Maglev approved for Munich

daveirl · 05-10-2007 4:54pm

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jlang · 06-10-2007 7:39pm

I have a photograph somewhere of a train platform in Frankfurt with the board showing the train I was waiting for and its time and a clock. The clock may have been fast, but the train was several minutes late and hadn't arrived by the time I took the photo.

murphaph · 06-10-2007 9:16pm

How many train movements are made in Germany every day? I don't know but I bet it's a LOT more than are made in Ireland in a YEAR. As a percentage of total journeys I'd say they have a miniscule number of delays, compared to us anyway.

Chris_533976 · 06-10-2007 10:43pm

I think it was quite funny that the 14:00 train to Cobh the other day was listed on their screens as "On Time" at 13:50 and "Boarding" at 13:55, even though there was no train!!

In fairness, the train did leave at 14:02, which isnt too bad I guess. Not for a service that just goes back and forth, it got there on time so thats fine.

daveirl · 06-10-2007 11:37pm

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strassenwolf · 07-10-2007 10:04am

The mayor of Munich is opposed to this project.

I'm not altogether sure why he's opposed to it. From the little bit I've read, he feels that it will end up being more expensive than currently envisaged. I think there's also an issue about this project amounting to an expansion of the airport, and the city of Munich (as a large shareholder in the airport) has not been adequately consulted on this expansion.

There may be other reasons.

It's a strange one, though. You'd think, if the mayor of the city doesn't want the project to happen, that it wouldn't happen - think Ken Livingstone here.:D

But there it is.

murphaph · 07-10-2007 12:46pm

daveirl wrote:

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Sorry daveirl, I wasn't disagreeing with you either, just adding a little context. I've been on delayed trains in Germany also, generally as in your experience, just a couple of minutes.

They give travellers months of advance notice of any works that will cause disruption. They put up signs at EVERY station with maps and amended timetables.

It's not that the germans are super human. They just all function in a society that expects a minimum standard that is higher than we as a society accept. This is why they get better services across the board.

parsi · 07-10-2007 6:25pm

Rather amusingly the German media (both general and specialist press) claim that the rail service has gone to the dogs since DB moved out from being a pure Gov service.

One thing that has always amazed me is the Wagenstandanzeiger which shows you where such-and-such a carriage will be on such-and-such a train. It's a simple idea but it shows great planning and great adherence to plans. Of course there's also the large printed list of arrivals and departures in each station which details the platforms and by the hokey 999 times out of 1000 the train will be there (my last trip to Berlin had a few platform changes).

Compare that to my last trip from Limerick where the train for the junction was happily siting at a different platform to the one on the electronic indicator and no-one seemed too pushed.

daveirl · 30-10-2007 11:38pm

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bk · 31-10-2007 2:30am

OTK wrote:

The munich airport maglev link has just been approved for funding.

How does it compare with Metro north?

Munich Maglev will be:
38km long, 10 minute journey time, €1.85 billion
no intermediate stops, projected 8 million passengers. Fare: €13

It is funny you mention this, first of all most say that €1.85 billion is PR bs, that in reality it is going to cost about €6 billion. Also the tickets are expected to cost €25+ and the fact that there are only two stops is considered a major disadvantage.

It seems most people in Munich are completely against this and when you listen to their arguments, it becomes clear why.

Currently Munich Airport is already served by two S-Bahn lines. It takes 45 minutes and €8 to get to the airport.

However during the World Cup they ran Express S-Bahn's to the Airport and they only took 22 minutes and had 4 stops including the three busiest inner city stations.

So an alternative plan has been put forward to build a constant Express S-Bahn service to the Airport. It would cost about €1 billion Euros (for a third track, signalling, etc.), have a 22 minute journey time, cost €8 per ticket and would have four stops.

