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Is Hyperloop the future of travel?

bbc.co.uk

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Re: Is Hyperloop the future of travel?

#151

Post by branchless »

ebiester wrote: post #145
branchless wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder would this reshape our world or just make it a little different. I don't want to get from Montreal to NY in 40 minutes. Or 10. I want to be able to live somewhere where I do not have to commute because tech has solved remote working. I don't want them to make me travel further for the same time. For example were they to build radial hyperloop around NY it's just more of the same drudgery. Only now bigger.

...but how do we get to remote working without crushing isolation? Can tech solve that problem? Can tech solve the problem of getting a coffee with a couple of coworkers and feeling connected to them in a way that helps the technical argument two months from now? Can tech solve the "Do I have my coworker's undivided attention or are they multitasking and ignoring me" problem? Can tech solve the "I'm in the room with…

Let me deal with the crushing isolation. Give me the choice.

Re: Is Hyperloop the future of travel?

#152

Post by nickparker »

pi-err wrote: post #67

There's a palpable excitement around Hyperloop and I can't wait to know if this will reshape our world or not. One of the largest problem I can see is not technical. The consensus is that a "standard" Hyperloop track (between 2 cities, 300 to 800km apart) would have a ~1,500 passengers/hour max capacity. High speed rail, such as Eurostar, would be around 10,000 passengers/hour. Even if Hyperloop managed to get built…

I'm not sure where your consensus is coming from, but it's not what I've seen/heard working on this stuff.

Hyperloop One (formerly Hyperloop Tech) said in an info session last Fall that they were targeting launch intervals below 15 seconds. They also want a pod to comfortably carry a single intermodal container - 8'x8'x40'.

That space can seat around 40, which works out to 9600 passengers/hr capacity at 15 second intervals, on a single track.

The other angle to consider is that tracks very likely won't be singular. The tubes are light by infrastructure standards, you could pack two for each direction onto a route without dramatically increasing pylon costs. Add in the relatively low trip times, and in route segments with varying asymmetric demand it's feasible to switch one in four tracks' direction at midday. Eg a route into the city could easily run 3 in 1 out for mornings and 1 in 3 out for evenings.

Re: Is Hyperloop the future of travel?

#153

Post by nickparker »

_Codemonkeyism wrote: post #136
dredmorbius wrote: post #126

No, it's not. There's also the Vactrain concept. Several variants were pursued from 1914 on, with Robert Salter of RAND writing a couple of proposals in the 1970s. The idea's not new, has been seriously explored previously, and has been rejected or failed on technical, cost, political, practical, and economic grounds. Some forms of local or highly-dedicated application, possibly . But for general use, no. https://en.…

Musk plan: 1. Announce Hyperloop to the world 2. Let someone else build it with tubes 3. Go to Mars 4. Use everything people have built - and went bankrupt - in the thin atmosphere on Mars with success without expensive tubes. Now the SpaceX plans, the Mars plans and Hyperloop come together.

You still need tubes on Mars for a vanilla air-levitation based Hyperloop. Martian fines would wreak havoc on your compression system.

The mag-lev systems could perhaps run on exposed pistes though.

Re: Is Hyperloop the future of travel?

#154

Post by lj3 »

samcheng wrote: post #128
pi-err wrote: post #67

There's a palpable excitement around Hyperloop and I can't wait to know if this will reshape our world or not. One of the largest problem I can see is not technical. The consensus is that a "standard" Hyperloop track (between 2 cities, 300 to 800km apart) would have a ~1,500 passengers/hour max capacity. High speed rail, such as Eurostar, would be around 10,000 passengers/hour. Even if Hyperloop managed to get built…

The world's busiest high-speed rail is the Japanese Shinkansen between Tokyo and Osaka. It was doing 23,000 passengers per hour way back in 1992. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shinkansen The newest trains have capacity for 1323 seated passengers each, plus plenty of room for standing passengers, and run 13 times an hour in each direction. These things do regularly fill to capacity, too; I've ridden them standing in t…

It's $130 one way. Surely, people don't use that to commute on a daily basis? A round trip flight is faster and cheaper ($80-$300 vs $260).

Re: Is Hyperloop the future of travel?

#155

Post by nickparker »

kuschku wrote: post #87
Retric wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Vacuums get much more costly as you get ever lower pressure. Hyperloop is an interesting cost / benefit between fast travel and lower construction and maintenance costs which is why the speeds are relatively low. The vehicle is also closer to an electric aircraft than an electric train. Note the big fan on the front: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyperloop#/media/File:Hyperloo... Another consideration is the faster y…

You realize that the fan concept, and the hovercraft concept both were cancelled? The new hyperloop concept is just a fan-less capsule hovering on a MagLev track. It’s just VacTrain over again, but more expensive and with lower capacities.

