China is building a magnetically levitated (maglev) train that will “fill the gap between high-speed rail and air transportation,” says CNN. This new train may have a top speed of 370 miles per hour, which “could narrow the gap between high-speed rail and air travel,” says Republic World.
What is this preoccupation with gaps? The only gap I see is between the ears of those who think maglev makes sense either in the United States or anywhere else in the world.
Here’s the gap: high-speed rail costs a lot more and goes a lot slower than flying. Maglev will cost even more and still go slower than flying. How does that fix the gap? Wake me up when someone comes up with a technology that costs less and goes faster than jet aircraft.
The truth is that all China has is the shell of a train car. It doesn’t have any tracks (except for the Shanghai Airport maglev that was built for it by the Germans), nor does it have a technology that is known to work.
Eating chocolates lead to higher levels of desire, click that pharmacy cialis cheap arousal and sexual satisfaction. Quit smoking, as it narrows arteries carrying blood into http://valsonindia.com/about-us/company-profile/?lang=it buy cheap cialis penis, thus making it smaller. This can be a double discount levitra http://valsonindia.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/VALSON-publish-result-Jun-2016.pdf cause of erectile dysfunction. My personal favorites are offers to purchase discounted purchase viagra on line, ads for pornographic websites, and bogus work-from-home programs. It appears that China is trying to steal Japan’s thunder, as Japan does have a maglev technology that is supposedly under construction between Tokyo and Nagoya. JR Central (aka JR Tokai), the private company that operates the existing high-speed trains on that route, figured that it could build a faster new line itself without any government assistance.
It turns out it was wrong about that. The latest word is that costs of the project (86 percent of which would be underground) are spiraling upwards and the government is having to provide financial support. The costs were originally projected to be 5.1 trillion yen (about $47 billion), but now have risen to 9.0 trillion ($82 billion), a 75 percent increase. The cost increase, combined with the fact that Japan’s population (and therefore travel demand) is falling, means that JR Central no longer thinks the line will pay for itself.
JR Central, by the way, is also behind the Texas Central plan to build a high-speed rail line between Dallas and Houston. Proponents claim this rail line, like the Tokyo-Nagoya maglev, can be built without government subsidies. More likely is that, like the maglev, they will get people excited and then “discover” they need some government assistance.
With China planning to build maglev lines, Japan will probably consider it a matter of pride to build the Tokyo-Nagoya line no matter what the loss. Meanwhile, the state of Maryland is writing an environmental impact statement for a Baltimore-Washington maglev line. Someone needs to check between Governor Hogan’s ears, as he was elected on a fiscally conservative platform yet somehow allowed himself to be talked into this fiasco in the making.
China’s high speed rail system has accumulated a total of 727 billion dollars in debt and stands to close out a trillion dollars by 2020. On the other hand if China wants to accumulate debts by building massive amounts of infrastructure it doesn’t need, by all means; encourage them. Japan’s faded economic prowess for the last 30 years was the result of a massive splurge of expensive building projects that served little actual use.
Japan, which faces intense competition from China, France and Germany in the global market for high-speed rail transport, has not found any takers for its maglev overseas despite aggressive marketing. Japan has staked premiership on restoring economic dynamism. Germany mastered the basic technology for maglev and failed to sell it to anyone.
China’s greatest strength is it’s biggest achilles heal. They have no regional or local authority power to spend or authorize projects. Every infrastructure decision is made by the communist party discretion. This from the top down approach often leaves localities with nothing short but begging and a numerous array of failed urban projects often approved by party leaders who’re easily bribed. Combine that with a nations propensity for building poor quality construction. Such as that lethal HSR derailment whose track was built at the behest of a railway minister who was laundering funds and accepting bribes. In Joseph Needhams famous book series “Science and Civilizations in China” which chronicles invention in the region going back centuries but one critical thing he misses is China’s propensity and lengthy history of conformity driven technological adoption and subsequent missteps and technological disasters. In China it’s cheaper to compensate the victims family than invest in preventing what caused the disaster
“Meanwhile, the state of Maryland is writing an environmental impact statement for a Baltimore-Washington maglev line.”
They should make better use of the $$$. Pay off the randsomware.
This prototype is the Concorde of trains.
True, but at least the developers of the Concorde knew that its most likely market was among high-income leisure travelers who could afford such luxuries.
China’s government, on the other hand, thinks that the proles will use these trains. But its previous experience with high-speed trains has suggested that most lower-income intercity travelers simply ignore this option because it is too costly, and instead opt for the less expensive, lower-speed trains.
But then again, this just confirms what I’ve believed all along about China’s high-speed rail program — that it is a make-work program for low-skilled laborers in an attempt to stave off mass unemployment. This is an expensive and risky bet, and one that I think will come back to bite them in the long run.
“Wake me up when someone comes up with a technology that costs less and goes faster than jet aircraft.”
Couldn’t have said it better myself, and this line made me lol. ?
Be careful what one wishes for. I defend maglevs because they have some merit. As our energy technology gets cleaner and more efficient maglev energy use won’t matter much. The only way to curb maglev speed higher is to either with vacuum tunnels, a unaesthetic boring ride, but a quick one if it can go as fast as a plane or faster. One strategy for making them even faster is to make them thinner, whats the fastest manned plane, the SR-71. Why’s it so fast, beside enormous amounts of thrust, it’s biggest speed advantage is it’s absurdly thin, sharp trailing edge profile. Design the train like that and you’ll see a massive decrease in aerodynamic drag. You can thin the passenger cabin. Shanghai’s maglev has seating rows for five You can trim it to three and double the number of cars to a longer train. Because the power needed to push an object through air increases with the cube of velocity, this race to ever higher speeds raises energy consumption exponentially. Planes avoid this by flying to the stratosphere, maglevs can avoid it by literally reshaping their designs into winged bullets.
Even if electricity was free and you had to pay for jet fuel, maglev is a dead-end. Why? Infastrucure.
A 2-mile strip of concrete is all you need to maintain at each end for air travel. You also only need to maintain it for 200 mph of travel.
Maglev? You need track for every inch of that route and need to maintain it for that 350 mph speed.
Vehicle maintenance? Just as expensive, perhaps more with the maglev because of reduced economy of scale.
There’s a “gap” between modern commercial airliners and the SR71 that can be filled for less than pipe dreams like the hyperloop.
China is full of shiny crap that they built in a hurry and later falls apart in a few years. Haven’t they had a couple dramatic rail accidents due to construction defects?
The Air Force/CIA shut down the SR-71 because they couldn’t afford it.
The only way to curb maglev speed higher is to either with vacuum tunnels, a unaesthetic boring ride, but a quick one if it can go as fast as a plane or faster.
Planes don’t have to follow terrain when they’re going 500mph. Curves and hills/valleys are a problem for trains going more than 300mph. Well, for the people riding in them, anyway. Above that and the G-forces turn trains into vomit comets.