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Hyperloop One to shut down

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Re: Hyperloop One to shut down

#231

Post by tomComb »

prometheus76 wrote: post #227
dougmwne wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’ve slowly lost my innocence when it comes to public transportation in the US. At this point I can see that 95% of the country is absolutely locked into low-density single occupancy transportation at least till we invent sky cars. We have trillions in sunk cost that covers nearly every road, every home and every business in America. We will never, ever be Europe.

Do you understand how much bigger and more climate-diverse and elevation-diverse America is?

Ever tried to get from Italy to Northern Europe? They are now building a truly incredible tunnel to make it easier.

Re: Hyperloop One to shut down

#232

Post by lmm »

prometheus76 wrote: post #227
dougmwne wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’ve slowly lost my innocence when it comes to public transportation in the US. At this point I can see that 95% of the country is absolutely locked into low-density single occupancy transportation at least till we invent sky cars. We have trillions in sunk cost that covers nearly every road, every home and every business in America. We will never, ever be Europe.

Do you understand how much bigger and more climate-diverse and elevation-diverse America is?

All that space and variety makes it even more baffling that apparently it's simply impossible to build even one decent city anywhere in the US that didn't have one in 1900, much less a proper conurbation like those in the Blue Banana.

Re: Hyperloop One to shut down

#233

Post by elcritch »

jazzyjackson wrote: post #221
mynameisnoone wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Only in Wyoming where, unlike Texas, truckers have the sense to stay to the right. Also, there is de facto no speed limit there because there are only a handful of WSTs. I suggest avoiding Wyoming Colorado unless you have nose plugs or no sense of smell.

Wyoming is exciting because a gust of wind can blow a semi into you at any second.

Driving across I-80 we'd always count at least a couple of semi's blown over. Not to mention sudden blizzards, snow blowing sideways, or super dense fog.

Once while I living in eastern Wyoming we had an "80 car" pileup, probably more like 60 cars but one tank truck caught fire:

https://www.facebook.com/118611954828240/photos/update-on-i-...

Re: Hyperloop One to shut down

#234

Post by seanmcdirmid »

hnbad wrote: post #185
seanmcdirmid wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It does, but the ventilation is still not designed for diesels. I guess we are just discussing boring, in that case, electric something is required, maybe battery would work out better than overhead or below lines. Or maybe the only way to do this right without any ventilation is via supercooled magnets or air pressure.

As I said earlier though, the problem with batteries is they're a PITA to extinguish if they catch fire and you don't want to have that problem deep underground unless you plan to flood entire parts of the tunnel (which brings its own problems not even considering cleanup itself). As any emergency worker will tell you, the problem with batteries compared to ICE engines is that if the battery is on fire it doesn't jus…

If they did the whole vacuum tube thing, you’d want to sealed anyways, and maybe propel it using maglev, although I’m not sure what the heat properties are of that. I’m guessing they have to expend energy to keep the magnets cool anyways.

Re: Hyperloop One to shut down

#235

Post by bluGill »

SonicScrub wrote: post #220
svnt wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You could calculate the cost to tunnel under one linear mile at 40 ft diameter and then realize that whatever number you got, it is the cheap part because you haven’t reinforced, drained, ventilated, or surfaced the tunnel. This doesn’t require a discussion to figure out. You just have to mentally walk through the process and do some back of the envelope math.

It's even easier than walking through that. Just Google the costs per mile of a typical subway line extension. There's a reason subterranean rails only makes when land costs are at a premium.

Even then most subways would be better as elevated rail

Re: Hyperloop One to shut down

#236

Post by lmm »

easton wrote: post #33
martythemaniak wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

High Speed rail attempts have failed everywhere in North America, it has nothing to do with Musk or Hyperloop and everything to do with how incredibly poorly HSR fits into the existing urban fabric of North America. There have been many studies of building a HSR line between Windsor and Quebec City and you just can't make it work.

Brightline exists and is operational in Florida, you can now ride a high speed train from Miami to Orlando (as long as you're okay with 120mph as high speed). They are still expanding it to Tampa too.

120mph is literally not high speed rail (200kph is the usual threshold), and Brightline only manages that much for the last stretch from Cocoa to Orlando.

