I had written about train transportation undergoing major improvements in the past couple years to fight the cheaper flight rates. The only chance the trains in Europe stood against air travel was to cut the travel time and reduce the fares. The former has been achieved by the French TGV last week when it hit 357.2mph mark during a sales exhibition.

TGV is built with a 25k horsepower engine which is regarded as France’s bullet train. It beat the previous speed record of 320.2mph set by another French train in 1990. However, the ultimate speed king is the Japanese magnetically levitated train which has hit a top speed of 361mph in 2003.

The French are trying to compete with the Japanese for a Chinese project connecting Beijing and Shanghai. The Chinese are planning on reducing the travel time between these two cities which currently stands at 9 hours.