

China Buys 80 Very High Speed Trains (236 mph) for $4 Billion - MikeCapone
http://www.bombardier.com/en/corporate/media-centre/press-releases/details?docID=0901260d800acfd9

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ATB
High-speed train competition is a fascinating topic (if you're a.. uh..
trainspotter :))

For about a decade, Germany has been trying to sell the 'Transrapid' mag-lev
trains and tech to China. Transrapid was sponsored by various German
governments (both federal and state) for well over two decades, with the
occasional state PM or federal minister turning it into their pet project
(e.g. to link an airport to a city, or to link two big cities), etc. The
Transrapid patent is from 1934 and the first test track was completed in
Germany in 1987, almost twenty years after planning first started.

Unfortunately (for the Transrapid guys), 'normal' train technology started
catching up, and the technological hurdles to implementing long-distance mag-
lev trains remain prohibitively expensive, despite vast sums being sunk into
it by the German government (not only is the actual technology quite
sensitive, but the tranches that need to be built tend to be elevated and very
straight - which doesn't work well in densely populated areas like Europe).

In the late 90s and early 00s, the only way forward seemed to be selling it to
a place needing fast trains and having no scruples about building the tranches
wherever they damn well please. Enter China. A few years ago, a German-Chinese
joint venture built a single 19-mile track to connect Shanghai to its airport.

The real kicker? The German companies behind Transrapid continue to allege
that the Chinese are stealing the technology and implementation details from
the German side of the joint-venture so they can build their own -- much
cheaper. Or as China Daily reported, the State Council is 'encouraging
engineers to "learn and absorb foreign advanced technologies while making
further innovations."'

The cost for the aforementioned 19-mile Transrapid track was $1.4 billion
dollars. The cost of 80 high-speed Bombardier trains (running on presumably
standard rail lines)? $4 billion.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transrapid>

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jacquesm
It might please you then to know that in dutch 'ATB' stands for 'automatische
trein beveiliging', loosely translated to 'automatic train protection'.

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jrwoodruff
This reminds me of an article I read awhile ago (in wired?) that said
something to the effect that China could very well leap-frog petroleum and go
straight to a 'green' transportation model. Seems dictators don't have to wage
petty battles over who-gets-what-when-where-why-and-how.

Given the number of dedicated, high speed rail lines in the U.S. (uhm, 0? as
far as I know...), it looks like China could beat us.

Note: Not advocating communism or anything here, it just makes me angry that
rail transit is so crappy in this country. It's a great way to travel, at
least in Europe.

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ujjwalg
This is great for China. Hopefully, US will be working in implementing this
soon too.

~~~
patio11
I hope not. The shinkansen is lovely, don't get me wrong (+), but they
estimate $40+ billion (which is likely about 40% of what it would actually
cost given the persistent cost overruns in infrastructure projects) just to
connect Sacramento through San Diego.

The only thing that would come close to making trains economical in the US is
a massive firebombing campaign of every city you hope they're going to run
through, and even that would be pushing it, since even with cheap right-of-
ways you'd still have to string them across the country.

See, in general, [http://green.venturebeat.com/2008/04/11/why-the-
california-h...](http://green.venturebeat.com/2008/04/11/why-the-california-
high-speed-rail-plan-is-fundamentally-flawed/)

\+ If you priced US high speed rail like Japan prices the shinkansen, it would
cost you about $250 for a round-trip ticket from New York to Boston. I do the
Nagoya to Tokyo circuit every once in a while for work. The system is one of
the wonders of the modern world but, holy cow, is it expensive. (Its expensive
to ride, its expensive to subsidize, and HOLY COW was it expensive to build.
Shinkansen-related debt hit nearly 30 trillion yen -- that's in the general
vicinity of $300 billion, folks. And that is for a country that would fit in
California, with room to spare.)

~~~
yuan
> See, in general, [http://green.venturebeat.com/2008/04/11/why-the-
> california-h...](http://green.venturebeat.com/2008/04/11/why-the-
> california-h..).

Too much hot air. How about some real numbers from historical data?

From "Sustainable Energy - without the hot air" by David McKay, p.121.
<http://www.inference.phy.cam.ac.uk/mackay/Books.html>

Energy consumption

(kWh per 100 p-km)

\------------------

Car 68

Bus 19

Rail 6

Air 51

Sea 57

\------------------

Table 20.8. Overall transport efficiencies of transport modes in Japan (1999).

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AndrewJ
American here, I think it'd be amazing if we'd increase our infrastructure by
taking oh, say, two billion and helping to cost down someone building these in
the US.

I admit I haven't researched this more, but someone just mentioned that
there's talks about a cross country high speed rail being built; it would go
through MI and that's how I came into contact with the topic. I'd love to see
something like that happen...stop building 2/10 bombs and build a few
trains/bridges :)

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garnet7
Love riding the train. Such efficient transportation. So much more relaxing
than driving the car. Personally though, I like the old technology. Steel
wheels on steel rails still goes plenty fast, feels smooth, is cheap, and is
so terribly simple that it's hard (but of course not impossible) for things to
go wrong.

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holdenc
Totalitarianism has its efficiencies.

~~~
LostInTheWoods
Totalitarianism is very efficient until the people realize material wealth
without political freedom is hollow.

~~~
randallsquared
That's the standard line, but I'm not sure that it's as inevitable as that. It
might well be that an efficient and well-run dictatorship or monarchy can
compete with Western-style democracy (though I'm not sure China is "well-run"
enough in this sense to be a good test case).

~~~
bilbo0s
Singapore . . . is the example you were looking for I think.

~~~
randallsquared
Yeah, I did think about Singapore, but I don't know much about how it's set up
politically, so I decided to stick with the case already on topic. :)

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_ck_
Not trying to be funny, but I am kind of surprised they didn't just buy a few
and make copies of them.

~~~
bliving
Construction will happen in China (Qingdao), with project management and
components(?) split between China and Europe offices.

And not that funny; I know of heavy manufacturing companies that multiply
their selling prices by 10 for equipment that is destined for China just for
that reason.

~~~
jacquesm
Thereby giving the Chinese a great incentive to copy them, after all they're
being ripped off.

That's pretty much analogous to people copying music because they've been
ripped off for so long.

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bliving
Apologies for not being clearer. I believe that they agreed to this co-
development project because they are getting a good deal; as in, no being
charged 10x because they're chinese.

They will have ample opportunity for the technology transfer required to do
the next 800 on their own. And Bombardier will have their opportunity to
compete on the next project. But the pessimist in me also believes that
Bombardier will do their best to prevent that technology transfer! Sad, but it
seems to be the path of least resistance in business these days.

~~~
jacquesm
Ah ok, I misread you completely. Too late to edit now, but thanks for the
clarification.

