The big difference between a maglev train and a conventional train is that maglev trains do not have an engine - at least not the kind of engine used to pull typical train cars along steel tracks.
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Soon, they believed, passengers would board magnetically propelled cars and zip from place to place at high speed, and without many of the maintenance and safety concerns of traditional railroads.
It wasn't long before engineers began planning train systems based on this futuristic vision. Even before that, in 1904, American professor and inventor Robert Goddard had written a paper outlining the idea of maglev levitation. The first patents for magnetic levitation (maglev) technologies were filed by French-born American engineer Emile Bachelet all the way back in the early 1910s. Less vibration and friction results in fewer mechanical breakdowns, meaning that maglev trains are less likely to encounter weather-related delays. Because the trains rarely (if ever) touch the track, there's far less noise and vibration than typical, earth-shaking trains. Yet high speed is just one major benefit of maglev trains. There's no rail friction to speak of, meaning these trains can hit speeds of hundreds of miles per hour. These trains float over guideways using the basic principles of magnets to replace the old steel wheel and track trains. In the 21st century there are a few countries using powerful electromagnets to develop high-speed trains, called maglev trains. For engineers looking for the next big breakthrough, perhaps "magical" floating trains are just the ticket. aren't much faster today than they were a century ago. And of course, during the World War I era, the first commercial flights began transforming our travels all over again, making coast-to-coast journeys a matter of hours. Just a few decades later, passenger automobiles made it possible to bounce across the countryside much faster than on horseback. In the 1860s, a transcontinental railroad turned the months-long slog across America into a week-long journey. The evolution of mass transportation has fundamentally shifted human civilization. A magnetically levitated (maglev) train developed by Central Japan Railways Co.