The Bangkok skytrain

With urban metros so much on our minds here at The Interpreter lately, and with Wired magazine's transport blog, Autopia, recently posting about Bangkok's Skytrain, I thought I'd say my piece. On my single visit to Bangkok, I found the Skytrain a brilliant service: clean, efficient, with an easy ticket system and only occasionally crowded carriages. Granted, the elevated tracks are an absolute eyesore, and by throwing parts of Bangkok into permanent shade, they can make the streetscape resemble a set from Blade Runner. But that somehow suits Bangkok, which (unlike KL and Singapore) has managed to maintain that South East Asian feeling of pleasant chaos, without being impossible to get around.

Photo by Flickr user maistora, used under a Creative Commons licence.