degree, circumscribing the potential of humankind. But all of that changed with the advent of steamships, trains, automobiles, and airplanes. In this program, Ronald E. G. Davies, curator of air transport at the National Air and Space Museum; historian Ruth Schwartz Cowan; MIT researcher Andreas Schafer; and other authorities investigate the revolutionary impact of modern transportation on society-and on the environment, where pollution is taking a heavy toll." 53 minutes