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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

#41

Post by mc3 »

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/Channel_Tunnel - I am still in awe that they did this! I like the vision, bean counters be damned. If he made a tunnel like that it'd be news.

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

#42

Post by maxharris »

yongjik wrote: post #36
maxharris wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When you build the tunnel for a tenth the cost, that's a pretty big difference. The same budget lets you build ten times more infrastructure, which is quite badly needed! I live in Los Angeles and things are so bad here that often you simply can't see friends that live only a few miles away.

But what if it's also tenth the capacity? According to the article this accommodates 4,400 people/hr. BART ridership is 411k/day, and (to pick a random example) Gangnam subway station in Seoul averages at 230k/day. And that's actual usage, not max capacity.

That's only a valid comparison if you take massive infrastructure projects head-on. There is no law of physics stating that these tunnels can't be used for other situations and purposes.

Several things come to mind:

1. There are lots of places with lower density than city centers, but higher density than suburbs that would benefit massively from underground transportation.

2. Smaller tunnels running everywhere will be very useful for package delivery! John McCarthy (the man that gave us LISP) explains it in detail here: http://jmc.stanford.edu/commentary/future/delivery.html

3. Let's not discount the strong likelihood of further cost reductions. The Boring Company has made huge strides already, with further cost and speed gains to be had from a TBM they are designing and building from scratch: https://www.teslarati.com/boring-company-line-storm-tunnelin...

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

#43

Post by [deleted] »

nrp wrote: post #40
ghaff wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The expansion of the LVCC made me vaguely curious about what types of shows use it given that all the IT shows I'm familiar with use the Venetian/Sands or, if they're a bit smaller, The Mandalay Bay. I haven't been there since Comdex days. It looks as if it's things like Kitchen and Bath Builders, World of Concrete, etc. So maybe things that are more oriented towards a mega show floor and less to speaking rooms.

CES is the key one. It occupies all of LVCC and Sands, with spillover and unofficial meeting rooms taking up basically all of the strip. It's not clear what CES is going to do with another full hall though. The show is already kind of a mish-mash of industries.

[deleted]

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

#44

Post by s_dev »

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/…

HN isn't exlusively for "tech news" but for anything that is of interest to nerds/intelligent people.

You can of course submit any tunneling articles/media you think are interesting.

Just look at the abundance of Atlas Obscura articles -- few are tech based.

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

#45

Post by justapassenger »

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.

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

#46

Post by nicehat »

jeromegv wrote: post #38
maxharris wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When you build the tunnel for a tenth the cost, that's a pretty big difference. The same budget lets you build ten times more infrastructure, which is quite badly needed! I live in Los Angeles and things are so bad here that often you simply can't see friends that live only a few miles away.

Except this 10% of cost is just a marketing ploy by Musk to sell you the project. When you compare to the price of subways in Europe, this isn't any cheaper. North America is extremely bad at building cheap subways, but other places of the world have already achieved it.

How is this different from saying someone selling a fine bottle of wine for $2 in New York is scamming you, because you could get the same bottle for $2 in France... ?

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

#47

Post by [deleted] »

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.

[deleted]

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

#48

Post by dv_dt »

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 think this follows Elons pattern of being able to find areas where the fundamental technology has advanced and is available, but the integration and step up to a new level hasn't been invested in yet. I think the Boring company basically made more efficient custom built tunneling equipment.

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

#49

Post by OnlineGladiator »

Jernik wrote: post #26
CydeWeys wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your units are confusing me. Meters per year? Surely they're faster than that?

They used miles and years right before that, so I'm not sure how it is confusing that m/yr is miles/year

It's confusing because the way the units are represented is inconsistent.

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

#50

Post by mc3 »

dv_dt wrote: post #48
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 think this follows Elons pattern of being able to find areas where the fundamental technology has advanced and is available, but the integration and step up to a new level hasn't been invested in yet. I think the Boring company basically made more efficient custom built tunneling equipment.

Yeah OK, does anyone have the angle on that? Is there a new technology aspect here?
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