Britain should have a maglev train from London to Edinburgh
Posted by PublicGullible5399@reddit | CrazyIdeas | View on Reddit | 31 comments
Britain's history with locomotives is a long and deep one. However, that relationship has all but been severed as the railways operate on a strange public/private model, reliability is down the drain and costs for passengers are sky high. Add to the fact the Chinese are absolutely destroying the world in development of high-speed rail, Britain is really the last horse in this race.
To combat this Britain should build a maglev train from London to Edinburgh.
Why you ask? The world's very first commercial maglev project was actually built at Birmingham airport - it was the Air-Rail Link. So it's probably in us to be able to to do it (although this is no indicator of being able to do it today). Better public transport would improve social mobility, enable less depence on London as economic hub and even ease the housing crisis as a result, due to the fact people dont need to live so close to work.
In terms of direct train comparisons, here's an example:
- London-Edinburgh:
- 533 km (331 miles)
- 4 - 4.5 hours (most likely longer with delays)
- Looking 3 weeks in advance, tickets are over £100 one-way, 2nd class
- Beijing-Shanghai:
- 1,318 km (819 miles), so more than double the distance
- 4.5 - 5.5 hours for non-stop services
- £60 - £75 one-way, 2nd class
With maglev (assuming an unrealistic, straight line), a direct journey could theoretically take 1 hour and 10 minutes. It is absolutely a crazy idea, but there's a little bit of sense behind the madness.
martzgregpaul@reddit
The majority of people on that route are not going to Edinburgh. They are getting off at the other major cities on the way or changing at York, Doncaster, Newcastle etc.
It doesnt save nearly as much time if you are speeding up and slowing down all the time.
174wrestler@reddit
Look at the population of Beijing and Shanghai and the population of Tokyo and Nagoya plus Osaka-Kobe-Kyoto (the Japanese maglev).
Now compare that to Edinburgh.
PublicGullible5399@reddit (OP)
Which is fair. Maybe I’m dreaming but I see world where tourism improves and there’s less dependence economically on London. Perhaps it is just that, an economic dream. But let’s say we compare London-Edinburgh to Zurich-Geneva: the populations are also small - London-Edinburgh is much bigger so are we saying there isn’t enough value in connecting both ends of a country in a better way? I can’t seem to buy that idea.
I’m going off the tracks now (badum tss) but this is where have a hard time with British me taking when it comes to public infrastructure, there’s always a justification why we shouldn’t do something rather than why we should.
jamesmatthews6@reddit
Well the obvious answer would be to build it to the large connurbations in northern England i.e. Manchester and Leeds-Bradford and then rejoin conventional lines from there. You still cut journey times considerably and can then go on to build extensions if you think it's worthwhile.
See, for example, France which built Paris-Lyon first and has subsequently extended the line south to Marseille (among other places).
PublicGullible5399@reddit (OP)
That idea makes perfect sense.
I think the question over my head about the other persons comment is, were they questioning whether connecting London-Scotland is worthwhile at all? Or, specifically maglev being the criticism.
smclcz@reddit
One way that economic disparity between London and the rest of the UK could be closed is by actually funding transport outside London and the SE of England. London has had an enormous amount of extra investment in transport compared to the north of England - which works out to about £10k more per person more.
I have no idea why the English aren't more upset about this - London's needs are met every time and the rest have to just accept they're always going to get scraps
Calm_Criticism9544@reddit
Maglevs use a ton of electric, far too expensive, China does not run theirs at full speed for that reason too.
Michaelleahcim00@reddit
I like the way you think, I like your creativity, I like your idea. But how about - a new line from London to Plymouth which is currently 4hrs+ ? This could be the perfect place for a brand new maglev line a la Brunel.
kacheow@reddit
If HS2 is any indication of how much things cost, I’m not sure they can afford it
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MariahJames8@reddit
They'd charge concorde prices for it. Id rather have infrastructure that ill actually use
PublicGullible5399@reddit (OP)
You’re probably right. But with increased renationalisation of certain parts of the railway system, I can kind of see some hope of price controls. But that’s probably just as crazy as wanting maglev…
SamLooksAt@reddit
Just build a regular Shinkansen.
They are approaching 340 kph in service in Japan now and if you were building the tracks from scratch they could be faster.
That's less than 2 hours for that distance using technology that's been proven for decades.
PublicGullible5399@reddit (OP)
I would love to have this. I don’t really know how to debate against folks saying “what’s the point?”. I think it’s important that the two ends of a country are well connected for a whole host of reasons, a bullet train in Britain would be a great way to do that.
K2YU@reddit
I'm not sure if maglev is the right solution for this. It would probably be better to restore the cancelled HS2 sections from Brirmingham to Manchester and Leeds and extend the line all the way to Edinburgh and Glasgow, although this seems to be unrealistic due to cost and NIMBY issues.
TJohns88@reddit
Hey it's a crazy idea, not a good one
PublicGullible5399@reddit (OP)
Agreed!!!
PublicGullible5399@reddit (OP)
Absolutely agree! Maglev was the crazy part of this idea lol. But more high speed rail would be great of all kinds.
Fine_Cress_649@reddit
Regular high speed rail like the TGV or the Eurostar could cover that in about 90 - 120 minutes. Honestly no need for maglev
Evening-Tomatillo-47@reddit
Yeah but we're still building a shit railway and calling it progress. We could do London to Manchester in about half an hour but nooooo.....
UniquePotato@reddit
That would be tens of billions of pounds spend to save two hours. Is it really worth it.
Most passengers would prefer a more comfortable, reliable and cheaper service.
superstrijder16@reddit
Maglev as an idea was proposed when the limit of trains was vibrations due to the speed. This meant in a train going 200km/h it was impossible to talk due to the clattering of everything around. Quite unpleasent. But now we have dampeners which almost entirely eliminate those vibrations. Therefore building a rail line with a design speed of 300-400 km/h and running trains over there is much better: now the trains can also go to other stations beyond, in the way that French TGV do.
ozaudi@reddit
It's 4 to 5 hours Kings Cross/Euston to Edinburgh. Flight time London City Airport to Edinburgh is under 1h30m
No real benefit in adding a high cost high speed train.
PublicGullible5399@reddit (OP)
I understand but that’s a bit of a red herring. A high speed train that connects the north to south would be greatly beneficial and with stops along the way, could be quite useful for the reasons I outlined in my post.
ozaudi@reddit
You understand there is no real benefit but you still think it's useful ? Add stops and the benefits diminish not increase.
Crazy ideas from crazy people.
theportyunionjack@reddit
If they built HS2 to the original plan, Edinburgh to London would have been 2 hours 12 minutes.
PersevereSwifterSkat@reddit
A straight link to Edinburgh doesn't make economic sense, there will never be enough passengers to justify it. But that this tiny island doesn't have a fast North-South unified rail line is a disgrace. We have the engineers for this I've no doubt, some people need to knock their heads together and sort it out.
LatelyPode@reddit
Not the craziest idea. It was actually considered and was called UK UltraSpeed. But they ended up not perusing it and going for UK HighSpeed proposal (HS2) due to it being drastically more expensive, incompatible with the rest of the network and the cons of maglev at the time.
Judging by the fact that the had to cut HS2 so much due to mismanaging the project and causing the costs to spiral, so much in fact that HS2 will do the opposite of what it was intended to do (it will reduce capacity rather than increase it due to not building it all), I don’t think maglev will be possible in the UK for a good few decades.
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