SUPERCONDUCTING

MAGNETIC LEVITATION
TRAINS

The Shinkansen is the high speed rail line in Japan
built to connect the distant Japanese regions with
Tokyo to aid the economic growth and development
of the country. Tokaido Shinkansen – the first High
Speed Rail employs an Automatic train control and
uses a 25kV AC, connecting one of todays busiest high
speed rail route of Tokyo – Nagoya – Osaka carrying
5.6 billion passengers with 13 trains per hours in
each direction having 16 cars each with a minimum
headway of 3 minutes between the trains at a speed
240 – 320kmph on a standard gauge. Inorder to
minimize the gauge fluctuation long rails are joined
by expansion joints, also, movable point frog are
installed in the railway turnout eliminating the gaps
and thereby reducing the damage and noise. Further
a combination of both Ballast and Slab track are
employed with Slab tracks installed mainly in
viaducts and tunnels on concrete bed sections.

Ride quality was affected by track irregularity leading
to the need for track maintenance. The frequent
moment of trains lead to the loosening of the
ballasted tracks and bed supporting it. In addition
train passage increased the grade sag and the rail
surface roughness. Inorder to track these the
inspection cars were incorporated and repair works
were carried out at frequent intervals.

Shinkansen became the most preferable mode of
transport reducing the burden on the regional
transportation system with a minimal environmental
footprint. It was highly credited for its reliability with
an average delay of not more than 24 seconds due to
the natural calamities. It is regarded for the safety
record of carrying over more than 10 billion people
in a period of 50 years with no passenger fatality or
injury due to train accidents. The success story of
Shinkansen led to increase in the speed and
development of new HSR routes in Japan namely
Tohoku Shinkansen, Hokkaldo Shinkansen etc. An
estimated 400 million hours were saved switching
from conventional to high speed rail. The below
graph represents the ridership details of Tokaid
Shinkanshen, making it a populous mode among
people to travel over the years.

RIDERSHIP
175

170

165

160
RIDERSHIP
155

150

145

140
FY2007 FY2015 FY2016 FY2017

Fig: Annual Ridership details of Tokaid Shinkanshen (in millions)


Central Japan Railway Company and Railway
Technical Research Institute developed a magnetic
levitation railway system called the SCMaglev that
attained a speed of 603kmph, a pace that has not
been surpassed till date. In order to operate at this
ultra high speed, the superconducting magnetic
levitation entity, or Maglev, levitates 10 cm (100mm)
above the U–shaped concrete guideway by the
magnetic forces generated by the superconducting
magnets in the coaches and the metal coils in the
guideway.

Maglev trains were extensively tested on the
Yamanashi test track leading to construction of Chuo
Shinkansen from Tokyo – Nagoya initially and a
subsequent extension to Osaka is set to be completed
by 2037.

2.5

1.5

Time
1 Route

0.5

0
Tokaid Chuo Shinkansen
Shinkansen

Fig: Time of travel camparision between Tokaid Shinkansen and Chuo
Shinkansen

The above graph represents travel time between Shin
– Osaka by Tokaid Shinkansen and the new Maglev
Chuo Shinkansen. It can be noticed that the travel
train will be reduced by half when the route opens up
for passenger travel.

TGV FRANCE

French electric high speed rail was inagurated to
public between Paris and Lyon suburbs in the year
1981. Originally the TGV operated at speed of
250kmph and less, with the newest TGV clocking a
high speed of 306kmph on a standard track gauge of
1435mm and thereby reducing the cost to build
maglev trains, like in Japan to reach a secodary
destination. These trains carry about 110 million
passengers per year. Also, recently a modified
commercial TGV test train on steel wheels set a
world record by clocking a speed of 574kmph on an
LGV section with vertical profile, gentle curves and a
dowhnhill segment.To accomplish this speed the
overhead voltage was increased from 25kV to 31kv
and the speed of train was increased to 610kmph
thereby providing the marginal safety beyond train’s
maximum speed. TGV train network is extended to its
neighbouring countries including Italy, Spain,
Luxemburg and Germany to name a few.

