NORFOLK
Old Dominion University is partnering with a Massachusetts-based company to test another maglev train on its campus.
The partnership, which has won the backing of the federal government, could bring a prototype about the size of a van or small bus to the Norfolk campus by summer 2009.
Officials plan to announce the partnership and financial support today. ODU and MagneMotion Inc. will jump-start their efforts with a three-year, $6.3 million grant from the federal Urban Maglev Program.
More than $700,000 will go to ODU for its role. The project beat out four others for Federal Transit Administration funding. ODU officials said Monday that they are excited about the new prototype, but it won’t halt plans to continue developing their own maglev vehicle, which has eluded the school for years. The partnership will help the university fulfill a goal of becoming a research center for maglev development throughout the country.
Maglev uses magnets to float a train over elevated tracks.
“I don’t think this is a race,” said aerospace engineering professor Thomas Alberts, who has led ODU’s maglev research. “We’d like to be a center for maglev research and give due consideration for any approaches.”
Jeremiah Creedon, ODU’s director of transportation research, said, “Our goal is to help develop affordable maglev systems. Now, we’ll have two approaches to get it – one with funds from the FTA.”
ODU began working on maglev after Georgia-based American Maglev Technology Inc. and its partners promised in 1999 to deliver a working maglev transportation system in 2002. Technical glitches, cost overruns, unpaid bills and lawsuits derailed the project.
After the project’s rocky start, expectations changed. ODU took control of the money and the work, changing the focus from a transportation system to a research project with the goal of producing a prototype of a low-cost maglev train.
Alberts and his team of professors and graduate students have achieved stable levitation of a small-scale test sled and are preparing to move their work to the elevated guideway that traverses the campus this spring.
University financing for ODU’s maglev, more than $100,000 this year, will run out in June. Alberts and Creedon are looking for new sources. MagneMotion, co-founded by former MIT engineering and computer science professor Richard D. Thornton, has been working to develop urban maglev for nearly two decades. The company was granted a patent in 2006 for its technology.
MagneMotion’s design is similar to ODU’s in some ways but uses different magnets for lift and a different propulsion system to move the vehicle, Alberts said. It is better suited for higher speeds, he said.
The company has successfully operated a small-scale indoor prototype on a closed-loop track and is ready to transfer the technology to a full vehicle that could accelerate to reach a speed of 100 mph.
Under the partnership, ODU will provide technical support and full-scale testing on campus for the company’s vehicle because of its larger track.
In the first 18-month phase of the project, which could begin as early as next month, much of the work to develop a full-scale train will happen at MagneMotion in Acton, Mass. In Norfolk, ODU will analyze how the train would perform on its track and adapt the infrastructure to accommodate it. The university also will conduct a small campus ridership study to determine what size vehicle to build.
A prototype for testing will be next. Initial tests would be conducted jointly, with ODU later assuming full testing responsibilities.
The ultimate goal of the partnership would be to have a deployable maglev technology at the end of the three years. Creedon said the university eventually would like to have a campus maglev transportation system, but there’s no funding for running one now.
Experts say an urban maglev system promises to be cleaner, quieter and less expensive than traditional inner-city trains.
Other efforts around the county, and the world, to create an affordable maglev system have yet to succeed. The only commercial maglev in the world, a high-speed train in China, cost billions of dollars to develop and billions more to build.
Debbie Messina, (757) 446-2588, debbie.messina@pilotonline.com
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Don't sweat a mere 6.3 mill
You will not pay for the mag lev, you have and will pay for welfare. Total federal welfare spending was $450 billion in 2006 in the US. Welfare spending is so large that, on average, the annual cost of the welfare system amounts to around $6,000 in taxes from each household that paid federal income tax in 2006. Adjusting for inflation, the amount taxpayers now spend on welfare each year is greater than the value of the entire U.S. Gross National Product at the beginning of the 20th century. www.whitehouse.gov
Way to go!
You know me as the negative real estate guy. I'll say this, I think Hampton Roads is for the most part exceptionally lame. One of the few gems as far as technology goes is this Maglev test track. Norfolk is RE-deploying old technology in their blight rail project. The Maglev system is important. With R&D (what are colleges for, oh yea, Counting Crows concerts at their entertainment venues, I forgot), the Maglev system provides an elevated, frictionless, quiet, automated transportation system that runs on green fuel (nuclear/wind/solar/hydro generated) electricity. $15 million dollars has been spent so far on research of a technology that could update the way we move, helping to break our dependence on foreign oil, and moving us into the real future (not old and busted ground based rail cars, like they had in the 20s). I email Prof. Alberts from time to time to get the status, and they are making progress. Too bad the USA wasted tons of money and debt on an unsustainable housing mania that had no where to go but down, instead of developing things for the future generations of our country (instead of giving them huge debt loads to pay off to the foreign countries the corps and gov't
Another boondoggle
Another $6.3 million of the taxpayers' money will be squandered on a project that should have died a natural death long ago. This project gives new depth and meaning to the word, boondoggle.