The four stops is an important point, the proposed Maglev will operate only to one of the quieter outside stations and that most people would need to transfer to/from and continue their Journey on S-Bahn anyway. On the other hand the Express S-Bahn would stop at the three busiest inner city stations. Many argue that with the transfer time of Maglev, that for most people the total journey time would actually be longer on Maglev then on an Express S-Bahn.

So for Maglev,
- 10 - 15 minute journey time (plus big interchange time)
- €6 billion cost
- €25+ ticket

versus
- 22 minute journey time with much more convenient stations
- €1 billion cost
- €8 ticket

No wonder people in Munich are completely against it. It is quiet clear that the Maglev is a completely unnecessary white elephant.

BTW if you are wondering why they are pushing it, it is because the German government want to build it as an example of an operating Maglev to help sell it abroad, this is also why they are trying to hide the real cost.

OTK wrote:

Dublin Metro North will be:
17km long, <30 minute journey time to Swords, <20 mins to airport,
€4.8 billion (?), 13 intermediate stops, projected 34 million passengers. Fare: ?

I think our one looks like better value.

Yes, it is clear that Metro North is vastly better value for money and goes to show you have to be careful when comparing with projects in other countries, we often don't hear the true story at all.

antoinolachtnai · 31-10-2007 8:22am

bk wrote: »

It is funny you mention this, first of all most say that €1.85 billion is PR bs, that in reality it is going to cost about €6 billion. Also the tickets are expected to cost €25+ and the fact that there are only two stops is considered a major disadvantage.

To be fair, the price per journey on Metro will certainly be over 15 euros. You can't really look at the fare in isolation from the state subsidy.

munchkin_utd · 31-10-2007 10:53am

The financing of the Transrapid isn't as secure as we previously thought.
The much celebrated announcement of the funding was made in the dieing days of the ruling term of Edmund Stiober, who was the chief honcho in the Bavarian government for 12 or 14 years previous.

The new "Minister president" or maybe first minister in english, is not so hot on bankrolling the whole project and has said that the amount given by the Bavarian state will not be a single cent above what has been agreed.
The long and the short seems to be that the national government and state government are looking for something along the lines of a fixed price contract with the risk borne by industry rather than the taxpayer.

Its not irrelevant either that the cost of 1.8 billion is from an old study from 2002. And thats before steel and other materials started rising in price. Its 1.8 billion that is secured for the project so whether anyone in industry is happy, or able, to do it for that price now in 2007 is a good question.
(never mind that theres 360 million euro alone missing from the 2002 estimate just for the 3rd service tunnel that is now wanted by the politicians).

This weekend there is a monster demo against the transrapid orgnized by some citizens group, who reckon that the couple of billion euro would be better spent on the schools/ kindergardens and improving public transport links in general rather than on the transrapid.

Their site in german is here:
http://www.contratransrapid.de/cms/website.php?id=/de/index.htm

or google-ified translation from german into english here:
http://www.google.com/translate?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.contratransrapid.de%2Fcms%2Fwebsite.php%3Fid%3D%2Fde%2Findex.htm&langpair=de%7Cen&hl=en&ie=UTF8

bk · 31-10-2007 1:54pm

antoinolachtnai wrote: »

To be fair, the price per journey on Metro will certainly be over 15 euros. You can't really look at the fare in isolation from the state subsidy.

Where did you get that from?

I'd expect the prices to be in line with LUAS or Bus from Swords, probably about €4 max.

Otherwise no one in Swords is going to use it and the reason for building it completely collapses.

antoinolachtnai · 31-10-2007 2:11pm

I am talking about the cost per journey, not the fare. Was in the paper from a study one of the political parties had done, but you can work it out yourself.

5 billion X .05 percent interest = 250 million euros per year. This is the cost of financing the initial build. This never decreases, because the system never makes a profit to pay off the capital.

allowance for maintenance = 5 percent of the cost per year (in the early years, maintenance will be lower, but it will increase as time goes on) = 250 million euros per year. (You can call this depreciation if you like, but this is public sector accounting, and it's not quite the same thing. You can argue with the exact amount too, but it isn't going to make that much difference to the final sums.)