Re: Hyperloop One to shut down

#237

Post by johannes1234321 »

iampims wrote: post #228
dangus wrote: post #226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Netherlands had a very similar problem and made very simple and inexpensive changes to roadway planning. For one thing, I think a lot of American suburbs could be way more bike friendly if people just had a safe path to ride in. We are talking a half a lane worth of pavement. Another thing is that this isn’t all or nothing. Still owning and perhaps needing a car but reducing the number of trips per week is a win.…

Roads safe for cycling is half the battle. The other half is around zoning and mixing residential with businesses.

That's not half the battle. Undoing the zoning is 90% of the battle.

Cycle paths can be added at a step by step basis and keeping some gaps isn't an issue and if some paths aren't used much initially there isn't a big problem. Also sometime a single line painted on the road is enough for a start.

If businesses settle in dezoned area they need to attract an audience quickly, but the will be less attractive than the hyperstore or mall for car drivers and depend on a bunch of other businesses in walkable distance. Financing the period till it works can be tough and will cycle through a few businesses till a working mixture is established.

And even then: In the car centric land usage, distances are too far quickly for quickly walking over to the bakery for fetching bread for breakfast, 15 minutes as a guidance for reaching everyday shops, doctor offices, a bar, ... density has to be increased. But people won't give up their yards.

Re: Hyperloop One to shut down

#238

Post by naikrovek »

dougmwne wrote: post #201
standardUser wrote: post #195

I think we should accept that, at least in the case of the US, most future transit infrastructure will be built on existing roads. Every other options is an order of magnitude more expensive. Plus, we have so many roads! If we didn't use them it the most inefficient way possible - cramming them full of giants cars for single people who also happen to be terrible pilots - we could get a ton of bandwidth out of them. A…

I’ve slowly lost my innocence when it comes to public transportation in the US. At this point I can see that 95% of the country is absolutely locked into low-density single occupancy transportation at least till we invent sky cars. We have trillions in sunk cost that covers nearly every road, every home and every business in America. We will never, ever be Europe.

We can’t possibly have transportation infrastructure like Europe until we have similar zoning laws (which would do away with the separation of homes and businesses into distinct areas) and similar population density.

Until we put shops very close to homes, end the huge big-box retailer’s death grip on everyone’s spending habits, and learn to live leaner, European style public transport will never work.

We put shopping centers far away from homes, and we put homes all over the effing place, making public transport effectively impossible to get right for even a small percentage of the population.

Re: Hyperloop One to shut down

#239

Post by cdelsolar »

dangus wrote: post #226
dougmwne wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’ve slowly lost my innocence when it comes to public transportation in the US. At this point I can see that 95% of the country is absolutely locked into low-density single occupancy transportation at least till we invent sky cars. We have trillions in sunk cost that covers nearly every road, every home and every business in America. We will never, ever be Europe.

The Netherlands had a very similar problem and made very simple and inexpensive changes to roadway planning. For one thing, I think a lot of American suburbs could be way more bike friendly if people just had a safe path to ride in. We are talking a half a lane worth of pavement. Another thing is that this isn’t all or nothing. Still owning and perhaps needing a car but reducing the number of trips per week is a win.…

I haven’t owned a car since 2017. I didn’t need one living in NYC and then I bike around my suburb. My wife does have a car which we use for shopping and taking the kids places but I’m trying to hold off on buying a second one. I really wish bike culture was more of a thing; I do see other bikers on the road, but anytime I go anywhere with my bike I’m often the only one that biked there.

Re: Hyperloop One to shut down

#240

Post by 1920musicman »

yigithan wrote: post #74
thechao wrote: post #12

There is a world where we dig tunnels under federal highways, and stick freight trucks down there. They'd run on a monorail, at 120+ mph. Surface vehicles would be dramatically limited in terms of height, width, and length. Maybe people buses could go down there? In my imagination these tunnels are, like, 200' down. Like mole people.

Right, they can even do this for within city delivery. Imagine each home having a tube box, like a mailbox, that is vertically connected to the network of tubes underground. Small electric vehicles running through the tubes and carrying parcel from warehouse hubs to homes and even vice versa. Amazon Instant Delivery!

A similar sentiment to other commenters in this thread... Why re-invent something incredibly resource-consuming like building specialized tube boxes?

If I were to invest into something today it would be medium size (about a tall van size) autonomous containers that can drive at night within city limits and drop off small reusable containers at delivery points such as apartment buildings. Case in point: Luxer One is a fairly common setup in SF today, the next step would be to stop delivering individual packages and, instead, deliver daily boxes for the whole building.

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