TGV and LGV track construction varies from a normal
railway line. The radii of the curves are built larger so
that so that the trains can pass easily without
increasing the centripetal acceleration. A
prefabricated track rest’s on the reinforced concrete
sleepers and the alignment of track is more precise,
ballast of atleast 32cm deeper is used below the
sleepers, ballast are piled up on each side of the track
to increase the load bearing capacity and track
stability to withstand high speed. Heavy rails are
welded by using the continuous joints, swingnose
crossings are employed for smooth transition and
more concrete sleepers are employed compared to
the normal conventional lines. Overhead catenary
masts are erected and the track is given final
alignment adjustments down to millimeter
tolerances. In tunnels, the diameter at the entrance is
designed larger as required by the size of the train to
reduce air pressure changes and noise pollution
which can be very problematic at high speeds. An
automated signal system called the TVM
(Transmission Voie – Machine) is employed and the
tracks are fenced to prevent the trespassing by
people and animals.

RIDERSHIP
140

120

100

80
RIDERSHIP
60

40

20

0
2006 2007 2008 2009

Fig: Annual Ridership (in millions)

The graph represents an increasing passengers travel
trend in the annual ridership every year of the TGV
trains.

TGV has a greater advantage over the other maglev
trains being planned around the world as it can use
the existing infrastructure at lower designs. Stations
of the inter – city trains will be an inexpensive
proposition. TGV’s are regarded to have one of the
world’s most advanced security system and never
experienced any fatal accidents in its operational
history. Future of TGV’s remain very promising as
TGV’s are being persuaded in the form of AGV trains
also running on the standard gauge with a possible
greater speeds of 360kmph.

HSR – CHINA

China has the longest high speed rail network in the
world and it has been extensively used by its
population. China Railway High Speed Rail has built
new high speed railway lines at a designed speed of
200 – 300kmph. The first high speed rail network was
inaugurated between Beijing – Tianjin in 2008 for
passenger traffic and runs at a speed of 330kmph and
thereby reducing the travel time from 70 minutes to
just 30 minutes. The passenger railway tracks are
mostly elevated and tunneled structures in China
with the guideway being ballast less resulting in
smoother rides at high speeds and thereby reducing
the maintenance cost in the future.

 HSR RIDERSHIP(IN MILLION)
2500

2000

1500
HSR RIDERSHIP(IN
1000 MILLION)

500

0
2016 2017 2018 2019

fig: HSR ridership in million


The above graph depicts the success story of high
speed rails in China, making it very popular mode
amongst its citizens. High speed rails in China have
reduced the travel time between the origin and
destination and has transformed Chinese society and
economy. They are highly regarded for comfort,
convenience, safety and punctuality.

Shanghai Maglev is credited to be the worlds first
commercial electric high speed maglev train to be
built in the world with a speed of 431kmph. The
construction of the maglev began on 30km stretch
connecting the Pudong International Airport and
Longyang road. This stretch was planned to be a test
track, having elevated structure with pylons
supporting the guideway at every 50m distance but
due to the deposition of the alluvial soil in Pudong the
decision was made to have colums at 25m instead so
as to ensure the guideway meets the stability and
precision criteria. As a result of this geological
condition thousands of concrete piles were driven up
to a length of 70m inside the ground to attain stability
for the pylons and this project was completed in 2002
costing $ 1.33 billion. The travel time on this stretch
takes about 7 minutes and 20 seconds from origin to
the destination at the maximum speed of 431kmph.
The same journey by road would take upto 45
minutes. The ridership due to shorter stretch in the
existing route resulted in only 20% of the capacity
but maglev trains can effectively satisfy the need of
long distance transportation system such as Shangai –
Beijing.

CRRC is conducting research and development on a
possible 600kmph maglev train. A test track of 1.5km
was built in Tongji university in Shangai and the tests
were successfully conducted clocking the required
speed in 2020. They aim to build 5 high speed maglev
train vehicles and test them before inducting them for
commercial use. Further, China plans to build 500km
high speed maglev trains for the commercial use by
2025. It is estimated that China will have a 70,000km
network of high speed rail by 2035.

SYDNEY TO MELBOURNE

Transportation in Australia is facilitated by road, rail,
air and water, these transport services connect
people to jobs, communities and essential services.
Australia is heavily dependent on the road
infrastructure for the moment of passenger and
freight. Capital cities of each states of Australia
including, Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Adelaide and
Perth have widespread commuter network which
have grown and expanded over time with increase in
the demand of population but has limited intercity
and inter – state train network. Air travel is very
populous for both domestic and International travel
in Australia, there are as many as 448 airports, with
305 airports having paved surfaces and 143 unpaved
airports in the country.

Available transport modes connecting Sydney and
Melbourne.

