High-speed rail (Shinkansen)
Tren de alta velocidad (Shinkansen)
- Date
- 1964 · confidence high
- Place
- Tokyo-Osaka, Japan
- Credited to
- Japanese National Railways (Shinji Sogō, Hideo Shima); opened on 1 October 1964
- Field
- Movement
What it is
The first railway line designed for 210 km/h, with no level crossings and in-cab signalling. It showed that the train could compete with the aeroplane, without a single fatality in sixty years.
What it led to
- The French TGV (1981), Spain's AVE and China's network, the largest in the world
- The revitalisation of the railway against the aeroplane and the car
- The economic integration of regions and megalopolises
Built on
- 25 kV 50 Hz railway electrification1936-1955
- electric traction
- automatic signalling
- broad-gauge railway
Made possible
- Superconducting maglev (SCMaglev)1997 / 2015
- Commercial maglev train (Shanghai Transrapid)2004
- TGV
- AVE (Spanish high-speed train)