That's a total of EUR 500m/year that will have to come from current expenditure to pay for the project, and there are forecast to be 34m passengers per year. 500m/34m = around 15 euros. Add to that the cost of actually operating the service which is likely to be around 2 or 3 euros/passenger and you have 17 or 18 euros.

The fare will quite likely be around 3 or 4 euros as you say. The rest will be paid for out of general taxation.

Antoin.

bk · 31-10-2007 7:25pm

antoinolachtnai wrote: »

I am talking about the cost per journey, not the fare. Was in the paper from a study one of the political parties had done, but you can work it out yourself.

But then your not comparing like with like, the actual fare for the Maglev is expected to be about €25 (think of a service more similar to the Heathrow Express, rather then a Metro). The cost per journey of Maglev is expected to be vastly more then €25 per trip.

The cost per trip is almost always far higher then the fare for most major public transport projects. Capital costs are almost always paid out of taxes, operating costs out of the fare.

This is true for the Luas, buses, most rail projects, etc. Nothing unusual there.

Also your estimate of €250 million a year for maintenance costs, seems to be very large, I'd expect it to be much lower and for the Metro fare to actually cover both the maintenance and operating costs:

34m x €4 = €136 million a year for maintenance and operating costs, that seems very reasonable, IMO. They might even make a profit.

That would make the capital cost per trip about €7.35 (250 m / 34m) for 20 years, which isn't so bad.

And here is the thing, the Metro doesn't suddenly disappear after 20 years!!, it will still probably be in use 100 years from now (just look at London Underground), so after 20 years the capital cost per trip is gone, the fare has gone up due to inflation and probably far more then 34m people per year are using it due to increase in population (Swords expected to go from 34000 residents to 100,000 in 15 years), so the maintenance and operating costs will be easily covered.

Over a 100 years it looks like fantastic value for money.

antoinolachtnai · 31-10-2007 10:47pm

First of all, they will definitely not make a profit. They might make a surplus. That is a very different thing. A profit is what ryanair makes. A surplus is what the Luas makes.

The Metro will certainly still be there, but it will need constant refit and maintenance.

In the first years, for sure, there won't be much maintenance because everything is brand new. But maintaining an underground railway is an expensive proposition on an ongoing basis. All the work is highly specialized and has to be done at night, in complete darkness, in a confined space, with all the safety issues that entails. It's a whole different world from the Luas. Metronet was spending 2.5 million a day on maintaining and bringing around three-quarters of the London Underground up to scratch, and it turned out not to be enough.

After thirty years a substantial refit is going to be required, including rail renewal, new carriages and all the rest of it. Obviously, this is easier to do than building a system from scratch, but actually not all that much. London could probably build a new system from scratch for the same money as the maintenance/upgrade, but that just isn't feasible.

The 34 million passengers is really the system running at full tilt as I understand it. That's nearly 100,000 trips a day, which assumes 12,000 people per hour at peak times, which is good going. That's a packed train every three minutes assuming a tram holds 300 people. You'd need to invest more in the system to increase the capacity beyond that, not only in the rolling stock and maintenance, but also in the platforms and station facilities (for example, you will need a couple of very long escalators in the peak direction to guarantee being able to get the 300 people off the platform before the next train comes along).

I don't think eur136m will pay to run and maintain that system, certainly not beyond the first few years. Only time will tell though.

The figures are also contingent on the project not going over-budget. As I understand it, the project is already over-budget, because of the necessity to put the Ballymun section underground.

The convention is not to take inflation into account when you calculate these things, because you assume that everything (costs and revenue) are going to inflate at the same rate.

The capital cost is never 'gone'. The government has to carry it forever, since this project never pays back any of its debt. (This isn't necessarily a bad thing, because the government benefits in other ways aside from direct cashflow, but it is definitely the case if you want to look at the train as a standalone business.)

