How the incredible 430km/h flying plane-train hybrid ‘The Aérotrain’ lies ABANDONED after promising to change travel forever – The Sun
THE world’s most unusual train could reach speeds of 430km/h and was set to change the way people travel.
But the revolutionary ‘Aerotrain’ was soon abandoned and the partially demolished test track has since become an incongruous landmark in the heart of the world. French country.
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Developed in France from 1965 to 1977 under the technical direction of Jean Bertin, the Aerotrain was intended to take the French rail network to the forefront of the future. public transport.
An experimental high-speed Tracked Air Cushion Vehicle (TACV), also known as a hovertrain, rode on an air cushion on top of a concrete track and was propelled by a airplanes engine.
However, unlike conventional railways, the Aerotrain would run on a single concrete track in the shape of an inverted T, meaning no wheels were required.
The idea for the Aerotrain had come about after one of Bertin’s employees, who worked on motorcycle exhaust mufflers, came up with a way to make their vehicles floating a few centimeters above the ground.
But after realizing that the vehicles had to be enormous to work, Bertin considered abandoning the entire process.
However, that was until he discovered a group English researchers planned to launch a hovercraft, a vehicle based on very similar characteristics technologyand so he continued to begin the research process.
Bertin’s dream quickly attracted attention and he soon struck a deal with SNCF (France’s national state railway company) in 1967, authorizing a test track in Loiret.
Located north of Orleans, a city in north-central France, about 120 kilometers southwest of ParisThe track reached a length of 18 kilometers and consisted of 120 meter long sections resting on 900 ten meter poles.
It was put into service in September 1969 and numerous tests were carried out over the next five years.
After the failure of a first prototype, a second reached speeds of 420 km/h in 1969 and 437 km/h in 1974.
It was not until 1981 that the TGV (France’s intercity high-speed line) exceeded the speed of 380 km/h.
In 1989, the Aerotrain broke the record for all air-suspended vehicles, which it still holds.
But after the first petrol crisis in 1973 caused a major shock to the financial world, Aerotrain and TGV were forced to rethink their way of moving.
While high-speed trains could rely on electricity, Aerotrain did not share the same luxury.
Despite this setback, Aerotrain signed a contract in 1974 to build lines from the new town of Cergy-Pontoise to the La Defense business district in Paris.
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Russia’s own Jet Train
Soviet engineers’ vision of a futuristic turbo train that could reach lightning speeds now lies rotting on a factory site.
The 50 ton jet powered train could reportedly reach speeds of around 300 km/h along the tracks.
And it is thought that the 28 meter long train carriage, with the right track underneath, could have reached a speed of more than 350 km/h.
But now the ruins of the futuristic locomotive lie slowly disintegrating on a factory site in Kalininsky. St. Petersburg.
In the 1960s, Soviet passenger trains traveled at an average speed of about 40 miles per hour.
And when the US launched its ambitious jet-powered train project, the then Soviet Union couldn’t fall behind the competition.
The American M-497 Black Beetle was built in 1966 and reached speeds of 300 km/h.
Soviet engineers were then tasked with building an experimental train that could rival the American model.
The experimental train was built in 1970 by researchers at Kalinin Carriage Works.
Designers took a standard train car and attached to its roof a pair of engines from a Yak-40 passenger plane.
The superfast train has reportedly performed well in tests, reaching speeds of 200 mph.
This is much faster than even today’s high-speed trains, including Japan’s Shinkansen bullet train.
The Russian turbo train – officially called the High Speed Laboratory Car – was unveiled in October 1970.
It would be conducted on an experimental test track under the control of engineer Mikhail Nepryaev and aircraft mechanic Alexei Lozov.
Five years of testing followed, with the superspeed train even running on some public stretches of track as it roared along.
The All-Union Research Institute of Carriage Building boasted that the train could have reached speeds of up to 360 km/h.
And they hoped that their creation could have been the basis for a new generation of railways crossing the Soviet Union.
But as the communist bloc slowly began to eat itself, such ambitious plans were shelved.
However, the month before, Valery Giscard d’Estaing had become the next French president and had plans to expand the country’s railway power.
But he prioritized financing the TGV and, to Bertin’s dismay, canceled the Aerotrain project in July 1974.
A. Jean Bertin died of cancer the following year and his Aerotrain dream would survive him only a few years, with the last ride taking place in 1977.
To this day, the strange concrete beams that were used as the Aerotrain track still lie in the middle of the rural French landscape.
Weathered, painted and partly even demolished, they form a memorial to an abandoned dream.
The abandoned trail stretches 18 km between Saran, a town just north of Orleans, and the village of Ruan, cutting an odd shape amid the agricultural landscape.
If the project had been successful, it could have connected Orleans to Paris in 25 minutes, which today takes about an hour.
In recent years, a company called Spacetrain (space-train.fr) has announced plans to revive the project in Saran, where the old test track is located.
Spacetrain launched in 2017 and planned to use the air cushion technology of its predecessors, with trains traveling at speeds of 500 km/h, powered by hydrogen fuel cells.
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