To address the issues of insufficient curve negotiation performance and severe wheel-rail wear caused by the prevalence of small-radius curves on intercity lines, this paper focuses on intercity electric multiple units (EMUs). An actuator was laterally installed between the axle box and bogie to form an active radial bogie. This actuator enables lateral movement of the wheelset, allowing the vehicle to follow a pure rolling line. A actuator system model was developed, and a fractional-order PI controller was employed to verify the actuator's rapidity, accuracy, and stability in tracking the desired trajectory under load disturbance conditions. Using the SIMPACK and MATLAB/Simulink software, a dynamic model of the active radial intercity EMUs was established. The study analyzed dynamic indexes such as wheelset yaw angle, wear number, lateral wheel-rail force, and derailment coefficient to evaluate the effect of operating speed and curve radius on the vehicle's curve negotiation performance. Additionally, the Jendel wear model was used to assess the wheel-rail wear performance when the vehicle passing a 500-meter curve radius. The results show that using the distance from the pure rolling line to the centerline of the track as the displacement control target for the actuator is reasonable. When passing the curved track with a radius of 500 meters, compared with traditional passive vehicles, the new type of active radial vehicle shows a 12% reduction in maximum lateral wheel-rail force, an 8% decrease in maximum wheelset coning angle, the derailment coefficient decreased by 20%, and the maximum wheel wear number decreased by 20%. The wear depth of the outer and inner wheels of the first wheelset was reduced by 31% and 12%, respectively, and the wear depth of the outer and inner rails of the curved track was reduced by 20% and 15%, respectively. Therefore, this type of active radial bogie significantly improves the vehicle's curve negotiation performance and effectively reduces wheel and rail wear.