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The Boring Company’s Las Vegas tunnel is nearly 50% done

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Re: The Boring Company’s Las Vegas tunnel is nearly 50% done

#91

Post by hinkley »

danso wrote: post #74
neltnerb wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Though if they really dug that much tunnel under a city in such a short time, maybe there's an actual innovation in a better way to make subway tunnels? I think putting cars in these tunnels is silly and that subways are obviously the best answer personally, but I'm also watching two new light rail lines being put in next to my house. It does not seem quick (though they're elevated). It'd be lovely if those tracks we…

If there were an actual innovation in tunneling, I feel like they’d be able to give actual specific metrics to rebut critics who argue that it’s apples to oranges. But AFAIK the bottleneck in tunneling is not a mechanical engineering one.

The tunnel boring in Seattle began right at the edge of downtown, went under a highway and a monumental retaining wall (They covered that wall with surveying targets and monitored it the entire time), then pretty deep under a residential neighbhorhood and a canal.

I think the only time it's moving close to high-rises again is over by the University.

Edit: I believe they went so deep because of the volume of glacial deposits in this area. Otherwise they would have been going through gravel. That made building the stations a bit of a pain (the Beacon Hill station still has chronic problems with water. It smelled like a moldy towel for a long time).

Re: The Boring Company’s Las Vegas tunnel is nearly 50% done

#92

Post by gamblor956 »

neltnerb wrote: post #32
mdszy wrote: post #9

So they're halfway through digging the tunnel, not halfway through doing all the other things to make the tunnel actually as useful as musk is claiming. This all just seems like subways from first principles but probably worse.

Though if they really dug that much tunnel under a city in such a short time, maybe there's an actual innovation in a better way to make subway tunnels? I think putting cars in these tunnels is silly and that subways are obviously the best answer personally, but I'm also watching two new light rail lines being put in next to my house. It does not seem quick (though they're elevated). It'd be lovely if those tracks we…

Boring Co is digging a small tunnel under a single parcel of uniform dirt, which is the easiest type of tunneling project.

Re: The Boring Company’s Las Vegas tunnel is nearly 50% done

#93

Post by siquick »

ShorsHammer wrote: post #88
mc3 wrote: post #41

ELI5... why is digging a tunnel tech news? Does Elon dig them faster or more cheaply or something? Otherwise do I submit this to HN? https://www.sydneymetro.info/tunnelling . I think tunnels are the future though for cities. But I'd prefer trains to be running in them, or roads that only allow electric public transport. Edit. In 1988 they started work on the Channel Tunnel UK to France: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/…

That Sydney Metro tunnel is coming in at nearly double the initial budgeted cost. It's over $1B per km of tunnel. Australian infrastructure projects are hardly something to be proud of.

Have you seen any breakdown of why it costs that much? It seems like an unfathomable amount.

Re: The Boring Company’s Las Vegas tunnel is nearly 50% done

#94

Post by downerending »

reaperducer wrote: post #69
ghaff wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The expansion of the LVCC made me vaguely curious about what types of shows use it given that all the IT shows I'm familiar with use the Venetian/Sands or, if they're a bit smaller, The Mandalay Bay. I haven't been there since Comdex days. It looks as if it's things like Kitchen and Bath Builders, World of Concrete, etc. So maybe things that are more oriented towards a mega show floor and less to speaking rooms.

what types of shows use it given that all the IT shows I'm familiar with use the Venetian/Sands Here's the list of big conventions this year: CES: 175,000 people Automotive Aftermarket Show: 160,000 ConExpo-Con/Agg: 129,000 National Association of Broadcasters: 103,000 MAGIC (fashion/makeup, I believe): 78,0000 International Builders Show: 68,000 Shooting, Hunting & Outdoor Trade Show: 61,000 World of Concrete: 60,00…

Did NAB once. Miserable. Barely any place to sit on the floor, let alone benches. And the roaches--ugh.

Re: The Boring Company’s Las Vegas tunnel is nearly 50% done

#95

Post by majormajor »

cgy1 wrote: post #78
astrodust wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Let's solve traffic by building more roads!" Elon has a lot to learn about induced demand.

He has said that he doesn't believe in induced demand: https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1211076829395738626?s=20

I think he's woefully disconnected from the non-rich person's life, then. He can already afford to buy however much space he wants.

>If the transport system exceeds public travel needs, there will be very little traffic.

Sure. But... it would take an enormous amount of development to make this happen, because so many people are going to want more space if they can have it with still a For all the talk of walkable neighborhoods, if you gave people the choice of a 30min walk-and-subway commute in a 5-story condo building vs a 30min new-car-tunnel point to point commute with a 2000sqft house on a private parcel of land, you're going to have a lot (not everyone, but a lot) of people picking the latter.

