Venus and Aerotrain - Chevilly - Loiret

The planet Venus glimmers in the twilight, with the abandoned monorail of the Aérotrain for décor. The ghostly work, futurist at its epoch, supported the Aérotrain designed by the French engineer Jean Bertin. This experimental track was constructed in 1969. With a length of 18 km, it was the test model of the last prototype of the Aérotrain, capable of transporting eighty passengers. This 1956 French invention consisted of a train that moved on a cushion of air on a rail in the form of an inverted T, powered by a propeller, a turbojet engine or by a linear electric motor. The French state supported Jean Bertin's project until 1974, but the arrival of Giscard as president put an end to it, as it was in competition with the SNCF's TGV. The monorail is still the property of the French state. It was on the portion where the photo was taken (Chevilly) that the prototype Aérotrain 180 HV reached the speed of 430 km/h in March 1974, a record for the time (in 1981, the TGV only reached 380 km/h). Japan has opted for this technology to transport its passengers, with its Maglev reaching the record speed of 603 km/h in 2015.