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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

#251

Post by on_and_off »

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/…

I have no idea either but I agree on the traffic.

The old quote about rich people using public transit applies : my personal preference is to live in an (european) city with a great public transport system.

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

#252

Post by puranjay »

justapassenger wrote: post #45
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/…

> ELI5... why is digging a tunnel tech news? It's because Elon is loved in the tech circle.

I can't see any argument where a boring machine (Elon's or otherwise) isn't "tech" and "engineering".

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

#253

Post by growlist »

flexie wrote: post #233
Rexxar wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you like tunnels, there will be 200km of tunnels built by 21 boring machines at the same time between 2020 and 2030 around Paris : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grand_Paris_Express

Thanks for posting. This really shows the power of the English language. I am not French, I don't live in France, I don't speak French and I am not particularly interested in tunnels or rails. And probably that's why it's the first time I hear about this. But I am not American either, and I don't live there, but I have read about the expensive few mile extension of a subway line in the Upper East Side of Manhattan an…

Not just language though. The MSM in the UK has such a narrow range it's shocking - today's leading story on the news will often be something like the rapper Stormzy's latest completely predictable opinions about whatever, and then I'll turn over to Al Jazeera and find out there's thousands dead in Peru from flooding, civil war breaking out somewhere in Africa, etc. It's hard not to come to the conclusion that they explicitly do not want an informed populace. It didn't used to be like this.

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

#254

Post by jshevek »

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/…

As a space exploration enthusiast, Elon's tunnel boring activities are especially interesting to me. He is the only tunnel boring CEO who has openly expressed interest in developing the technology for Mars.

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

#255

Post by chrisco255 »

asdff wrote: post #228
chrisco255 wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's amazing to me is that we built the Golden Gate bridge for $35 million in 1933 (would be $688 million in today's dollars) and it only took 4 years. The Empire State building was built in one year (1930). What happened to our ability to build massive structures quickly? Is it amazing that Musk can do things so quickly or is it just that we got so fucking slow on everything that it seems amazing?

We can build a building like the empire state today in a year if we are willing to waste a half dozen lives in the process as well. In fact in some countries that's pretty much what's done.

You look at the old photos of the construction and these guys were walking around on steel beams 80 stories high with no hard hats, no rails, no protection from falls...it's no surprise they lost 5 workers. I wouldn't argue that safety should be sacrificed, but as others said, a lot of the hold up in construction is environmental review, inspections, permitting process, etc. It's nuts, but the architect conceived of the design in two weeks. Construction began the next year after concept drawings and it took 13 months to build. They were putting down nearly one floor a day. Amazing. And it's an iconic building that remains a landmark today.

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

#256

Post by thaumasiotes »

growlist wrote: post #253
flexie wrote: post #233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks for posting. This really shows the power of the English language. I am not French, I don't live in France, I don't speak French and I am not particularly interested in tunnels or rails. And probably that's why it's the first time I hear about this. But I am not American either, and I don't live there, but I have read about the expensive few mile extension of a subway line in the Upper East Side of Manhattan an…

Not just language though. The MSM in the UK has such a narrow range it's shocking - today's leading story on the news will often be something like the rapper Stormzy's latest completely predictable opinions about whatever, and then I'll turn over to Al Jazeera and find out there's thousands dead in Peru from flooding, civil war breaking out somewhere in Africa, etc. It's hard not to come to the conclusion that they e…

To be fair, "civil war breaking out somewhere in Africa" is news in the same way that the tide going out is news. If you're upset about how predictable it is to hear about a rapper's opinions, you should be more upset about coverage of a war going on in Africa.

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

#257

Post by rahulnair23 »

clairity wrote: post #117
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.

induced demand is often (intentionally?) misunderstood as demand being literally insatiable (and by extension, "why bother?"), but really, we're just severly underserving the market, and there are very limited price signals we can rely on to understand the cost and value of a road foot-second (or meter-second). people want more fast, affordable, on-demand, point-to-point private transportation. "induced demand" tells…

I think you've missed the point, going by your second paragraph.

How capacity is provisioned from A to B influences how people choose to move and, over the long term, build homes/workplaces.

Induced demand does not suggest that supply is less than demand - it implies that demand is "flexible" to meet any supply conditions. There is overwhelming evidence of this at work over 50 years and across continents.

As a consequence, the argument is not "why bother?" but rather - "build it in a way that scales". For urban areas, private transport doesn't scale well.

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

#258

Post by hurricanetc »

asdff wrote: post #219
spectrum1234 wrote: post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is completely wrong. The biggest costs to tunnels is bureaucracy. Simply using private funds without numerous contractors can decreases costs by an order of magnitude with no technological improvements.

Simply using public funds to employ a workforce rather than contract one would save the most money due to eliminating the need to house and feed shareholders and turn a profit, but voters seem to like the contractor profiteering model even if it eats the public purse. NYC only has a big subway system because it gobbled up all the failing private railways over the years. LA used to have the largest rail transportation…

Using public funds to employ a workforce is basically “How to Bloat 101.” The MTA in NYC is a shining example of taxpayer waste. They call it “Money Thrown Away” for a reason.

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

#259

Post by fouc »

mbesto wrote: post #159
SECProto wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And the Tesla Roadster was just a modified Lotus Elise. Buying an of-the-shelf product and reverse engineering it, before building ones' own, is a very valuable step.

And Tesla's Gigfactory is a JV with Panasonic and partially funded by taxpayers. I'd say the largest value add about Elon Musk is his ability to create a reality distortion field to convince large swathes of people to follow his dream. I'm actually not being critical of Musk here. Jobs did this and you can see how transformative certain technologies have been as a result.

Musk and Jobs having strong visions and making them happen so that we can all benefit is denigrated as "reality distortion field"?

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

#260

Post by jacobush »

vl wrote: post #222
thereisnospork wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Imo big infrastructure needs like roads and subways shouldn't be done on a project basis at all. For instance, NYC shouldn't bid and build out massive contracts for a few km of subway. They should own a boring machine and add 10-100m of tunnels a week, every week[0]. (numbers arbitrary) You can shake so much overhead around project start-up and shut-down and it will be a long time before NYC (nevermind someplace like…

But why there is a need to paint it all the time?

So it doesn’t rust
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