Best case it's going to, for a long time, until we reach steady state, still just be a repeat of the "build roads, watch sprawl" cycle of the last century, just with potential to build even more roads by being able to continually go deeper (but is this that much easier than vertical overpasses and such?).

Re: The Boring Company’s Las Vegas tunnel is nearly 50% done

#96

Post by ryantgtg »

gamblor956 wrote: post #89
dv_dt wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this follows Elons pattern of being able to find areas where the fundamental technology has advanced and is available, but the integration and step up to a new level hasn't been invested in yet. I think the Boring company basically made more efficient custom built tunneling equipment.

Musk never learned that most of the cost of subways is the stations and supporting infrastructure, not digging the tunnel itself. Musk has not proposed any improvements to the expensive parts of tunneling.

Most of the costs are also emergency systems, such as ventilation and frequent exits. From what I've seen (I'm not an engineer or a tunnel expert), his tunnels do not account for these things. The standards, which cost a lot to meet, are there for a reason.

Re: The Boring Company’s Las Vegas tunnel is nearly 50% done

#97

Post by kjksf »

reaperducer wrote: post #72
sambroner wrote: post #11

I don't know much about tunneling speeds, but this seems much faster than Big Bertha in Seattle although for a much smaller volume (the tunnel is narrower) and (I'm assuming) less complex location. Big Bertha - 3.5 years, ~1.75 miles, 1.5 m/yr Boring - .15 years, .35 miles, 2.33 m/yr

this seems much faster than Big Bertha in Seattle Big Bertha dug under the downtown of a city with existing tunnels and utilities. The Las Vegas tunnel is mostly under parking lots with no obstructions.

While I doubt that "Las Vegas tunnel is mostly under parking lots with no obstructions" is even close to represent reality, here's what Boring Company says on the subject:

> With a typical minimum depth of 30 feet, The Boring Company tunnels are well beneath most utilities, which are typically less than 10 feet below the surface. In circumstances where a utility is located deeper, the tunnel depth is increased accordingly.

From https://www.boringcompany.com/faq

Re: The Boring Company’s Las Vegas tunnel is nearly 50% done

#98

Post by gamblor956 »

CydeWeys wrote: post #80
maxharris wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When you build the tunnel for a tenth the cost, that's a pretty big difference. The same budget lets you build ten times more infrastructure, which is quite badly needed! I live in Los Angeles and things are so bad here that often you simply can't see friends that live only a few miles away.

They're using standard tunnel boring machines same as anyone else. It's not clear what their "special sauce" is that's supposed to enable them to do it at one-tenth the cost. So far they haven't delivered. As for LA, you've had ample opportunity to expand your subway system over the past decades to solve this problem, it's just never actually been done. It's not clear how Boring Company changes anything. I would love…

LA has expanded its rail system quite dramatically in the past decade and will be opening a new rail line next year...

It turns out the expensive part was not the digging. It was moving undisclosed utility lines and building the stations. Moving undisclosed utility lines is almost singlehandedly the reason the regional connector and Crenshaw lines are over budget.

Re: The Boring Company’s Las Vegas tunnel is nearly 50% done

#99

Post by gamblor956 »

maxharris wrote: post #56
jeromegv wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except this 10% of cost is just a marketing ploy by Musk to sell you the project. When you compare to the price of subways in Europe, this isn't any cheaper. North America is extremely bad at building cheap subways, but other places of the world have already achieved it.

I personally know people that work at SpaceX (because my wife works there). Reusable rockets weren't a cheap marketing ploy. I don't have personal contact with anyone at the Boring Company, but it's located right across the street from SpaceX in Hawthorne, and I know that many of the people there are from SpaceX. In fact, I just drove past the test tunnel there this morning, as I dropped her off at work. I might be b…

Boring Co has already demonstrated the type of tunnel you get for 10 percent of the cost.

It was so bumpy that multiple journalists got motion sickness and puked during the demo rides.

Re: The Boring Company’s Las Vegas tunnel is nearly 50% done

#100

Post by [deleted] »

kjksf wrote: post #97
reaperducer wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

this seems much faster than Big Bertha in Seattle Big Bertha dug under the downtown of a city with existing tunnels and utilities. The Las Vegas tunnel is mostly under parking lots with no obstructions.

While I doubt that "Las Vegas tunnel is mostly under parking lots with no obstructions" is even close to represent reality, here's what Boring Company says on the subject: > With a typical minimum depth of 30 feet, The Boring Company tunnels are well beneath most utilities, which are typically less than 10 feet below the surface. In circumstances where a utility is located deeper, the tunnel depth is increased accord…

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