The Roads Must Roll

"The Roads Must Roll" is a 1940 science fiction short story by American writer Robert A. Heinlein. It was selected for The Science Fiction Hall of Fame, Volume One, 1929–1964 anthology in 1970.

The story is set in the near future, when "roadtowns" (wide rapidly moving passenger platforms similar to moving sidewalks, but reaching speeds of 100 mph) have replaced highways and railways as the dominant transportation method in the United States.

Heinlein's themes are technological change and social cohesion. The fictional social movement he calls functionalism (which is unrelated to the real-life sociological theory of the same name), advances the idea that one's status and level of material reward in a society must and should depend on the functions one performs for that society.

Larry Gaines, Chief Engineer of the Diego-Reno roadtown, is dining in a moving restaurant on the road when one of the moving sidewalk strips unexpectedly stops, causing injuries to the thousands of commuters on it. Gaines learns that it was sabotage. The technicians who maintain the section of the road have been persuaded by a radical social theory, Functionalism, that their role in maintaining the nation's transport infrastructure is more important than that of any other workers and that they should therefore be in control. The roads are managed by the Transport Cadets, an elite paramilitary organization formed by the US Military to keep this crucial infrastructure running. The rebels have stopped the strip as a demonstration to encourage their fellow technicians around the country to rebel against the Cadets, and start the Functionalist Revolution.

Going into the machinery under the roadway that runs it, Gaines takes command of the response. He doesn't order the Road stopped, since that would leave millions of commuters stranded, but instead has the military evacuate the riders, a time-consuming procedure. In command of a hastily gathered corps of armed cadets, he proceeds up the underground access tunnel toward Stockton, on "tumblebugs," motorized and gyroscopically stabilized unicycles much like the later real-life Segway. As the military advance proceeds, they arrest rebel technicians and cross connect the wiring of the machinery, motor by motor, to take control away from the rebels in the Stockton office.

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