No one paying attention
there are other Maglev's that are very expensive. The entire point of this is to cut the production cost by 90%. It's funny how emotional people are getting about the Maglev when the potential benefits are great.
Oh never mind the money, Let's reinvent the wheel!
At this point ODU has proven itself not to be a very good engineering school and outrageously wasteful with our tax dollars. And yes, our tax dollars were used to fund the initial project. An experiment is one thing, a needed transport for students is something entirely different. This huge joke was intended to help keep students from having to cross traffic on Hampton Blvd. I go by there everyday and am always amazed that a student isn't hit everyday. It's hard to believe some of these kids actually made it to college age without learning how to cross a road safely. Give up on the maglev embarrassment and put an electro tran on the rail and start using it. Stop wasting our road funds on foolishness like this.
who is being realistic here?
Really now, how practical can this maglev technology be for our area? Zero to none. And for not spending a dime who are we trying to kid? No company does anything for free. There is always someone footing the bill.
And what is wrong with retirees/jobless/rednecks or government distrusters? Who do you think makes up the primary tax base? Please don't say its business and industry. Because in reality we the people pay their taxes.
I admire your enthusiasm for the maglev project. But IMO this is just another waste of money. Perhaps if the maglev did not need a track it eliminate our need for these aging tunnels. Now thats a solution worth investing in. We need the maglev as much as we needed the I-POD. Toys.
How slower can they get this thing working?
I moved from Hampton Roads in 2005 after living there for 32 years. I moved to Charlotte, NC and guess what they started their light rail train in October 2006, and we have had the thrill of riding it since two weeks before Christmas. I never believed while living there that we(Hampton Roads) would always be last with the type of city we have, but it is obvious that Norfolk is still stuck in the 80's looking the same way Charlotte did in the 80's. GUess what, they took a chance, they built arenas (NBA Charlotte Bobcats), football stadium (Carolina Panthers) and now they are starting a downtown baseball field this spring (?? Tampa Bay Devil Rays or Florida Marlins). Norfolk will always provide the memories but Charlotte leads the way in innovation and forward thinking, unlike Fraim and R. Williams(they are just happy to have a job and they don't dare rock the normal 1980's thinking that would upset the Conolly Phillips of the world). Good luck with the experimental train, and come on down and ride a non experimental working train.
For the uninformed
ODU has NOT spent one thin dime on that project. They ONLY donated the land for the thing to run on, they did NOT pay for the construction of the rails, platforms, or anything else. It was ALL paid for by the firm who was trying to make the thing so they could sell one for use from Hampton Roads to Richmond. The engineering dept at ODU volunteered to work on it as a reasearch project when the company failed, which is perfectly within their rights to do so. Do your homework before posting this stuff people.
For more information
The MAGLEVs in China and Japan were extremely expensive to build ($1.2 Billion, $82 Billion respectively) it is designed with a "smart track" and "stupid train” meaning that all the brains that control the movement of the train are actually contained in each piece of track. The project at ODU is attempting to cut that cost dramatically by creating a Smart Train and a stupid track, the control processes would be contained on each train and the track would be normal track. That is the difference between the two projects. ODU's track is believed to cost approximately $14M a Mile unlike the 39.67M a mile that China wants to spend or the 125M a mile that Japan spent. So you can complain about the money being spent now but when the project works and it is affordable because of this money most will be singing a different tune. Just to also consider the cost an 8 lane highway cost about $50M per mile to construct.
In the Name of Progress
This announcement is a great, forward looking vision that will hopefully lead to a cost efficient form of mass transportation. We have made very limited progress concening this low cost form of maglev train technology. Let us continue on, engage in further exploration, as well as progress, and deliver a viable form of transportation that will benefit all those who week it out. Thanks for the money Mr. Federal Government.
Backwards as Usual
I suspect there will lots of complaining about the cost of such a project as the day goes on as more retirees/jobless/redneck/government distrusters wake up and read the Pilot. To head that off I say - if it was up to you people we would still be taking a horse and buggy to work.
Poco, I believe you comment here solely to agitate. Troll, I say. Btw, your cat comment was insipid.
What a Waste!
ODU wasted millions of tax dollars of the first failure, now the feds are passign them another $6 million of my tax dollars? What is the idiots name that proposed that earmark in the budget? He needs to be voted out.
Correction!
Currently:
"ODU and MagneMotion Inc. will jump-start their efforts with a three-year, $6.3 million grant from the federal Urban Maglev Program."
Should be:
"ODU and MagneMotion Inc. will jump-start their efforts with a three-year, $6.3 million grant from the Stupid, Complacent Taxpayers of the United States Program".
Wake up Amuhrica!
???
Aren't their other countries (like Japan) who have working maglev trains already? Why are we funding research when the research is already well on its way? Sounds like an expensive pet project so the boys can say "We have one too!". What a waste.