Magnetic Levitation

WASHINGTON -- A $105 billion transportation bill to give states unprecedented freedom to decide how to spend federal highway money was sent to the Senate floor yesterday.The bill includes provisions that would affect most U.S. motorists and commuters, including continuing restrictions on double- and triple-trailer trucks, continuing the 65-mph speed limit for some roads and strengthening emphasis on mass transit.Overall, the five-year bill would shift the highway program's emphasis from construction to maintenance, recognizing that a 30-year era of massive road building is ending with the imminent completion of the interstate system.

NEW YORK -- A group of 23 Japanese companies seeking to hasten the development of high-speed passenger railroads in the United States is asking the Bush administration to support a joint U.S.-Japanese effort to design and build the first system in Pennsylvania rather than the Baltimore-Washington corridor.The group, which includes some of Japan's largest industrial conglomerates and banks, contends there is sufficient need for such a system in the United States to ease already clogged urban transportation networks.

Waving signs that read "MTA - go another way" and "Maglev, Shmaglev," more than 100 Linthicum residents protested yesterday outside Lindale Middle School as state officials inside outlined plans for the hotly contested high-speed train. Maglev, a 250-mph train that would ferry passengers from Baltimore to Washington in 16 minutes, is not a certainty for the region. Maryland has been trying to win the right to build the train - and the $950 million in federal money to help pay for it - since the Federal Railroad Administration announced in 1992 that the funds were available.

CSX Transportation's transfer of its remaining 350 top jobs from Baltimore marks the end of a railroad era. For the first time in 164 years, Baltimore, the birthplace of the nation's commercial railroading, is without a rail headquarters.When the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, one of the antecedents of today's CSX, was created in February 1827, it was clear that America's future was linked to its westward movement. But how?Two technologies competed. One of them envisioned a network of canals linking natural waterways, the other wanted to push iron rails through the mountain ranges that separated the Atlantic seaboard from the Midwest.

THE NOTION THAT soon there will be sleek, high-tech trains hurtling along at 300 miles per hour on a cushion of air, shuttling commuters between Baltimore and Washington, has long been a beguiling image. Magnetic levitation technology, or maglev, has also been accompanied by serious reservations. Is it feasible? Cost-effective? Safe? But those questions have never provided a reason to reject the maglev project. Rather, they are the reason why it must be studied further. Lawmakers need to find out as much as possible about its potential rewards and its risks.

Mayor Martin O'Malley flew to Berlin yesterday for a demonstration of a magnetic-levitation train prototype - the first of three overseas trips on the mayor's schedule in the next month paid for by nonprofit or business groups. In his first trip abroad since becoming mayor, O'Malley joined Washington Mayor Anthony A. Williams on the excursion to Germany to see the "maglev" train. O'Malley, who is also scheduled to fly to Ireland and Australia, is expected to return today. Last year, Maryland won a $3 million federal grant for a feasibility study on the first maglev train, which floats on magnetic currents and travels at 250 mph. It could cut travel between Baltimore and Washington to about 15 minutes.

An incomplete map accompanied an article Tuesday in the Maryland section on a feasibility study of a prototype 300-mph magnetic levitation train. These are the four alternative routes for a regional maglev system, a project that currently lacks federal support.In the year 2005, a traveler might board a sleek vehicle at Baltimore's Camden Yards and arrive in downtown Washington just 16 minutes later after a high-speed commute on a train levitated by magnetic forces.A $900,000 study released yesterday at the Maryland Business Council headquarters in downtown Baltimore examines the feasibility of a 300-mph magnetic levitation train that would link Baltimore and Washington.

Business travelers could benefit significantly over the next decade from two little-noticed appropriations Congress approved this fall.One is designed to help speed rail service between New York and Boston. The other could spur development of ultra-high-speed, magnetic-levitation trains that would be faster than flying on certain routes.For the New York-to-Boston rail line, Congress approved $125 million to begin an overhaul designed to get the 231-mile trip down to less than three hours.

The logic seems inescapable. Baltimore County last year granted the state $60,000 that the state didn't spend to study a proposed magnetic levitation train that wouldn't even go to Baltimore County. To boot, the counties the train would go through and one it would stop in, Anne Arundel, haven't spent a dime on the thing. So when Baltimore County auditors looked for possible cuts in the fiscal 2002 budget, to be approved this month, they found plenty of reasons to recommend against the $100,000 earmarked for the study this year.

One more potshot at Annapolis snipers' favorite targetAlmost nothing happens in Annapolis these days without a reference to Gov. William Donald Schaefer's well-chronicled bouts of letter-writing and personal visits to constituents -- not to speak of the odd memorandum questioning the loyalty of his lieutenant governor.The syndrome was apparent on a bill to change the date of Maryland's presidential primary to March 3, 1992.If Maryland votes early enough, the state will burst full-blown upon the national political landscape as a challenger to New Hampshire or Iowa, according to sponsors of the bill.