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Is Hyperloop the future of travel?

bbc.co.uk

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Re: Is Hyperloop the future of travel?

#161

Post by Animats »

kuschku wrote: post #83
S4M wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> High speed rail, such as Eurostar, would be around 10,000 passengers/hour. How is that remotely true? There is one Eurostar approximately every 30 minutes (looking at the departures from London [0], it seems that there are 32 Eurostar leaving London every day), and I seriously doubt one train can carry 5000 passengers (I would say about 500 passengers), so your approximation is completely off (even taking into acco…

Simply, because you don’t have to run them every 30 minutes. In Germany and Japan on select few HSR lines trains are operating with a frequency of 2 minutes, and 800 passengers per train. That’s 24'000 per hour.

The record is probably the Yamanote Line in Tokyo, with about 165,000 passengers per hour at peak. That's effectively a conveyor belt made out of trains; there's a loop in each direction with trains every 2 minutes in each direction during peak periods. Each train carries up to 1600 people, and there are 50 trains on the loops during peak periods.

Re: Is Hyperloop the future of travel?

#162

Post by ksec »

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 think that is exactly why I "think" hyperloop doesn't solves the problem we hope it would. But will likely provide another set of transport to complement Air traffic. The amount of passenger / hour is simply... too low, ( Doesn't handle peak traffic )

"May" be it will work in US or EU where it is less populated, but it seems hard to scale in places like China and Japan

Re: Is Hyperloop the future of travel?

#163

Post by fzzzy »

ino wrote: post #111
fzzzy wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, but I think it's fair to call a train that is powered with electromagnetic pulses from stationary coils something different than a train that is powered by an onboard engine.

You just described a Maglev

Yes, although I think maglev trains use continuous linear motors while if I understood the original proposal correctly, the hyperloop would be more like a series of railguns evenly spaced along the route.

Re: Is Hyperloop the future of travel?

#164

Post by tiatia »

The German Transrapid gave very little advantage over regular trains and was bound to fail from the beginning. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transrapid

The Hyperloop has the same problems (technology still developing, requires new, incompatible infrastructure) but it has one big advantage:

In contrast to the Transrapid, it can compete with planes regarding to speed.

What both technologies share: They require electricity, which is good. Electricity can be generated easily, possibly with thorium reactors in the future. It is hard (but possible, e.g. reduction of CO2 to methanol) to create combustible fuels for plane engines from electricity. Electric transport will likely overtake all kind of combustion engines.

Re: Is Hyperloop the future of travel?

#165

Post by kuschku »

Grishnakh wrote: post #150
kuschku wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In Germany there are some tracks with higher usages, but those are not the same line – they just share part of the line (imagine on the track A -- B -- C -- D, a train going from A to C, and from B to D, both every half hour – between B and C now you have 15min frequencies). But the point is the same, regardless of if we use Japan, Germany, France, Spain, etc: 10k people per hour, or more, is easily possible. Hyperlo…

>Hyperloop transports less people than a single lane of highway So what? Airplanes also transport fewer people than a highway. How many people travel by air between LA and SF right now per hour? Probably no more than the capacity of Hyperloop. >But the point is the same, regardless of if we use Japan, Germany, France, Spain, etc: 10k people per hour, or more, is easily possible. What makes you think 10k people per ho…

> when they can just use their car, get there in about the same time

> HSR is not, it's slow

Have you ever seen an actual HSR system?

We’re talking about 220mph minimum. That’s quite a bit faster than per car.

And, due to TSA, it’s faster than an airplane, and without the annoying stuff. And cheaper.

Hyperloops only differences over HSR is that it’s 15min faster, is a lot more uncomfortable, a lot more expensive to build, a lot more expensive to use (due to few people per capsule), etc.

Re: Is Hyperloop the future of travel?

#167

Post by aptwebapps »

Grishnakh wrote: post #149
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 not a distraction, it's a better alternative. HSR is too slow and too expensive. As for passenger capacity, who cares? This is not Japan, where density is very high and lots of people don't have cars. What's important is demand: how many passengers are actually flying between LA and SF right now ? And how does that compare to the capacity of Hyperloop? Hyperloop is being positioned as an alternative to regional…

how many passengers are actually flying between LA and SF right now?