As I understand it, the value for money projections on this project are actually not that big. Pricing in a hike in the project cost or a reduction in demand could make the project unviable.

Certainly, you have to do some long-term thinking to make these projects make sense and that's definitely the way to do it. There's obviously no use in looking at just a 20 year horizon, or just looking at the direct cashflows in isolation.

If you're looking at the long-term though, why not link to Luas at Ranelagh as part of the plan and get some real capacity into the system?

The capital cost of the Heathrow Express is not completely out of line with the Munich maglev (about 450m pounds sterling in 1996 money). It is privately funded and makes a profit (the old-fashioned kind, not the Luas kind).

bk · 01-11-2007 2:15am

antoinolachtnai wrote:

First of all, they will definitely not make a profit. They might make a surplus. That is a very different thing. A profit is what ryanair makes. A surplus is what the Luas makes.

Fair enough.

antoinolachtnai wrote:

It's a whole different world from the Luas. Metronet was spending 2.5 million a day on maintaining and bringing around three-quarters of the London Underground up to scratch, and it turned out not to be enough.

Ok so, lets do the maths.

2.5 million per day is 912 million per year.
London underground is 408km long, 2/3rds of that is 272km.
So that is 3.36 million per km per year on a system that is over 100 years old and very heavily used.

Metro North is 17km long, so going by that figure it would cost 57.12 million per year to maintain and refurbish (and remember Metro north will be much newer then London underground).

That seems to be a much more reasonable figure (but still high IMO) then your estimate of 250 million per year, 250 million would mean that it would cost 5 times the amount per km to maintain and refurbish a shiny new Metro versus the 100 year old London underground system. That makes no sense at all.

57 million is well below my estimate of €136 million takings per year, so it would seem that they would easily be able to pay for both maintenance and operating costs out of the fare and probably even make a healthy surplus.

So we are left with a capital cost of €7 per trip, for the first 20 years and zero after that, sounds very reasonable to me, I'm wondering what all the fuss was about?

antoinolachtnai wrote:

The 34 million passengers is really the system running at full tilt as I understand it. That's nearly 100,000 trips a day, which assumes 12,000 people per hour at peak times, which is good going. That's a packed train every three minutes assuming a tram holds 300 people. You'd need to invest more in the system to increase the capacity beyond that, not only in the rolling stock and maintenance, but also in the platforms and station facilities (for example, you will need a couple of very long escalators in the peak direction to guarantee being able to get the 300 people off the platform before the next train comes along).

Again I'm afraid your wrong, 34 million is just the initial normal running capacity, it will have a much higher maximum capacity.

The red luas line carries over 40,000 people per day (14.6m people per year) as it is.

A 40m luas tram has a capacity of 358, with a tram every 4 minutes.

Metro North is being designed to take 90m long trams (about 805 people capacity) with a frequency of 2 minutes at peak (possibly even going to 90 seconds) that is 24,000 passengers per hour per direction.

I estimate it's maximum capacity to be about 70 million.
(its actual maximum capacity is something like 350 million, if you ran it at full capacity 24 hours a day, but obviously that isn't likely or necessary and not how these things are usually measured.)

Now it won't likely have that capacity to start with as it isn't needed, initially it will probably run shorter trams at less frequency, but it is certainly being designed with much greater capacity possible for the future.

antoinolachtnai wrote:

I don't think eur136m will pay to run and maintain that system, certainly not beyond the first few years. Only time will tell though.

Well based on your figures for London underground, it is clear that it will be more then enough to run and maintain the system.

antoinolachtnai wrote:

The figures are also contingent on the project not going over-budget. As I understand it, the project is already over-budget, because of the necessity to put the Ballymun section underground.

