How It Works

5 FACTS ABOUT MONORAILS

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1 More & more monorails

Monorail manufactur­ers such as Bombardier are set to build over 470 kilometres of new monorail track by 2019, most of which will be in Asia and Latin America.

2 Olympic track

After winning the bid for the 1964 Olympics, Tokyo built a $55-million (over £40-million) monorail system between Haneda Airport and downtown Tokyo in order to improve infrastruc­ture.

3 Turntables

Monorails are not good at sharp corners, so turntables are used to rotate them. The car stops on a movable platform to change tracks, such as when moving from storage to the main line.

4 Longest line

The current record for the longest monorail system is the Chongqing Rail Transit in China, which has a total track length of over 200 kilometres.

5 Safety

Modern monorails have the highest safety record of any transport. Collisions are virtually impossible and the electrical systems are safely contained.

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