The Usborne Book of the Future
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TRANSPORT ON LAND AND WATER TDmDRRDUJ S TRAIRS Although most passenger train services in today’s world lose money, they still have several advantages over other transport systems. They are very safe, and can take loads from city centre to city centre causing little pollution and no congestion. Freight services, which already catty 70% of the world’s inland freight, arc likely to carry still more -few people wish to see the number of juggernaut trucks increasing in the future. Most trains in the rest of this century will be electric powered. The train below is a futuristic solution to the problem of long-distance travel across the world. (---------------------------------- An old-fashioned answer to a problem of tomorrow — coal power The‘fluid-bed’ furnace is one solution to support the sand/coal mixture. Burning the problem of powering tomorrow’s coal in this way is very efficient, giving off trains. In a fluid-bed furnace, crushed coal little or no pollution and generating great (1) is fed into a sand-filled firebox (2), while heat. Water contained in a boiler (4) is jets of scorching hot air (3) vibrate and_heated. The steam rushes along pipes to This train has room for /5(9 passengers, pU*s crew tv monitor 'the robot control systems The tram is robot controlled. Automatic systems adjust speed, brakes and life-support for the passenger* The hull is triple-layered and pressurized, '/ust like on an airliner 74
spin turbines (5). The spinning turbines power electric motors (6), one to each axle. The steam is condensed back into water after it has spun the turbines so there is no need to carry large quantities of water. An alternative to carrying the furnace on the train is to have central fluid-bed power stations, each feeding electricity to an overhead pick-up line system like the one used on many of today’s railways. Whichever system is used, the outlook for coal as a power source is bright -experts estimate that the world’s coal supplies will not run out for 1,000 years. Supertube under the ground This bullet-shaped train, proposed by Dr Robert Salter of the American Rand Corporation, is what some scientists think will replace high-speed passenger aircraft in the future. The train would run through underground tunnels, hundreds of metres below the ground. It would be supported by MAGLEV-Magnetic Levitation (just like two horseshoe magnets repelling each other) and would be propelled by electric motors. A maximum speed of over 13,000 kph could be achieved because the tunnel would have practically all the air pumped out of it, so there would be no air pressure to act as a barrier to the train’s progress. Gtftobo/ of MTA, the Inter national Tube-way Authority ^Friction heats fuselage and wings Lower dec* contains cargo holds for standard-size containers Conduits supply power to the vacuum pumps, keeping most op the dir out of the tube so the train has a -friction-free ride Tube tram remains / cold in racuuni tube ▲ Concorde's wings and nose heat up by hundreds of degrees during supersonic flight, due to the friction of the air that has to be forced out of the way. The tube train’s fuselage remains icy-cold as it hurtles through its vacuum tunnel. 75
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