For most Americans, trains are less a part of their daily lives than they are a part of the nation's history. When most people think of trains, they likely recall seeing steam engine locomotives in movies or museums . The reason for this has to do with a lack of investment in the rail lines and train technology of the United States.

While they're used primarily for transporting vehicles, commodities, and freight, passenger trains aren't used by the public nearly as much as airplanes or personal cars. Elsewhere in the world, that's not the case. If you look into the rail lines in Europe and Asia, you'll not only find trains running constantly all over the place, but you'll also find the fastest trains in the world.

American trains lumber along, blocking traffic for extended periods of time, while European and Asian trains race by at hundreds of miles per hour. Bullet trains, maglev trains, and other innovations keep them moving. The world's fastest trains are all located across the pond on both sides of the United States, and their speeds are impressive.

While they don't move along at the same speed as a jet airplane, most are operated with incredible efficiency, keeping time and making their stops without delay. This makes high-speed passenger rail systems around the world some of the best means of moving from place to place, and these five trains are the fastest of them all. The TGV is France's primary high-speed train that operates throughout the nation and into several cou.