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Korean boffins vow 1,000km-an-hour supertrain

Anything Elon can do…?

Korean boffins want to create the blueprint for a train capable of operating at 1,000km/h (621mph).

Like Elon Musk’s back of the envelope Hyperloop concept, the Korea Railroad Research Institute (KRRI) project envisages the vehicles running inside a partial vacuum or low pressure tube.

The KRRI joined the project this week, the Korea Joon Gang Daily reported. Korea’s equivalent will be called the Hyper Tube Express, or HTX, and the government has committed W24bn to the ventures. It’s already keeping three Korean research institutes busy.

The KRRI’s fastest trains can currently operate at 370kph (230mph), with a design speed of 430kph (267mph)

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There’s plenty of global interest in the Hyperloop concept, with Dubai hoping to start connecting the cash rich Gulf emirates by 2020. The distances are far shorter than the 400 mile Los Angeles to San Francisco route originally envisaged by Tesla CEO Elon Musk.

HyperLoop One has been beset by management infighting.

The world’s only operational MagLev train, a showcase that runs from a Shanghai suburb to the city’s Shanghai Pudong International Airport proved to be overschedule and more expensive than anticipated, largely because of the nature of the land: it’s an alluvial plain. Plans to extend the line into the city itself having been postponed several times. ®

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