Nation on track for 5 maglev lines by 2020

China will operate more than five magnetic levitation rail lines with maximum speed of 160 kilometers per hour in cities including Chengdu, Wuhan and Guangzhou by 2020, said its manufacturer CRRC Dalian Co Ltd on Monday.

A new generation of Chinese medium-to-low speed magnetically levitated or maglev trains, manufactured by CRRC Dalian, a subsidiary of China Railway Rolling Stock Corp, completed test runs at a test speed of 120 kph in Shanghai earlier this month. The vehicles are expected to enter the market within a year.

"Even though metro trains can meet the demand to transport a large number of passengers from one location to another, it is too costly to build the infrastructure and difficult to control the noise," said Qu Tianwei, chief engineer of CRRC Dalian. "In addition, they cannot run very fast."