Sydney to Melbourne is one of the worlds busiest
domestic air route with 9,090,941 passengers
choosing to travel by air in 2019. This route covers a
total distance of 705km within a travel time of 1 hour
and 30 minutes costing close to $300 dollars for an
economy ticket.
The Hume highway connects Sydney to Melbourne by
road with a total distance of 840km on dual
carriageway takes a total time of more than 10 hours
between origin and destination points. To complete
this journey, car consumes 65.85 liters of petrol
costing close to $100 dollars.
New South Wales train link operates two xpt trains
from Sydney to Melbourne having a maximum speed
of 160kmph twice a day, one in the day and other an
effective overnight train with a travel time of 10
hours and 50 minutes with a ticket costing around
$132 dollars in first class.

 TIME
12

10

6
TIME

0
ROAD RAIL AIR

fig: Time taken by existing mode of transportation from origin to destination
(Sydney to Melbourne)

The above graph represents the time of travel
between Sydney and Melbourne in hours. Further
delays are caused due to travelling time to reach the
airport, check – in time, boarding time etc

COST ($)
350

300

250

200
COST ($)
150

100

50

0
ROAD RAIL AIR

Fig: Cost of transportation from different modes of transportation.



Transportation Delays in the existing modes of
transport.

Airlines sometimes delay the flights citing bad
weather condition due to which an aircraft will be
unable to fly and in more worst conditions Air Traffic
Control shuts down runways, forcing the airlines to
cancel flights if the weather conditions do not
improve specially during the winter months and
bushfires season around the Christmas months
forcing the passengers to wait over long period of
time.

The Australia land friend is expected to grow by 75
percent from 2011 and 2031.The main interstate
road freight network in Australia includes the Hume
highway connecting Sydney and Melbourne and
accounts to larger passenger traffic between two
cities. Road accidents accounts to 1,195 road crash
deaths in 2019 and hospitalized injuries to 39,330.
Two third of these accidents occurs in regional and
remote areas with one third occurring in major cities.
Road accidents brings traffic to a complete halt until
the emergency services arrive and clear the accident
site which causes major delays up to several hours.
Travel demand between Sydney and Melbourne is
increasing as two are the biggest cities of Australia
resulting in traffic jams and causing further delays.

Sydney to Melbourne rail corridor is one of the oldest
rail corridors in Australia with just 2 trains running
from Sydney to Melbourne every day. A 1024
Kilometers stretch largely on standard gauge and
narrow gauge with small curves and sharp gradients
carries both passengers and freight from one place to
another starting from Sydney, stopping at Albury,
Tottenham yard and Melbourne. Track repair work is
frequently carried out on this stretch, yet there was a
traffic disruption in the recent time after a Sydney –
to – Melbourne train derailed at Wallan killing two
people. Australia has to enhance its current rail
transportation infrastructure and reduce the load on
road and air traffic either by upgrading the current
railway infrastructure and thereby reducing
expenditure for new infrastructure where the new
infrastructure would be particularly expensive or an
extension where traffic does not justify new
infrastructure.

Future plans for a High speed rail network

Australia is separated by its long distance capital
cities and the existing rail infrastructure is not
developed over the past few years leading to the
wasted time and cost productivity. The highest speed
on an Australian track was recorded at 210kmph
during a trail run by Queensland Rail’s Electric tilt
train in 1998 which is slightly above the criteria of
high speed rail speed at 200kmph but this speed was
never tested nor implemented during commercial
passenger use and the highest operating speed in the
country remains at 160kmph and therefore High
speed rail infrastructure does not exist in Australia
yet, given the speed of 200kmph but it has the
highest potential to have one given the distance
between major cities. This mode of transport in
Australia is under investigation between Australia’s
two largest cities Sydney and Melbourne stopping at
Canberra. The studies on this route suggested a
construction cost of $A61 billion, initially but the
adoption of difficult alignments and cost blowouts in
the future will cost over $A100 billion.

Output

Australia has diverse regions with differing
opportunities and challenges. In an output to the
above study of the route from Sydney to Melbourne
we understand that this route has a potential to have
a Ultra – High – Speed rail network for both
passenger and freight which is safer, faster, low cost,
more convenient and reliable, immune to weather,
environmental friendly and self powering. Fostering
innovation and embracing opportunities based on the
trends in transport sector will provide economic
growth and productivity gains allowing Australia to
prosper in the years to come. We need to launch a
speed up campaign in Australia to build a custom
infrastructure to accommodate new mode of
transportation having high speeds, at same time a
safer and a reliable. This new mode of transportation
will be possibly a 5th mode of transportation –
Hyperloop. It is conceptualized to have a high speed
of 900 – 1000kmph and can be a revolutionary mode
of transport connecting two cities. It will be most
suited for longer distances and can carry both
passengers and freight.