Good question. About 3.4 million per year (I think that's both ways based on other sources) according to this:

http://www.statista.com/statistics/536977/domestic-air-route...

Re: Is Hyperloop the future of travel?

#168

Post by dragonwriter »

Grishnakh wrote: post #149
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 not a distraction, it's a better alternative. HSR is too slow and too expensive. As for passenger capacity, who cares? This is not Japan, where density is very high and lots of people don't have cars. What's important is demand: how many passengers are actually flying between LA and SF right now ? And how does that compare to the capacity of Hyperloop? Hyperloop is being positioned as an alternative to regional…

It's funny that hyperloop proponents both argue that it is better for HSRs role, but that it's main purpose is to replace airline flights.

HSRs main justification is reducing the increase in long-range intrastate auto trips.

Also, whether an air travel or auto trip replacement, the hyperloop paper relied for its low cost on a route that doesn't have the transit connections to either where people are from or where they are trying to go be useful, whereas HSR both connects population centers and includes investments in improving connecting regional transit around the termini (and other stations). Hyperloop aims for a much smaller goal than HSR, and even at that has an alignment which makes it useless for the goal.

Re: Is Hyperloop the future of travel?

#169

Post by Grishnakh »

kuschku wrote: post #165
Grishnakh wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Hyperloop transports less people than a single lane of highway So what? Airplanes also transport fewer people than a highway. How many people travel by air between LA and SF right now per hour? Probably no more than the capacity of Hyperloop. >But the point is the same, regardless of if we use Japan, Germany, France, Spain, etc: 10k people per hour, or more, is easily possible. What makes you think 10k people per ho…

> when they can just use their car, get there in about the same time > HSR is not, it's slow Have you ever seen an actual HSR system? We’re talking about 220mph minimum. That’s quite a bit faster than per car. And, due to TSA, it’s faster than an airplane, and without the annoying stuff. And cheaper. Hyperloops only differences over HSR is that it’s 15min faster, is a lot more uncomfortable, a lot more expensive to b…

>Have you ever seen an actual HSR system? >We’re talking about 220mph minimum. That’s quite a bit faster than per car.

Sorry, that's complete bullshit.

We're not talking about HSR in Japan, China, or Germany here. We're talking about "HSR" in California, USA.

The California system will be very, very lucky if it manages to ever hit 200mph in a short stretch. Realistically, it might be about the speed of the Amtrak Acela Express, which is basically no faster than any regular train, except that it manages to hit 150mph once or twice, briefly.

You seem to be making the ridiculous assumption that HSR in America will resemble HSR in other countries somehow, in both speed and cost. Nothing could be farther from the truth. HSR here is a horribly expensive boondoggle. It'll be worse than the F-35.

Re: Is Hyperloop the future of travel?

#170

Post by pi-err »

nickparker wrote: post #152
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 int…

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

Thanks, didn't have those figures. I used a study from a Hyperloop study group (can't find the URL) who found that the most efficient setup would be to assemble 5 pods together (total ~100-150 pax) , with 1 departure every 5 minutes so ~1500pax/hour.

Now a realistic turnover time (unload, clean+inspect, load, launch and contingency) would be 10' per pod - and this would already be pretty agressive.

So if you launch a pod at 15 seconds intervals, a station would need capacity for >40 pods. Inbound and outbound pods would need to station 3' upon arrival and pre-launch - again, super aggressive figure. Imagining we keep the whole setup on 6 tracks with a swapping device at the end of the tracks and relatively narrow 3m wide platforms, a station would be >40m wide and long, not accounting for circulations etc. Realistic figures would be 100x50m stations - or an equivalent volume if tracks are stacked instead of juxtaposed.

This amount of underground real estate would just not be found in most Europe cities, or at punitive prices, not even mentioning NYMBYism. HSR managed to take off thanks to heavy direct or indirect subsidies and by leveraging existing infrastructure (stations and many rail connections). Hyperloop won't get the same sweet deals.

I'm a Hyperloop supporter for the scifi potential in it, though I just don't get how and where it can get built in this world.

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