Transportation Routes

An airline in China is mulling over plans that would allow passengers to stand during short flights and pay less than those who have seats. Spring Airlines, a low-cost carrier based in Shanghai, said having passengers stand up in flight would enable it to cram 40% more travelers into its Airbus A320 planes while cutting operating costs 20%.

The skyline of this country junction is familiar to anyone who has driven America's interstates. Aloft, on 60-foot pylons, are the franchise logos. Scanning lower, plastic flags of every color flap in the muggy breeze. At ground level are the gas pumps, fast-food restaurants and chain motels. Big rigs lumber past rows of parked cars with plates from half a dozen states. Like so many of the nation's pit-stop towns, the setting seems benign, if less than scenic.

In the largest airline alliance in history, British Airways on Tuesday said it will invest $750 million in USAir, giving the British carrier a long-sought foothold in the U.S. market while providing its struggling partner with a badly needed financial boost. The deal, which requires the approval of the U.S. and British governments and company stockholders, would create the most formidable entry so far in a worldwide race among airlines seeking growth and profits through international expansion.

Seeking to cash in on booming Asian exports, Nicaragua will announce a $20-billion proposal next week to build a canal linking the Pacific and the Atlantic oceans that would accommodate ships too large to use the Panama Canal, Nicaraguan officials said Friday. If approved by Nicaragua's Congress, the project would be a joint public-private venture financed by unnamed investors, said Lindolfo Monjarretz, a spokesman for Nicaraguan President Enrique Bolanos.

Determined to keep control of their lucrative, illegal business, Colombia's drug cartels are finding new partners to move their cocaine and heroin into the United States and Europe. Imprisoning the country's top drug lords and deporting their traditional European contacts weakened the cartels for a time, but now law enforcement officials fear that they are rebuilding their illicit empires with reliable new routes.

More than 4,000 miles of train tracks stretch through California, winding up the blustery Cajon Pass and snaking through the desert surrounding Barstow. Those tracks could be seeing a lot more traffic in the next few years as trains loaded with Chinese-made toys, electronics and clothing roll eastward, connecting West Coast ports with cities across the U.S. Warren Buffett is a believer. In November, the world's second-richest man paid $34 billion for railroad giant Burlington Northern Santa Fe Corp.

At least three times a week, Mary Sims rides Metrolink from Riverside to Los Angeles in a nearly two-hour journey to her sister's place in Compton or Harbor-UCLA Medical Center in Torrance. First, the 57-year-old Perris resident drives 20 minutes to the downtown Riverside station to catch the train because Metrolink doesn't go to Perris. That may soon change.

It was another G'day for travelers looking to head Down Under. Delta Air Lines Inc., which recently became the world's biggest carrier by merging with Northwest Airlines, said Thursday that it would begin nonstop service between Los Angeles International Airport and Sydney, Australia, starting in July. The start of Sydney flights -- which may prompt a fare war on the popular U.S.

An investigation into last year's record cocaine seizure at a Sylmar warehouse shows that Colombian drug cartels have shipped vast quantities of cocaine along America's interstate highway system despite law enforcement efforts to choke it off, according to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration.

On Monday, the 52 floats participating in the 106th Rose Parade will proudly display the results of months of planning and hard work as they make their way down Colorado Boulevard. Heading the Pack From conception to construction: the life of the float that will lead this year's parade. Fall, 1993 * Float entries committee begins selecting float sponsors. January * Idea is conceived for float designs. Artist, conferring with engineer, begins design sketches.