FROM EIR DAILY ALERT
Expert Shows Maglev Transportation Is Eminently Feasible in U.S. Northeast Corridor
Nov. 16, 2018 (EIRNS)—Kevin Coates, an expert on magnetic levitation (maglev) technology, published a powerful article in the Baltimore Sun today, in which he argued for a maglev line for the Washington-Baltimore-New York-Boston corridor. He further explained that maglev is more than a new technology, but is rather an entire class of transport technologies.
Coates writes:
“Since I arrived in Maryland 35 years ago, traffic congestion has increased almost exponentially. Yet relatively nothing has been done to alleviate the congestion problem. This is because very little can be done to accommodate a doubling or tripling of the number of vehicles. The simple reason for this is that road capacity is limited—and measurable. If the ‘throughput’ of vehicles exceeds 2,000 vehicles per lane-mile, per hour, you get traffic jams.”
The city of Shanghai, China, he writes, with a population of more than 24 million, will soon have 19 subway lines that will “provide station access that is no further than 2,000 feet from any resident in the central part of Shanghai.” The maglev connecting the city’s Pudong International Airport to the downtown, is being extended to the west to a domestic airport cum high-speed rail station, which will cut the present two-hour commute between airports to “15 reliable minutes.”
“This is a perfect example of why congested areas such as our Northeast corridor demand new transportation infrastructure that enables the reliable and efficient movement of more people per hour through a narrower right of way than any 20-lane highway—and something a dual-track maglev does in a financially sustainable and environmentally benign way.”
Coates points out that maglev has extremely low operational and maintenance costs, and that these are the same for low-, medium- and high-speed versions. “Through automated high-quality mass production of component parts and advanced construction techniques...” he says,
“both manufacturing and construction times could be vastly accelerated and, as a consequence, result in an initial capital cost that was far lower than high-speed rail infrastructure costs.”
Coates concludes:
“The real objective of the Northeast Maglev project is to build a 1-hour maglev from D.C. to New York City to make driving I-95 unattractive and financially impractical. Future generations are the ones who will thank us for building such a smart travel option.”
