41–50 of 146 posts
Link to the BBC article instead of the blogspam: http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20120601-high-speed-pipedrea... Also, easy terrorist target.
> Also, easy terrorist target. What a shame this determination is made on so many "advancements" now. (I think it's complete nonsense to even mention)
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Daryl Oster's company has submitted proposals to Florida, at least, on building and maintaining a system such as this. I think part of the requirement for submitting such a proposal is at least a cursory cost analysis. Wikipedia reads a bit like the company wrote it itself, but: The firm fixed bid for the 96-mile (154 km) Evacuated Tube Transport (ETT) system was $253M, this was less than one tenth of the cost of the…
Would love to see how they costed that out. Given that I don't know of a single engineering company that can build straight up light rail track for at $2.5M/mile even if you give them the land for free. Edit: add this update -- Interestingly this link: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/843626/posts claims that the ET3 bid was 1.2B$ which is $12.5M/mile which is a lot more credible (still low though since the s…
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Would love to see how they costed that out. Given that I don't know of a single engineering company that can build straight up light rail track for at $2.5M/mile even if you give them the land for free. Edit: add this update -- Interestingly this link: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/843626/posts claims that the ET3 bid was 1.2B$ which is $12.5M/mile which is a lot more credible (still low though since the s…
How the hell does light rail track cost $2.5M/mile? How did people build railroad tracks back in the days of horses and buggys?
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Would love to see how they costed that out. Given that I don't know of a single engineering company that can build straight up light rail track for at $2.5M/mile even if you give them the land for free. Edit: add this update -- Interestingly this link: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/843626/posts claims that the ET3 bid was 1.2B$ which is $12.5M/mile which is a lot more credible (still low though since the s…
A large chunk of the costs of projects like this is building the long flat tunnel/level ground over significant distances. The actual costs of building a moderate vacuum is not that significant. Where this project falls down is in the maintenance and safety side of things not the infrastructure to send the first train down the line. Don't forget every 10m adds 1atm water pressure. Building a glass enclosed under sea…
Firstly: As I see it, an evacuated tunnel at 20m is a very different proposition to a non-evacuated tunnel at 30m, even if the pressure difference is the same. Why? Well, your big problem is always going to be leaks. In an air-filled tunnel you can get away with microscopic cracks, no problem; you've got a small direct interface between water and air, and the surface tension of the water is enough to keep the water in place. It's very hard to force water through a really tiny crack. In a vacuum, however, surface tension goes away -- liquid water at an interface with vacuum will boil, and all of a sudden you've got water vapour filling your nice evacuated tube through every microscopic crack in its five thousand mile length. Nasty. Clearly the joined-concrete construction used for the Transbay Tube isn't going to be sufficient.
Secondly: unfortunately the Atlantic Ocean isn't 20m deep, or 30m deep, or even 40m deep like the deepest point of the Transbay Tube. It's several kilometers deep.
The book title A Transatlantic Tunnel, Hurrah! has stuck to my memory. It's a 1972 SF (alternate history branch) novel by Harry Harrison, featuring a vacuum/maglev system. More at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transatlantic_tunnel , including reference to Goddard patents on the subject.
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Would love to see how they costed that out. Given that I don't know of a single engineering company that can build straight up light rail track for at $2.5M/mile even if you give them the land for free. Edit: add this update -- Interestingly this link: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/843626/posts claims that the ET3 bid was 1.2B$ which is $12.5M/mile which is a lot more credible (still low though since the s…
How the hell does light rail track cost $2.5M/mile? How did people build railroad tracks back in the days of horses and buggys?
[1] http://tacnet.missouri.org/history/railroads/rrcosts.html
Good luck holding a vacuum under the ocean. I read stuff like this and I think, "Gee, I don't think these people have actually built anything." because if they had they would realize that if it costs $1M a foot too build subways [1] in cities with moderately skilled labor, its going to cost $10 - 25M/ft to build something like this. That's half a quadrillion dollars (448 trillion dollars). What sort or rate of return…
It really shouldn't be that bad. The cost is mainly due to it being in a dense city and having to deal with endless environmental (broad sense) concern. A better comparison is an actual underwater tube: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transbay_Tube 3.6 miles cost about $1 billion in 2012 dollars. Closer to $55k/foot. Don't get me wrong. This is still impossibly expensive even at that lower rate: $22 trillion. Even at us…
Which is roughly 1 / 14th the cost of the Iraq war. Not bad if you think about it.
I never have understood people's fears about getting on an airplane... this though I'd be scared to death of. You have any unfortunate shift in the tectonic plates (which happens daily and unpredictably) and you could be dead in an instant.
You have your answer right there.
Good luck holding a vacuum under the ocean. I read stuff like this and I think, "Gee, I don't think these people have actually built anything." because if they had they would realize that if it costs $1M a foot too build subways [1] in cities with moderately skilled labor, its going to cost $10 - 25M/ft to build something like this. That's half a quadrillion dollars (448 trillion dollars). What sort or rate of return…
It really shouldn't be that bad. The cost is mainly due to it being in a dense city and having to deal with endless environmental (broad sense) concern. A better comparison is an actual underwater tube: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transbay_Tube 3.6 miles cost about $1 billion in 2012 dollars. Closer to $55k/foot. Don't get me wrong. This is still impossibly expensive even at that lower rate: $22 trillion. Even at us…
The nice thing about a transatlantic tunnel is that crustecaeans can be bought off cheaply
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The chunnel is technically under rock, not under water. It's not exposed to the ocean.
Surely any tunnel built will be surrounded with rock/concrete as its structure, ultimately it will still be a case of people surrounded by solid material surrounded by water.