Your right, Ballymun going underground, plus an extra stop at Parnell Square will cost more, but your figure of €5 billion is already the inflated figure being trumpeted by the newspapers and which we have now done the maths on and have worked out is a reasonable capital cost of €7 per trip for 20 years.

antoinolachtnai wrote:

If you're looking at the long-term though, why not link to Luas at Ranelagh as part of the plan and get some real capacity into the system?

Personally I'm 100% for continuing Metro North south to Tallaght. I believe it will happen anyway in the long term and that it will be far cheaper to do it now with the tunnelling machine in the ground, then to bring it up and then put it back down in a few years when every sees how amazing Metro North is and screams for one on the south side.

Just like with the two luas lines not being joined up with are currently only doing half the job with Metro North.

antoinolachtnai wrote:

The capital cost of the Heathrow Express is not completely out of line with the Munich maglev (about 450m pounds sterling in 1996 money). It is privately funded and makes a profit (the old-fashioned kind, not the Luas kind).

But the Munich Maglev is being funded by the German tax payer and that is why the people of Munich are so mad. A far cheaper alternative is available (S-Bahn express), they even say that an ice train to the airport would cost half the cost of Maglev and only be 2 or 3 minutes slower!!!!

Maglev is nothing but an ego stroking white elephant and is looking like it is now going to get canned.

antoinolachtnai · 01-11-2007 7:55am

Where are you saying the capital cost has gone away after 20 years? Where does it go away to? There are no capital repayments being made, or interest payments for that matter, so the amount is growing rather than reducing. You are confident that a modest fare can cover the maintenance costs. I disagree with you. Most metro systems need external help to do upgrades from what I can see. Maybe you can show that I am wrong.

Maybe my estimate for maintenance is high for the initial years, but:

- the prices I mentioned were in sterling (so the figure is more like 80 million per year in euros per year)

- that turned out not to be enough money

- a larger proportion of LU is overground than will be the case for the Dublin Metro. A large proportion of our route has to go under sensitive architectural areas as well. This long underground stretch is probably the nub of the issue with the cost of Metro. Of course, if we need to do it, we need to do it.

I am concerned about the safety of operating such large trains at such high frequency without escalators. I don't see how the system could be rapidly evacauted, and it would add time to the journey. Still, maybe this is an unfounded fear on my part.

- a

bk · 01-11-2007 1:32pm

antoinolachtnai wrote:

Maybe my estimate for maintenance is high for the initial years, but:

- the prices I mentioned were in sterling (so the figure is more like 80 million per year in euros per year)

- that turned out not to be enough money

- a larger proportion of LU is overground than will be the case for the Dublin Metro. A large proportion of our route has to go under sensitive architectural areas as well. This long underground stretch is probably the nub of the issue with the cost of Metro. Of course, if we need to do it, we need to do it.

€80 million would still easily fit in the €136 million fare takings.

You say above that most of LU is underground (therefore more expensive to maintain) while much of Metro North is above ground and therefore should be much cheaper to maintain, in line with any normal stretch of rail line.

So looking at it that way, I'd actually expect the cost to maintain Metro North to be even less then the above quoted €80 million.

You also seem to be ignoring that LU is a 140 year old, very heavily used, heavy rail metro system and that the current maintenance costs include a massive refurbishment and overhaul project to increase capacity.

Sure in 100 years we will also need to do the same, but the ongoing maintenance costs for the next 50 years will likely be far less then that and even if it is, then as my maths has shown, it can still easily be covered by the fares.

Victor · 01-11-2007 1:32pm

bk wrote: »

Again I'm afraid your wrong, 34 million is just the initial normal running capacity, it will have a much higher maximum capacity.

The red luas line carries over 40,000 people per day (14.6m people per year) as it is.

A 40m luas tram has a capacity of 358, with a tram every 4 minutes.

Metro North is being designed to take 90m long trams (about 805 people capacity) with a frequency of 2 minutes at peak (possibly even going to 90 seconds) that is 24,000 passengers per hour per direction.

