Maglev
The world's first commercial maglev system was a low-speed maglev shuttle that ran between the airport terminal of Birmingham International Airport and the nearby Birmingham International railway station between 1984 and 1995. Its track length was , and trains levitated at an altitude of , levitated by electromagnets, and propelled with linear induction motors. It operated for 11 years and was initially very popular with passengers, but obsolescence problems with the electronic systems made it progressively unreliable as years passed, leading to its closure in 1995. One of the original cars is now on display at Railworld in Peterborough, together with the RTV31 hover train vehicle. Another is on display at the National Railway Museum in York.
List of maglev train proposals
Baltimore – Washington D.C. Maglev: A 39 Mile (64 km) project has been proposed linking Camden Yards in Baltimore and Baltimore-Washington International (BWI) Airport to Union Station in Washington, D.C. It is in demand for the area due to its current traffic/congestion problems. Based on the Japanese design with the backing of the Japanese government, in November 2013 the company set up to promote it offered to build the guideway and propulsion system for nothing. As of January 2014, the Japanese government has offered to provide financing for half of the estimated $8 billion construction cost. On Saturday 7 November 2015, the office of Maryland Governor Larry Hogan announced that the state had received a $27.8 million grant from the U.S. Department of Transportation to assess the feasibility of a superconducting maglev train line between Baltimore and Washington DC. A maglev train is a super-high-speed rail system that already exists in other parts of the world, reaching speeds of 373 miles per hour in Japan.