Westinghouse was the developer and leader in maglev technology for high speed trains years ago. They sold it to China for reasons I don’t remember.
Look at the cost for “high-speed rail” vs. the costs of expanding the highway system, number of riders, etc. It’s financially feasible in China since they can expropriate the land for nothing, use extremely low-cost/no-cost labor, and subsidize the rail lines. Further, their highway infrastructure outside of the major cities is very poor.
Here in the US, we already have the highway infrastructure in place. For a rail line, land costs would bankrupt any line attempting such a project. Rremember that we had to give land to generate the cross-US rail lines. Second, take a look back at the Trans-Texas corridor. This was part of the proposal. We would be required to use union labor (Ka-Ching). The costs of rail road cars and engines would be tremendous. Couple that with limited capacity (how many you can run at any one time on a line) and it’s an economic non-winner. It would never be viable against air lines and car travel.
We’re having to subsidize AmTrac through the nose since it can’t pay for itself, even in the northeast and on the west coast. The Las Vegas monorail, touted as the next chapter of rail, has gone bankrupt, even with the millions that vist Vegas. There is not a single public transit rail system that is paying for itself in the US. And people expect high-speed rail to be economically viable?
You can’t compare what happens in China with what is possible economically in the US. Totally different systems, economically and politically.