I estimate it's maximum capacity to be about 70 million.
(its actual maximum capacity is something like 350 million, if you ran it at full capacity 24 hours a day, but obviously that isn't likely or necessary and not how these things are usually measured.)

Irish Rail have a calculation of

Peak usage x 900 = annual usage
24000 x 2 x 900 = 43,200,000 - close enough to the 34 million.

The Red line has strong off-peak passenger numbers that may not be repeated (proportionately) on Metro North.

Maglev is nothing but an ego stroking white elephant and is looking like it is now going to get canned.

You mean like one of those monorail projects?

antoinolachtnai · 01-11-2007 2:37pm

bk wrote: »

€80 million would still easily fit in the €136 million fare takings.

You say above that most of LU is underground (therefore more expensive to maintain) while much of Metro North is above ground and therefore should be much cheaper to maintain, in line with any normal stretch of rail line.

I said the opposite. The underground stretch is quite long for us - is it around half the length now? Incidentally, rail line in general is expensive to maintain no matter where it is. I am not saying it is not worthwhile, but it is definitely expensive.

You also seem to be ignoring that LU is a 140 year old, very heavily used, heavy rail metro system and that the current maintenance costs include a massive refurbishment and overhaul project to increase capacity.

Sure in 100 years we will also need to do the same, but the ongoing maintenance costs for the next 50 years will likely be far less then that and even if it is, then as my maths has shown, it can still easily be covered by the fares.

The LU is very different in many ways, for sure. But it is important to have an idea of how colossal the costs can get. Railway maintenance in the UK, on both mainline and on underground has lurched from crisis to crisis over the last 15 years, mainly as a result of unsuccessful efforts to keep costs under control. It's very complicated and very expensive, once you get into high frequencies, high speeds and late night operations.

I think there is an inclination to underestimate the complexity of running this thing even when it has been built and is brand new. It's not just a matter of building it. You need a lot of skilled staff to keep the doors open on an underground railway.

For comparison, what are the running costs of the Luas? I'm not sure, but the income would appear to be about 70 million euros, with a small surplus, and there is no renewal bill or even much maintenance to do as yet. Metro will certainly be more than that.

Every underground station will have to be constantly staffed. There will be a big complicated control centre. There are endless safety checks to do. It's a big deal.

bk · 01-11-2007 4:23pm

antoinolachtnai wrote:

I said the opposite. The underground stretch is quite long for us - is it around half the length now? Incidentally, rail line in general is expensive to maintain no matter where it is. I am not saying it is not worthwhile, but it is definitely expensive.

Erm, so Metro North is 50% underground, versus almost 100% underground for LU. Therefore it is clear that Metro North will be much cheaper to maintain then LU.

antoinolachtnai this all started because you claimed that Metro North was going to cost €250 million a year to maintain, based on 5% of the construction cost. Your figure was plainly absurd, you can't calculate maintenance costs based on the building cost.

Your figure would put the maintenance cost of Metro North at more then 3 times the current cost of maintaining LU, a 140 year old, heavy rail, heavily used system. If you apply even a little logic, you can clearly see that your original figure was just wrong. It was a pure guess, nothing more.

The only way to calculate the maintenance costs is to look at similar systems around the world. Now we have only got LU to compare with, a system which is vastly older and more complicated and therefore likely to be much more expensive to maintain then Metro North, but at least it gives us a good upper limit to look at. Therefore it looks clear that the upper limit of the cost will be €80 million per year and likely a lot less.

antoinolachtnai · 01-11-2007 5:21pm

LU is not 100 percent underground or anything like it.

The point is that the costs of maintaining, operating and renewing this thing are vast, and it's not just a once-off cost. The cost of growing the capacity of the system is also significant. You think all this can be covered on an ongoing basis from the farebox, I don't see how that can be possible.

