We just had a friend visiting us from Toronto. She arrived by train a few days ago, via VIA Rail.

The topic of Shanghai came up quite often, as both she and I may be going there in the next few months. After I dropped her off at the train station yesterday, I remembered that Shanghai has one of these things now. Her trip took home yesterday took about 5 hours, but if she had been travelling on a maglev train she could have gotten home in about an hour. Yup. Toronto-Montreal downtown to downtown in one hour. Sure it would cost billions, but imagine what Belleville would like whizzing by your window at 500km an hour...

Some folks in California are looking into it; there are those in Washington pushing for a line; there is a Pennsylvania plan, and the Germans are working on it too.

It seems like Canada is more interested in 'normal' high-speed rail, but considering we can't seem to get the pothole problem under control, I don't think we'll seeing Belleville at high speeds anytime soon.