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Hyperloop

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Re: Hyperloop

#481

Post by DannyBee »

wpietri wrote: post #444
DannyBee wrote: post #384

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The same reason san francisco has built like 100 or 200 new housing units in the past year, and the same reason the california coastal commission was being sued (and found unconstitutional, etc): California has a very large amount of regulatory burden compared to almost anywhere else in the US. High speed rail there is likely to cost overrun by a massive factor, and under deliver by a massive factor, and both, for no…

The reason San Francisco built 269 units in 2011 was not bureaucracy, but that we were at the tail end of a real estate crash. More than 4000 units were started in 2012, and a further 30,000 have been approved. Source: http://www.spur.org/publications/library/article/san-francis...

Wake me when they actually happen (IE are built and available).

SPUR's data comes from the SF planning department, which is now under tremendous pressure to at least claim they are doing something. Data on the actual ground (IE real estate listings, etc) do not support their claims, as anyone who tries to get a residential unit in SF can tell you. I'd love to know what they consider a "start". It shouldn't take multiple years for a simple residential unit to be completed.

You are also talking about places where it takes months to get a tree removed from your property and requires approval from the "county arborist". It often takes years for people to acquire permits to do remodeling.

California also has significantly different and more stringent energy/building codes from all other places, in areas completely unrelated to things like 'earthquake protection' (or anything reasonably related to California issues)

It absolutely has a high regulatory cost compared to most other places, and past HN, i don't think i've seen anyone dispute this (IE AFAIK, California doesn't dispute it, they simply claim it's worth it)

Re: Hyperloop

#482

Post by jimmcslim »

Someone needs to convince Musk to build this on the east coast of Australia; linking Brisbane-Sydney-Canberra-Melbourne. The Sydney-Melbourne air corridor is one of the busiest in the world (6,795,000 passengers in 2007, vs 6,306,638 for LA-SF in 2009 [1]). We recently had a feasibility study into HSR along the east coast (a condition of Greens support of the current Labor minority government) but it suggested that such a project would be ridiculously expensive and take upwards of 30 years to complete (some say the study was doomed to fail and the numbers are wrong).

The geography is probably less favourable for Hyperloop in the eastern Australia context (e.g. Sydney is in a basin bordered by low mountains north, south and west), whereas the route it would follow in California is mostly flat?

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World's_busiest_passenger_air_r...

Re: Hyperloop

#483

Post by Turing_Machine »

Thiz wrote: post #354

Pretty but absurd. With all that money I rather give a Cessna to 1M people so they can fly anywhere without restriction. Or make special small airports for direct flight between cities. Much less infrastructure. Kudos to Elon, I love they guy and his incredibly visionary mind.

"I rather give a Cessna to 1M people"

The average driver can't control a vehicle safely in two dimensions, much less three. :-)

Re: Hyperloop

#484

Post by dragonwriter »

spikels wrote: post #442
dragonwriter wrote: post #361

Earlier quoted context omitted.

California is more able to attract interested private operators because the availability of potential passengers with money to spend on fares is substantially greater.

Not sure why you think there would be more passengers on LA-SF versus SaoPaolo-Rio: Greater populations, shorter distances and lower costs ($17 vs 68 billion). Brazilians may be poorer today but they are catching up fast. Sure there will be private contractors but is there really any private interest in building and/or operating high speed rail in CA? Perhaps Hyperloop will change things but so far it has been govern…

> Not sure why you think there would be more passengers on LA-SF versus SaoPaolo-Rio

More potential passengers in the latter, more potential passenger revenue in the former.

> Brazilians may be poorer today but they are catching up fast.

Per capita GDP in Brazil is less than 1/3 of that in California, and is increasing at about 1.7%/annum (2.7% GDP growth, 0.9% population growth); assuming no growth in California GDP per capita, it would take Brazil more than 65 years to catch up.

Re: Hyperloop

#485

Post by jlgreco »

jacoblyles wrote: post #355
jeffasinger wrote: post #229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The tube is not nearly as wide or heavy as a traditional train, so I don't know that it's fair to say that you can just as easily put a train up on pylons as you could this tube. It's interesting to think about, but also there are probably much higher costs associated with a completely untested system like this than estimated. I wouldn't be surprised if this system, if it actually worked at all, ended up being more e…

My bet is that Elon could build the Hyperloop closer to budget than the state of California could build a traditional train. Leadership matters.

It's not clear to me that he is interested in being the one to build it. I think he wants somebody else to.

Re: Hyperloop

#486

Post by tinco »

ibudiallo wrote: post #449
tinco wrote: post #438

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bill Gates has more important things to spend his money on than moving rich americans from somewhere in America to somewhere else in America.

I live in los angeles and the proposed price is cheaper than taking a cab from the LAX to my place (4 miles). So no, this is not to help rich americans.

I think anyone who pays money to be transported from one place to another at high speed is too rich to be cared for by Bill Gates, from his perspective :)

Re: Hyperloop

#487

Post by joshAg »

mcintyre1994 wrote: post #424
jfb wrote: post #379

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, fast trains or no new trains. It is still technically possible to get on BART in San Francisco and get off from a train in Los Angeles. You wouldn't choose to do this -- nobody would choose to do this [1] -- but it is possible. [1] http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/14/magazine/14Train-t.html?pa...

I see, fair enough, cheers for pointing that out. I'm in the UK and we're pretty well connected by rail, I wasn't expecting the alternative to be that ridiculous, just normal slower trains.

In the US, rail is optimized for freight, not people.

Re: Hyperloop

#488

Post by Turing_Machine »

wehadfun wrote: post #111

Appreciate Elon Musk for this idea. But do you really want a bus sized hunk of w(ever)tf this is made out of zipping by you at 700mph?

Bus-sized chunks of metal are flying over your head every day. They're called "airliners".

Re: Hyperloop

#489

Post by pbreit »

greedo wrote: post #161
toble wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can get up and walk around on a plane.

Most flights I've been on in the last decade, you don't want to leave your seat for anything except a bathroom break. It's not like we're flying on Pan Am Clippers with pianos and seven course meals. Air travel is a glorified cattle car unless you're willing to be financially raped for first class or a chartered jet.

But you could.

Re: Hyperloop

#490

Post by mcintyre1994 »

ibudiallo wrote: post #449
tinco wrote: post #438

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bill Gates has more important things to spend his money on than moving rich americans from somewhere in America to somewhere else in America.

I live in los angeles and the proposed price is cheaper than taking a cab from the LAX to my place (4 miles). So no, this is not to help rich americans.

In fairness, compared to the people he helps with his philanthropic work at the moment I'd hypothesise those this will affect are fairly "rich".
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