+1

been traveling a lot these days around China, and Solar power is VERY visible in the countrysides.

Meanwhile in Japan they've had bullet trains since 1964...

My electronics teacher explained the physics in detail about these high speed trains which are powered by magnets one day, pretty amazing stuff

Said they would easilly be capable of breaking the sound barrier, and can basically stop and accelerate at speeds which would basically destroy your body/bones

Also if it did break the sound barrier the shock wave produced off the train would flatten the surrounding area for a large distance on either side of the train, however it would also flatten the cars behind the wave as well lol
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^ you should watch, how its made in discovery...

they showed trains in germany that leans when travelling in a curve...stops with the help of eddy currents...pretty cool..

ZhangFei!! how did you escape the pearly depths of perma-ban hell n make your way back onto RS??

(fail just for good measure :))

That's what I thought

ZhangFei being back is more interesting than this article!

I took the Beijing - Tianjin Highspeed train last March. Train was impeccable, brand spankin new, clean, modern, even the "stewardesses" were pretty. Before that though, the train station was exactly as you described. As awesome as new tech is emerging in China, the people still need to catch up. Speaking of that......the expo was a nightmare.

yeah sonic booms are not that strong, mythbusters already pretty much busted this.

Aren't maglev trains really quiet anyways? i would assume that the strength of a sonic boom somewhat depends on the amount of noise that object is creating.

Sonic boom is generated by the force produced of breaking the sound barrier, a stream line jet is like deafening crusing near the barrier so I would assume a large train breaking the barrier would be even louder/stronger
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I personally don't find train as a reasonable mean of transportation in NA. We simply do not have the population density to support such a project.

If US or CA get into the high speed rail game, it would be pretty stupid and bringing very little benefit to the country. America already has an extensive network of roads, why waste them? Simply build them better and wider to accommodate the pop. growth and additional speed of modern cars (think a 8 lane highway each way with no speed limit ala auto bahn)

In a world where we are progressing more and more toward internet based life, it would actually make more sense that government starts funding for ultra high bandwidth networks. In 30 years, most business would be done without face-to-face interaction, why waste money on something that would likely become obsolete in a foreseeable future?

I would vote to whoever proposing cheap gigabit+ connection to major cities

The money spent on the war effort could have built enough wind, solar, turbine and other alternative energy sources to make the US completely independent of non-US oil for its energy needs and put many Americans to work.

In Canada we don't, but the eastern seaboard of the US does.

Because the scarcity and price of oil will make high-speed rail a viable alternative.

I'm not a business person, but I'm also not naive enough to believe that teleconferencing will replace face-to-face human interaction. Have you ever sat through a teleconference before? (e.g. There is a great example from the movie Up In the Air in which someone is fired through a teleconference.) Unless teleportation or some other form of 3D technology comes online, teleconferencing technologies are just a compliment to, rather than a replacement for, human interaction.

who needs a N.A. rail system?....

who travels from city to city? business can be done via web cam... and my tax dollars shouldn't be paying so tourists have something to ride around in. they can pay for airfares

It has enough population, but the population are heavily concentrated in major cities, it won't help anything in between to grow (one of the point of building train stations is to promote urban expansion). If I were to work in NYC, I would stay in Queens or Brown before I think anything further away. All the benefits of city won't get you far.

By the time oil scarcity becomes a major concern, we will have cars that runs on alternative type of energy source or so efficient that it's not really a problem anymore. And with self-driving cars being viable in a near horizon, I believe a better developed road will trump railroad any day. Think high speed train today as train in the 19th/first half of 20th century. They ultimately become a mean to move freight rather than people, this would be the case for high speed trains in 50 or 100 years from now.


Sure human interaction is important, but I think face to face meeting will be less and less important if there's a good replacement. Think if we can project full 3D holographic at 4K resolution? Why do you still want face to face meeting? In my parent's company, they source a specific industrial blade from a Japanese company and they have never met them in person, and they have done business for over 20 years. Online business is still at a very early stage IMHO, Internet as we know it could change tremendously if we have 1000 times the bandwidth

Uh......oil is getting scarce NOW, what's our alternative energy? Electric cars is hardly a solution, and we're years and year away from "Self drive" cars dude.

I think big businesses will continue to have face to face meetings, even if your proposed "3D holographics" is developed. Nothing trumps interacting with a real person in a negotiation situation for example. You obviously don't need to see the other guy (per your parents' example), but the world isn't just about the web in the future, you still have to have tangibles behind the web itself (if that makes sense).

i would be scared about it de-railing at those speeds....

I wouldn't call a bit over doubling the price from the lowest point I started to care about gas price (from about 55cents to 112 today?) oil scarce.

They are still pumping out more than the world could consume any given day.

I'm sure we won't stop having in-person relationship/meeting any time in the future, many tangible goods such as food and cloth simply can't be transported via internet. I'm just saying that with very close and suitable alternatives at fraction of the price, corporate would start to adopt.

Back to the original topic, even with the idea of future technology or not, a well developed road system still makes more sense than high rail trains.

And as for self-driving cars, I'd expect to see it within 10 years. Many corporations including google have developed their system for the car to drive by itself. It's only the time it will take for law to adapt and the tech needed to lower its price to a commercially viable point.

China is hilarious. 10% super modern society, and 90% hidden communist industrial pollution.

I don't get why people protest the Oil Sands here in Canada when China is far worst.

Actually Oil is not getting Scarce. There is Oil still un-tapped in Saskatchewan and Manitoba. I work in this industry and I'll be first to tell you that 500 years from now, when it is, the magical alternative solution will be sold to us by the same people that sell us oil. Thats just how the world works.

My only advice is to buy up solar pannels and wind power BEFORE there is local laws to prevent you from doing it. Cheers.

GG to any one on the tracks! there's no stopping!

Meanwhile the majority of Japanese culture originated in China, have a nice cup of STFU and GTFO

you sir are an idiot :buttkick:...

take off your blinders... there are far more uses going from city to city (or in this case from one point to another...i won't tell you what those are and will let you find those out for yourself...

How did you figure that out? What is your premise? A rise in gas prices at the pump does not dictate a scarcity of oil.

http://shadow.eas.gatech.edu/~kcobb/...gs/Watkins.pdf