China Slows Down Its High-Speed Trains
NAMTI Warnings Regarding Rail’s Limitations Validated
Washington, DC – On April 14th, the China Daily reported that the new minister for Chinese Ministry of Rails, Sheng Guangzu, who replaced former railways minister Liu Zhijun on Feb 25 amid corruption charges, is ordering all high-speed trains to lower top cruising speeds from 220 mph to 185 mph. Mr. Liu was removed from office and is being investigated for “severe violation of discipline,” according to Chinese media reports. The official reasons cited in the new directive were “lower energy consumption” and “improved safety.” However, there is more to this directive than meets the eye.
Since its founding, the North American Maglev Transport Institute has attempted to inform the public and policy leaders about the not so obvious fact that mechanical steel-wheel-on-steel-rail trains are speed limited due to exponential increases in maintenance and maintenance costs at speeds above 175 mph.
Contrary to the American high-speed rail lobby’s claims of 220 or 250 mph trains for America, sustained operations at such high speeds simply wear out the rails and wheels too fast for such systems to be economically feasible. The HSR lobby’s other claim that high-speed maglev is “not proven” and is “too expensive” is also contradicted by the Shanghai maglev line’s 7 years of continual daily operations at speeds up to 267 mph, now with 115 daily trips. According to Shanghai Maglev Transport officials, there has been no wear to the maglev guideway and its 19-mile alignment has been adjusted only twice in a few locations in the last 7 years to correct for subsidence, for a grand total of only two weeks’ worth of labor.
If the goal is reliable, high-speed, electric-powered ground transportation, then maglev is the most efficient and cost effect way of accomplishing that goal. This is why the next Japanese high-speed rail line is using maglev technology for its new Tokyo to Nagoya Shinkansen.
For more detailed information on this subject, visit the NAMTI website video section and the “Maglev: Safer Than Trains” section.
About NAMTI
The North American Maglev Transport Institute was founded and registered in 2010 as a Washington, DC non-profit educational organization to increase the exposure and level of understanding of magnetically levitated (maglev) transport. NAMTI advocates for the deployment of fast, reliable, safe, clean, quiet & sustainable transport. Current maglev transport technology meets or exceeds that definition, while rail does not. NAMTI members and supporters are comprised of travelers who want highly reliable, all-weather transport at reasonable prices. Contributors to the site are a highly educated international cadre of scientists, engineers and academics who well understand the many advantages that maglev transport has over traditional mechanical transportation systems, whether fast or slow, due in part to maglev’s dramatically lower annual maintenance needs and costs. Frequent and costly maintenance is the “Achilles’ Heel” of fast HMR trains. The fact that maglev transport can travel safely at speeds in excess of 300 mph (500 km/h) without any “speed/maintenance penalty,” gives it clear superiority to HMR in both economic and reliability terms. For more information, please visit the NAMTI website: www.namti.org.