WEBVTT
Kind: captions
Language: en-GB

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for crying out loud. The filmmakers didn't need to shoot that,

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but they did, because it was the future.

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But here's the catch: hovercraft are expensive.

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The cross-Channel ones had four gas turbine engines chucking out 13,000 horsepower.

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That's an immense amout of fuel, and a lot of noise, particularly at full speed.

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Passengers had to stay in their seats for safety,

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because hovering on an air cushion, you could feel every wave.

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And maintenance costs were huge:

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because there weren't many hovercraft, so spare parts were expensive,

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and going on saltwater meant they needed constant repair.

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Oh, and they could only carry a few dozen cars at a time.

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Does any of that sound familiar? A technology of the 1970s future,

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faster than anything else, but too expensive, too inefficient,

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and too uncomfortable to survive.

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It's just like Concorde.

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The majority of people who could afford Concorde preferred to spend

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twice as long in business-class comfort, rather than a few hours

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cramped into a small seat, albeit one that was going very very fast.

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Concorde used a huge amount of fuel, its maintenance was expensive,

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and after one of the planes crashed in 2003,

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the airlines decided that it wasn't worth keeping them running any more.

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Now, it wasn't a disaster that ended the big cross-Channel hovercraft runs.

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It was the Channel Tunnel providing a more comfortable option,

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even if, end-to-end, it did take just a little bit longer.

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But it was still a signal, that perhaps,

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the dreams of the 1970s did get a little bit out of hand.

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In a world where fuel was cheap and the future, for those who could afford it,

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was cool, fast, and slightly uncomfortable,

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hovercraft and Concorde fit in perfectly.

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But for the 21st Century, with lots of people wanting to travel cheaply:

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we left all that behind.

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Apart from here, in one little bit of southern England.