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Simeon Mitropolitski is a Canadian analyst, of Bulgarian origin, and a former syndicated columnist with the Bulgarian News Agency (BTA). He is the author of several hundred articles dealing with hot political and economic topics, both national and international.

He was part of the first group of Bulgarian intellectuals and students that began the opposition movement that finally put an end to the communist regime in this country in 1989, and in 1996-1997 participated in international observation teams during the elections in several Balkan countries - Romania, Albania and Bulgaria.

In 2002 Simeon and his family moved from Bulgaria to Canada where they live now in Montreal, province of Quebec. Simeon is a Master of Political Science from McGill University and a B.A. of Political Science and History.

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After the Second World War, the American and Canadian way of life, and to a smaller degree the way of life in Europe has been marked by the mass car transportation. The main directions of urban development have followed the new highways. First built for security and economic reasons, and to allow the population to escape large cities in case of nuclear attack from the Soviet Union, these highways gradually became the main transportation corridors for millions of suburban dwellers, going to work and back home. In many North American cities, and in all largest Canadian big agglomerations, the car civilization seems to have reached the point when new investments don't bring expected additional economic development. It's time for new transportation approaches, built on public means of transportation.

As surprising as it might appear, but initially the webs of highways spreading away from the largest cities in North America and Europe weren't built in order to satisfy the daily transportation needs of population. In Nazi Germany, building highways in the 1930s had first of all military significance, making easy to move large quantities of military personnel and weapons from east to west. In the United States during the same period, this was the way for the federal government to employ thousands of unemployed and underemployed workers during the Great Depression. Beginning in early 1950s, building highways in North America and Western Europe had one strategic goal, evacuating as many as possible urban dwellers in case of a nuclear attack by the Soviet Union. As we see, again a goal miles away from today's needs for the urban development.

Highways in Canada, let's take this country as a good example, became a factor for the urban development after having been initially projected to be a part of the east-west national building and to protect the population against Soviet nuclear strikes. Once the population had the ability to move quickly back and forth at significant distances from home, ever-growing number of people started appreciating the quietness of suburban life coupled with daily 'promenades' to work. Once they did it, it was just a matter of time before the existing highways became part of the most suburban peoples' worst nightmares. The price to be paid for the quiet life in suburbia was the daily traffic to and from work. The solutions in North America up until now, and for some cities even now, consist of building additional highways in order to 'decongest' the old ones. More urban boulevards are turned into highways; the existing highways see the number of lanes increased; additional bridges are built wherever is possible. Far from being a lasting solution, these measures only increase the flow of people moving toward the suburbs, thus making the traffic an even bigger problem.

Instead of being a solution for the transportation needs of the people, urban highways become part of the problem. More than that, as all physical structures they need constant repair and eventual replacement. At some point, very specific for every major city, the simple cost of maintaining these transportation infrastructures becomes impossible to bear by the local population. From a tool of progress the highways become a burden that enslaves peoples and their tax money. At this point, however, it's already impossible to think about moving all suburban people back to the urban downtowns. It's also impossible not to look for solutions. At this point we see the renaissance of the public transportation.

By public transportation we mean subways, streetcars, trolleybuses, and passengers' ferries. The initial boom of public transportation in Canada, like the United States, falls on the very end of the 19th c. With the gradual development of the cities beyond the traditional walking distances between home and work; and with the gradual elimination of horses and horse carriages, both the lower and the upper classes find it necessary to use alternative means of transportation. When the middle class families began moving away from the urban downtowns in the 1950s, this inflicted a major blow on the public transportation. Trying to satisfy ever-growing needs for new highways, the municipal authorities gradually disavowed the existing means of transportation. With some exceptions, we can now see streetcars mostly in the old photo albums.

The history, however, took revenge. Unable to provide adequate transportation for ever-growing number of suburban dwellers, cities are again turning toward public means of transportation. It isn't necessary here to cite different projects for different cities, but the bottom line is that the municipal authorities in many Canadian cities are trying to move citizens from their cars toward the busses, streetcars, ferries, and subways. They do this, on the one hand, by providing public transportation alternatives to any suburban community, and on the other hand, by NOT providing necessary funds for highway maintenance and enlargement. In no way, however, these plans will make suburban life less attractive. On the contrary, by solving once again the transportation problems for those living away from the downtowns, Canadian municipalities will create a new wave of out-migration.

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