Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Elon Musk is boring a tunnel to skirt gridlock

bloomberg.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

271–278 of 278 posts

Re: Elon Musk is boring a tunnel to skirt gridlock

#271

Post by alex_duf »

paulddraper wrote: post #164
alex_duf wrote: post #104

If I can agree that building tunnels for public transport may be a good idea, building tunnels to encourage people to use their car doesn't sounds like it's taking humanity in the right direction. I'd rather see disruption to encourage people to use their bicycle and walking. Granted American cities aren't build for that but it's never too late. http://www.ted.com/talks/jeff_speck_4_ways_to_make_a_city_mo...

Bicycles and walking are slower, more subject to weather conditions, and work for a smaller portion of the population.

that means changing the design of our cities, and ensure that people who can't use cycling or walking can make use of public transport and / or individual cars if necessary.

The vast majority of people could live in a situation where individual transportation isn't necessary. In fact, cities like London are showing it's possible, simply by making cars unaffordable.

Re: Elon Musk is boring a tunnel to skirt gridlock

#272

Post by pnathan »

ChuckMcM wrote: post #239
abduhl wrote: post #229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I doubt Bertha will be purchasable given the litigation on the SR 99 job. I don't know what you would be able or want to use it for - it's 58.5 ft in diameter. It is unlikely that you will get an inventory of all the parts in the machine. If you really want a machine then you would just call the contractor and ask them their price. You would likely have to pay for delivery. The process to establish whether or not one…

> I doubt Bertha will be purchasable given the > litigation on the SR 99 job. Can you say a bit more about this? I had reasoned that the litigation would make it more likely that Bertha would be purchasable as a way to offset costs/losses for the party that holds title to the equipment. > I don't know what you would be able or want to > use it for - it's 58.5 ft in diameter. One of the longest bus routes in the Bay A…

Running a bit late here, but Bertha is widely considered by informed laypeople in Seattle to be the wrong solution: two smaller TBMs would have been better. The Big Bertha solution is widely considered to have been picked as a part of civic pride "a yuge tunnel!!!" rather than on engineering concerns.

I'd suggest looking at the Sound Transit "ST2" tunnel boring project, it's been massively simpler in execution.

Re: Elon Musk is boring a tunnel to skirt gridlock

#273

Post by ChuckMcM »

pnathan wrote: post #272
ChuckMcM wrote: post #239

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I doubt Bertha will be purchasable given the > litigation on the SR 99 job. Can you say a bit more about this? I had reasoned that the litigation would make it more likely that Bertha would be purchasable as a way to offset costs/losses for the party that holds title to the equipment. > I don't know what you would be able or want to > use it for - it's 58.5 ft in diameter. One of the longest bus routes in the Bay A…

Running a bit late here, but Bertha is widely considered by informed laypeople in Seattle to be the wrong solution: two smaller TBMs would have been better. The Big Bertha solution is widely considered to have been picked as a part of civic pride "a yuge tunnel!!!" rather than on engineering concerns. I'd suggest looking at the Sound Transit "ST2" tunnel boring project, it's been massively simpler in execution.

Late indeed, is there even a tunnel in the ST2 project? Looking here: http://www.soundtransit.org/st2 was not bringing anything up with a quick parse. (search for tunnel, boring, underground all came up empty)

Re: Elon Musk is boring a tunnel to skirt gridlock

#274

Post by pnathan »

ChuckMcM wrote: post #273
pnathan wrote: post #272

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Running a bit late here, but Bertha is widely considered by informed laypeople in Seattle to be the wrong solution: two smaller TBMs would have been better. The Big Bertha solution is widely considered to have been picked as a part of civic pride "a yuge tunnel!!!" rather than on engineering concerns. I'd suggest looking at the Sound Transit "ST2" tunnel boring project, it's been massively simpler in execution.

