High-speed trains have been a high priority in China in recent decades. The Chinese government wants to connect more major cities by train to reduce the time and cost of traveling in the world’s most populous country. To this end, a project to build maglev trains was launched at the beginning of the 21st century.Maglev trains appear to “float” thanks to an electromagnetic force that makes them glide over the tracks.
The first visible result was a line connecting Shanghai International Airport with Longyang Road station in the city. With a cruising speed of 431 km/h, it covers the 30 km in just seven and a half minutes. A remarkable achievement when you consider that the ICE reaches a top speed of 330 km/h. Moreover, less than twenty years later, the Transrapid Shanghai is already the oldest functioning commercial maglev train.
Record-breaking, “floating” trains
And it seems that the Chinese government is not yet satisfied with this astonishing speed. It recently unveiled another super-fast train that reaches a whopping 620 km/h. And that’s not even the most impressive piece of information: the China Railway Rolling Stock Corporation is said to have developed an even faster prototype that will reach 800 km/h. That’s almost as fast as the cruising speed of a commercial airliner (900 km/h) – with the added advantage of not having to wait for take-off and landing.
This super-fast train and its record-breaking older brother are expected to cover the distance between Shanghai and Beijing (1,200 kilometers) in less than three hours. To this end, China is also building a high-speed rail system that will make such speeds possible. The development is to be completed as part of the 14th Five-Year Plan (2021-25), which is China’s main development strategy to promote scientific and technological innovation in the railroad industry.
Could we see something similar in Germany? Well, at the moment it seems difficult, as the German railroad system only allows a speed of 300 km/h. Therefore, the entire network would have to be renovated. Ultimately, however, passengers could travel from Stuttgart to Berlin in just 45 minutes .