To bring it back to the original discussion, Metro is like Munich's maglev if you ask me. If you believe in it, you will do it and it will eventually pay off although it may require further ongoing investment.

BrianD · 02-11-2007 1:05am

Personally, I don't think you can compare the two systems that detailed in the OP other than the fact they will have the same builder.

The Munich is a dedicated airport express train that is built only to serve airline passengers that wish to travel from the terinus (city centre?) to the airport. Of course the passenger numbers will look small and the fares expensive.

The Dublin line is a commuter line to Swords that happens to serve the airport.

I would view it as like comparing the Heathrow Express to the Picadilly line.

BK wrote:

Just like with the two luas lines not being joined up with are currently only doing half the job with Metro North.

I might be taking you out of context here. While it's desirable that the lines would be linked, I don't really view as a major issue. I have yet to see a report that suggests that users of the green line would be users of the red line as opposed to any modes of transport. Having said that, the meeting of the lines would deposit passengers in the middle of Dublin Bus land and one change to either Connolly or Heuston.

BK wrote:

The red luas line carries over 40,000 people per day (14.6m people per year) as it is.

Can you clarify something for me? Is ths figure based on actual ticket sales or capacity of the schedule if all trams were fully loaded?

antoinolachtnai · 02-11-2007 10:40am

What they might both have in common is that they're projects which are somewhat ovesize and expensive for the immediate requirement. You have to look at a longer term vision, population growth and route extension to see how they might make sense.

markf909 · 02-11-2007 10:48am

antoinolachtnai wrote: »

What they might both have in common is that they're projects which are somewhat ovesize and expensive for the immediate requirement. You have to look at a longer term vision, population growth and route extension to see how they might make sense.

What exactly do you propose to serve the Airport/Swords corridor then?

bk · 02-11-2007 3:52pm

BrianD wrote:

Can you clarify something for me? Is ths figure based on actual ticket sales or capacity of the schedule if all trams were fully loaded?

The figure comes from presentations given by RPA, so I've no idea what the figure is based on.

However I believe that the maximum capacity is greater then 40,000, so I don't think it is based on maximum capacity. Also the figure they gave for the Green line was something like 38,000, yet the Green line has greater capacity then the red line (more frequent and all 40m long), so it seems to be based on some sort of count of the number of people they are carrying, I assume ticket sales and tag ons.

antoinolachtnai · 05-11-2007 9:07am

markf909 wrote: »

What exactly do you propose to serve the Airport/Swords corridor then?

Bear in mind that I never said that Metro was a bad idea, just that it might be underscale.

I can be expected to be biased, and my interest is declared, but I would say that a well organized, rapid, prioritized bus service (like http://www.swordsexpress.com/) can sort out a lot of problems at the Swords/Airport end. The same sort of solution would help along the M50 corridor which is as relevant to many of the commuters in that area.

munchkin_utd · 27-03-2008 10:27am

Latest news from the papers yesterday just for you folk at home.

The transrapid project is now estimated at a minimum cost of 3 Billion Euros.
NOW!
only a shade under 2 Billion is available from National/ Fereral Government + Rail company + Airport Authorities as they were budgeting according to 2002 cost estimates.

If the 1 Billion gap in costs is not met by Industry (and heck the feckin point of the whole project is to showcase german industry in the hope of future contracts, so the shaggers should cough up a bit more) then its curtains for the whole project.

None of the current stakeholders is prepared to put a single cent more to the project than they are currently offering.
Source: http://www.sueddeutsche.de/deutschland/artikel/873/165402/

In addition, the Munich City Council is having a referendum in a few weeks to OPPOSE the project and the use of city funds via the Airport Authority which they co own with the Bavarian Government.
http://www.toytowngermany.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=91788&st=0&start=0

All in all, its looking increasingly doubtful that the thing will get off the ground at all.

Run_to_da_hills · 27-03-2008 11:29am

I doubt if the Maglev would mix up the carriages

Maglev approved for Munich

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