Late indeed, is there even a tunnel in the ST2 project? Looking here: http://www.soundtransit.org/st2 was not bringing anything up with a quick parse. (search for tunnel, boring, underground all came up empty)

ST2 bored from Westlake to University of Washington, and is continuing out to the Northgate station. I'm slightly unsure how the "Eastlink" system plays out with ST2 - but they are boring around there.

That page reads like a man page, and the associated pdf's are worse! :-o

Re: Elon Musk is boring a tunnel to skirt gridlock

#275

Post by Ericson2314 »

niftich wrote: post #194
Ericson2314 wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

DC's certainly seems bored—and some are extremely deep and therefore must be. Stations might be cut and cover but are arched to match.

The Washington Post has a good graphic [1] on which stations were cut-and-cover and which stations were bored. You will find that most stations were actually cut-and-cover, with only the Red Line having bored segments: one starting from after Farragut North [2] and running until shortly after the Medical Center [3], and another starting as soon as it leaves the CSX Metropolitan Sub northwest of Silver Spring and cont…

That makes sense. DuPont and Rosslyn are insanely deep; the rest of the orange line, not so much. Thanks for the info!

Re: Elon Musk is boring a tunnel to skirt gridlock

#276

Post by abduhl »

pnathan wrote: post #274
ChuckMcM wrote: post #273

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Late indeed, is there even a tunnel in the ST2 project? Looking here: http://www.soundtransit.org/st2 was not bringing anything up with a quick parse. (search for tunnel, boring, underground all came up empty)

ST2 bored from Westlake to University of Washington, and is continuing out to the Northgate station. I'm slightly unsure how the "Eastlink" system plays out with ST2 - but they are boring around there. That page reads like a man page, and the associated pdf's are worse! :-o

The soils vary quite significantly between the two projects with the soils up at Northlink being much more amenable to tunneling than those that plagued the SR 99 job at the start (and might at the finish).

I have close ties to both jobs.

Re: Elon Musk is boring a tunnel to skirt gridlock

#277

Post by pnathan »

abduhl wrote: post #276
pnathan wrote: post #274

Earlier quoted context omitted.

ST2 bored from Westlake to University of Washington, and is continuing out to the Northgate station. I'm slightly unsure how the "Eastlink" system plays out with ST2 - but they are boring around there. That page reads like a man page, and the associated pdf's are worse! :-o

The soils vary quite significantly between the two projects with the soils up at Northlink being much more amenable to tunneling than those that plagued the SR 99 job at the start (and might at the finish). I have close ties to both jobs.

Yeah, I've heard a bit about it, but I've not really heard enough to Know What I'm Talking About. My impression is the early phase of SR99 was running through infill from early Seattle and thus a significant amount of debris etc was involved in the problems getting Bertha going.

Do you know of any good resources on these projects for the transit / infrastructure geek who's willing to read technical information? Executive summaries and dog-and-pony documents only go so far. :)

Re: Elon Musk is boring a tunnel to skirt gridlock

#278

Post by abduhl »

pnathan wrote: post #277
abduhl wrote: post #276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The soils vary quite significantly between the two projects with the soils up at Northlink being much more amenable to tunneling than those that plagued the SR 99 job at the start (and might at the finish). I have close ties to both jobs.

Yeah, I've heard a bit about it, but I've not really heard enough to Know What I'm Talking About. My impression is the early phase of SR99 was running through infill from early Seattle and thus a significant amount of debris etc was involved in the problems getting Bertha going. Do you know of any good resources on these projects for the transit / infrastructure geek who's willing to read technical information? Execu…

You may be able to get the bid documents from the Owners (e.g. - WSDOT and SoundTransit) although I'm not sure. This would give you information on the soils and what the original consultants thought.

Anything past that probably hasn't come out yet since the jobs are aren't in a position where much has been published about them. If you want more information in general you can read conference proceedings (RETC, WTC, NATC).

Much of the deeper analysis and such isn't really accessible to the layman because it's really buried in the litigation.

SR 99 is likely your best bet between the two jobs because WSDOT has had an open book policy on the job. I think they've been too much of an open book, but that's neither here nor there.

Post reply on HN