Ahead of the curve

Re: 'Behind the curve on maglev,' letters, Jan 14: The Shanghai maglev is an impressive achievement, as the writer says. But the underlying technology (the German Transrapid system) is inherently expensive, so Shanghai has so far been the only deployment despite decades of concerted sales efforts by Transrapid.

The 30-kilometer run (not 30 miles as stated by the writer) is reported to have cost $1.3 billion, or $70 million per mile.

Dr. Colin Britcher, chairman of the BCET Aerospace Engineering said ODU is focusing on technical approaches that would lead to greatly reduced costs and on systems more likely to be deployed in urban environments, where high top speeds are less critical.

Further, if maglev caught on, it would be nice to use some homegrown technology, rather than importing everything from overseas. Continued research into almost anything, not just maglev, is justified as we constantly strive to improve performance, safety and economy.