Maglev for Munich?
 

Evoking the Maglev bullet train linking Shanghai to its airport, Munich officials are seriously thinking about construction a similar one from its remote airport to the town center. Maglev technology, which began in all places the UK, not known for rail development in the modern era, but was perfected in Germany, on a test track in the Hamburg/Hannover area but was not deemed feasible for Germany - mainly due to trackinfrastructre, being built on pillars, causing lots of opposition from folks near the proposed right of way - but for short hops like this it could be viable.
Officials are presently disgusted at the poor rail link to the airport, via a slow stopping S-Bahn that takes about 40 minutes. The Maglev will do it in about 10-15 minutes.
Chances of being built: talk is cheap, Maglev is not.

The name is "Transrapid" and it's a genuine german invention, which was exported to China and renamed "Maglev" (Magnetic elevation) train. Even though you see the train at the munich airport, it is not going to be built in Bavaria or Germany. Edi would want it, but since there's is not enough money, and it's only 40min to downtown anyway, who cares??? Thyssen will make a lot of money constructing the tracks from Shanghai to Peking anyway. :-)

>Officials are presently disgusted at the poor rail link to the airport
Officials of all political parties are perfectly happy with the current situation ;-).

logos99: enjoy your view - obviously know more than i - i were just quoting an article in my rail magazine that said some officials were embarrased by the slow rail link. Moi - S-Bahn is just fine as well.

City officials are mostly geen/social democrat. The last thing they want is the maglev. "Edi" Stoiber, the bavarian prime minister wants it, but only if it's financed by subsidies from Berlin, so it's not going to be build. But all this is far from being top priority for him.

The maglev is finally dead, too expensive. Twice as much as expected.
If you want to see it go to Shanghai.

Hey, what about the vote in April, I bet there'll be a zero percent of voters at the polls. I'll be there voting PRO maglev, the only voter in town, wonder what they'll do... :D

Never slow to climb onto a dead bandwaggon, especially if someone else's taxes are paying for it, Liverpool and Manchester are now investigating magleving The World's First Railway

http://tinyurl.com/2u6799

Those U.K. taxpayers must be filthy rich!

Both the idea of a Maglev train to Munich airport as well as the current rail connection was or is a joke.
Currently two lines with suburban trains serve the airport. Both need 45 minutes for appr. 20 miles from the airport to the city center - stopping at every bog hole, one of them also sharing most of the line with long-distance trains.
While the Maglev would probably be only a waste of taxpayers money, the current connections are indeed disgusting, slow, and usually not on time. A major PIA at least for those people who need to use the airport for more than two or three holiday flights a year.

Express trains would indeed be a good idea. If New York can do it, why can't Munich...

I'm astonished about this discussion coming up right now because today's news is that the Munich Transrapid plans have been abandoned for good.

Yeah, VERY astonishing :D
Someone that has read the news ;-)