"Cancelled" by who?

Hyperloop One is by far the most credible project, with HTT somewhere behind them in second. They haven't revealed anything about their compression systems or lack thereof. HTT has backed off air levitation, but they're still using Inductrack which is radically cheaper than conventional MagLev and hasn't been applied commercially yet.

Several of the competition teams (like the one in this article) have built MagLev sleds with nice brakes, but they're just trying to win a speed record competition. That has no bearing on the real Hyperloop. Other teams are focusing more on scalable tech and doing some pretty innovative work.

The lower per-vehicle capacities also aren't a negative if launch cadences can be kept high enough to maintain throughput. Smaller vehicles let the network operate in a more point-to-point manner instead of the stop-and-go crap that trains have done since day one.

Re: Is Hyperloop the future of travel?

#156

Post by samcheng »

vladd wrote: post #148
samcheng wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The world's busiest high-speed rail is the Japanese Shinkansen between Tokyo and Osaka. It was doing 23,000 passengers per hour way back in 1992. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shinkansen The newest trains have capacity for 1323 seated passengers each, plus plenty of room for standing passengers, and run 13 times an hour in each direction. These things do regularly fill to capacity, too; I've ridden them standing in t…

Subway line 14 in Paris is fully automated, has trains arriving every 85 seconds during peak hours, and has an hourly capacity of 30'000 - 40'000 seats/hour. https://www.systra.com/IMG/pdf/metro_meteor_en-3.pdf

Subway is complementary to high speed rail (or hyperloop).

The trains travel (on average) about 1/10th the speed, and the distances covered are much smaller.

The Hong Kong MTR (the worst commuter crush I've personally experienced) handles an eye-popping 75,000 commuters per hour per direction: https://www.mtr.com.hk/en/corporate/operations/detail_worldc...

Re: Is Hyperloop the future of travel?

#157

Post by Animats »

For a more advanced concept with a working prototype, see [1]. The Applied Superconductivity Laboratory of Southwest Jiaotong University has a maglev train in a glass tube about two meters in diameter. Their goal is 3000 KPH.

Here's a technical paper on the maglev system used.[2] They discovered a problem with bumps in the magnetic field at rail joints, and figured out a way to fix that.

Maybe that's the future. If you're going to have a maglev system, you may as well go all the way and ditch the air turbine propulsion.

[1] http://english.swjtu.edu.cn/public/viewNews.aspx?ID=154 [2] http://link.springer.com/article/10.1186/s40064-016-1965-3

Re: Is Hyperloop the future of travel?

#158

Post by jaredklewis »

lj3 wrote: post #154
samcheng wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The world's busiest high-speed rail is the Japanese Shinkansen between Tokyo and Osaka. It was doing 23,000 passengers per hour way back in 1992. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shinkansen The newest trains have capacity for 1323 seated passengers each, plus plenty of room for standing passengers, and run 13 times an hour in each direction. These things do regularly fill to capacity, too; I've ridden them standing in t…

It's $130 one way. Surely, people don't use that to commute on a daily basis? A round trip flight is faster and cheaper ($80-$300 vs $260).

Having done both, I'd say door to door total travel time of Tokyo -> Osaka is shorter by train. But I like to get to airports two hours early to deal with security non sense. YMMV.

Also, a standard Shinkansen seat is far more spacious and comfortable than any economy plane seat.

Re: Is Hyperloop the future of travel?

#159

Post by odessacubbage »

branchless wrote: post #151
ebiester wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

...but how do we get to remote working without crushing isolation? Can tech solve that problem? Can tech solve the problem of getting a coffee with a couple of coworkers and feeling connected to them in a way that helps the technical argument two months from now? Can tech solve the "Do I have my coworker's undivided attention or are they multitasking and ignoring me" problem? Can tech solve the "I'm in the room with…

Let me deal with the crushing isolation. Give me the choice.

you already have the choice if you're willing to make some sacrifices.

Re: Is Hyperloop the future of travel?

#160

Post by _Codemonkeyism »

deftnerd wrote: post #147
_Codemonkeyism wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Musk plan: 1. Announce Hyperloop to the world 2. Let someone else build it with tubes 3. Go to Mars 4. Use everything people have built - and went bankrupt - in the thin atmosphere on Mars with success without expensive tubes. Now the SpaceX plans, the Mars plans and Hyperloop come together.

I wouldn't be surprised if his involvement in Solar City comes into the picture somehow either.

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