Hyperloop Infrastructure for route Sydney and
Melbourne.

1. THE HYPERLOOP POD/CAPSULE

Capsules/Pods aims at Ultra – High – Speed and
climate neutral ground transportation system. Pods
will have the capacity to carry passengers and freight
in the Hypertube at possible high speeds of 700 –
1000kmph, which is 3 times faster than high speed
rail and 10 times faster than traditional rail. Air and
rolling resistance are taken out of the equation and
thus allowing speeds greater than 1000kmph. These
capsules are supported via air bearings that operate
using a compressed air reservoir and aerodynamic
lift. As the capsules speed up, the aerodynamic drag
increase, thus increasing the power requirement.
Pods travel extremely efficiently and gain their power
from renewable energy sources such as sun.

TRAVEL TIME (hours)
12

10

4 TRAVEL TIME (hours)

fig: Travel time from Sydney to Melbourne by different modes of transport.
The two versions of Hyperloop capsule are
1. Passenger only version
2. Passenger plus version

A Hyperloop passenger capsule will have a width of
1.35m, height of 1.10m and power of 5500lb onboard,
to carry a full capacity of 28 passengers while
travelling along the interior of the tube and weighing
around 3500kgs with the interiors adding an
additional 2500kgs to the pod. The system also
includes a compressor, which helps the capsule travel
in a narrow space without any filling up of air mass
between the capsule and tube walls, a motor is
installed in the system to accelerate to high speeds
and a cooler. These capsules depart at an average of 2
minutes depending on the traffic, the system has the
capability to depart several pods per minute and not
requiring to stop at every station. This means a total
of 30 capsule departs every hour with 840 passengers
onboard travelling from Sydney to Melbourne in one
hour, where loading and unloading of passengers can
take up to 5 minutes. The hyperloop capacity can be
increased depending on the traffic and requirement.
The passenger plus vehicle will depart as often as the
passenger only version but will in addition to the
passengers it will accommodate 3 additional vehicles.

The Hyperloop pod is currently at an experimental
setup. A Hypertube is a steel tube built for partial
vacuum (nearly airless) having an outer diameter of
1.83 meters to levitate the pressurized vehicle pods
on a shorter test track of 1km, which was set up in the
state of California in The United States of America in
2017. A subscale prototype transport vehicle was
built in order to demonstrate various technical
feasibility aspects of hyperloop.

The highest speed attained by pod so far, was
designed by the Technical University of Munich with a
record speed of 482kmph, peak acceleration of 2.4g
and a mass of 69kg. This pod consists customized
battery cells have improvised power density to power
the system, 8 light weight but high power iron – less
motors to generate higher pressure, pneumatic
power braking system with higher power was
installed and all titanium design was considered
which was lighter but stronger reinforced chassis
were utilized.


2. HYPERLOOP PYLONS

Hyperloop structure should be capable of
withstanding atmospheric pressure, tube weight,
winds, etc. This structure will be designed elevated
for most part of the stretch between Sydney and
Melbourne thereby minimizing the physical footprint
by lifting its functions above the ground level.
Hyperloop tubes will be placed on elevated pylons
(columns) with these pylons acting as structural
support for this transportation system. Pylons
constrain the tube in vertical direction but allow
longitudinal slip for thermal expansion. The pillar to
tube position will be structured in a way such that in
case of possible ground settlements the nominal
position will be able to adjust vertically and
horizontally. Slip joints are designed at the stations,
which will be able to take variance in the tube length
due to thermal expansion as a result temperature
increase, thus allowing the tube to be smooth and
welded along the high speed gliding middle section.
This elevated infrastructure will reduce the costs of
land acquisition and possibility of colliding with road
traffic.

The distance between the hyperloop columns
carrying the tube will be critical since to achieve the
design objective of the tube structure. We will
consider a spacing of 30 meters (100ft) from one
pillar to another supporting both the hyperloop tubes
and the overhead solar panels. The pillars will be
designed to be 7 meters tall but the length will vary
depending on the geographical obstacles, such as
mountainous terrain and other obstacles in the way.
The spacing between the pillars may also vary
depending on the soil conditions according to the
geotechnical findings and also in order to pass over
roads and other obstacles. Further, small spacing
between the supports will help reduce deflection in
the tube and increases resistance to the seismic
loading and lateral acceleration of capsule.

The stretch from Sydney to Melbourne will require
close to 30,000 pillars, and due to low cost per
volume reinforced concrete is selected as the material
for construction of these pillars. In order to keep the
alignment as straight as possible, to avoid bent radii
and going over the mountainous terrain, tunneling is
required for shorter areas. Tunneling is an expensive
infrastructure in comparison to elevated structures
but shall be considered wherever required by
virtually eliminating the aerodynamic drag the
hyperloop can have cross-sectional area half that of
high – speed rail and therefore close to half the cost.


3. STATIONS

The stations for hyperloop will include the major
traffic regions. The larger traffic regions in the given
stretch from Melbourne to Sydney will include the
Sydney, Canberra (which is at 290km from Sydney)
and Melbourne potentially making hyperloop
stopping at these places.

There will be continuous flow of passengers at
hyperloop stations due to frequent departures and
short travel time. Safety and security of the
passengers is paramount and security checks similar
to airplane shall be considered for hyperloop
transportation. The Hyperloop terminal will consist
of large airlocks signifying entry and exit of the pods
that will allow the capsule to equalize the pressure
with the station and then allow passengers to
disembark. Once the capsule is vacated it will be re –
aligned for re – entry into the hyperloop tube where
the pod will be moved into airlock to lower the
pressure to operating level and set ready for another
departure.

4. Hyperloop Tube

The Hyperloop route between Sydney and Melbourne
consists of a partially evacuated cylindrical tube in a
closed loop system. These tubes will be elevated on
the pillars to minimize the cost and to reduce the
environmental footprint. The right – of – way
requirements ranges from 12 to 24 meters across, a
significantly smaller right – of -way than the 18 to 30
meters requiring for the high – speed – rail.
Hyperloop journey in this tube will be smooth, as it
will be guided by air bearings and suspension
preventing the need for the costly track (i.e. high
speed Maglev). Solar panels shall be fixed on top of
the tube to provide required system energy. Given the
increased freight movement between two cities we
can have passenger capsule and passenger plus
capsule (freight capsule).

Hyperloop tube makes up a large part of Hyperloop
infrastructure and this tube should be strong enough
to withstand the loads exerted on it and stiff enough
to resist the deformation. Also, the tube
infrastructure should be capable to withstand
extreme weather condition (saline air, rain, heat, etc.).
The potential tube materials are steel, concrete,
aluminum and acrylic. Steel has the advantages over
the other materials like, concrete is very weak in
tension, acrylic is very expensive, aluminum has
lower stiffness and high but steel is most widely
produced and extensively used material in the world
having high strength and stiffness, relatively
inexpensive and it can be mass produced to a
required strength, so considering all these advantages
of steel over other materials, steel tube reinforcement
with stringers is selected as the material of choice for
the inner diameter of the Hyperloop tube. Steel
reduces the construction costs and construction time
leading to significant improvement in the economical
potential of the hyperloop. The steel tubes are pre –
fabricated and installed between the pylons at
distance depending on the geotechnical condition of
the soil. A distance of 30 meters shall be considered
given the alluvial soil, clay and sand deposition in the
given route. Steel tubes are joined by simple welding
process. These tubes will also include safety
emergency exits and pressurization ports along the
length of the tube. The difference in the air pressure
causes the vacuum buckling and this is very
dangerous for thin – walled hyperloop tubes in order
to counteract this the thickness of the outer tube wall
will be 25mm. This will also help to resist bending,
and load due to capsule weight and acceleration.
These steel tubes make up to 20 percent of the overall
hyperloop infrastructure cost.

Challenges:

The major challenges in construction of the hyperloop
tube in Australia are, the cost of steel, thermal
expansion and damages to the tube.

Given the benefits of steel over other materials,
constructing a steel tube with 25mm thick wall for
more than 1000 kilometers will require a large
amount of steel and therefore will have
environmental constraints. The Hyperloop is not
potentially affected by the external weather condition
and tube must be able to withstand these weather
condition so further assessment in regards to
corrosion resistance and wind loads needs to be
carried out. Australia is exposed to higher average
temperatures and steel is very susceptible to thermal
expansion and hence this disadvantage has to be
counteracted.

Future Scope:

A steel vacuum tube can be replaced by a Concrete
vacuum tube, which can serve as an economic design
choice for Hyperloop Transport.

ROUTE

Hyperloop will travel

COST