I talked a little about this last week. I think he wants the tech to bore a hole close to the core of Mars and set off a nuke. This would restart natural lava flow in Mars which would then create self sustaining magnetic field.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13598876
Elon Musk is boring a tunnel to skirt gridlock
81–90 of 278 posts
Re: Elon Musk is boring a tunnel to skirt gridlock
#82We can't afford to maintain the surface roads & bridges we already built, and tunnels are more expensive and require more maintenance by like an order of magnitude. (I made that up, but I'm pretty sure it's right, to within an order of magnitude... but if tunnels are 1000x more expensive, then I'm wrong). I can admire someone who has the resources to exclude himself from the traffic problem instead taking action to t…
Isn't the problem with traffic (in most places) that people are using the roads at the same time?
Re: Elon Musk is boring a tunnel to skirt gridlock
#83I've become completely disenchanted with Elon Musk over time. I used to be a huge fan and cheerleader, and enthusiastically pointed to him as inspiration. But slowly I started to realize that I was buying a lot into carefully crafted propaganda. The way SpaceX used lawyers to keep PSLV at bay, all the while Musk gassed on about free markets and competition made me a bit mad. Then he had that quip where he said he was…
You've managed to let cynicism overcome the actual good his companies do. We now have good electric cars, we now can launch stuff to space at a fraction of the price. Assume that you're right and he's not that nice a person: still because of him we're now somewhere we would not be otherwise. I think what he brings to the table far outweight any thing like "doesn't like unions" or "is an opportunistic campaign donor".
Decent electric cars are a natural product of basic research on batteries.
That was driven more by the consumer electronics business than by Tesla.
Telsa is likely a quite smart option on the future demand for batteries though.
Re: Elon Musk is boring a tunnel to skirt gridlock
#84Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think light rail is fantastic - in London we have the DLR which is fully automated (there is an assistant onboard who can override), and it's a thoroughly pleasant experience. We fondly call it the smallest rollercoaster :)
But it lowers property values close by, the noise is quite significant. So putting light rail in a tunnel would be the better option. If Musk can really lower costs, London would be a good client. I'm sure that if he could reduce construction costs for new tube lines by 80% (costs are mostly tunnels), there would be at least 4 new lines that could be approved quickly. After that, they'd still have money left over fro…
> But it lowers property values close by
The findings of most studies directly contradict this assertion. And, if I recall correctly, there's a strong correlation between urban density and light rail value add -- the denser the area, the more property values rise near new light rail lines.
Re: Elon Musk is boring a tunnel to skirt gridlock
#85I thought the current thinking was that building more roads means that there will be more roads to use, and therefore more cars on the road. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Induced_demand
The idea that we shouldn't build infrastructure because it will get used is one of the more silly talking points out there right now.
Infrastructure projects should respond to the density and context of the neighborhood. Don't build a low-throughput highway between high density Manhattan and high density western Queens or it'll immediately become congested. Build a train instead.
A bias toward highways in cities, which are inherently low throughput, has been the norm and also the problem over the last 80 years of urban infrastructure projects.
Re: Elon Musk is boring a tunnel to skirt gridlock
#86We can't afford to maintain the surface roads & bridges we already built, and tunnels are more expensive and require more maintenance by like an order of magnitude. (I made that up, but I'm pretty sure it's right, to within an order of magnitude... but if tunnels are 1000x more expensive, then I'm wrong). I can admire someone who has the resources to exclude himself from the traffic problem instead taking action to t…
Cars and public transport are vastly different in capacity. A tunnel for cars is obviously a crazy idea but what if it carried some sort of pods that carried lots of people at once, maybe in a vacuum, at fast speeds?
Re: Elon Musk is boring a tunnel to skirt gridlock
#87Earlier quoted context omitted.
He must've been writing before the Acela Express made its debut. But Boston and New York are close enough that I'd argue true high-speed rail isn't all that much needed. Which is good, because there's no way in hell our government-supported passenger rail monopoly could ever implement it. That's half the problem right there - nobody can compete with Amtrak because Amtrak can undercut everyone, so Amtrak's service can…
I've never had any issues with Amtrak's service. People forget that they're second-class citizens to freight on the track, so they're usually not to blame for being late and they're held back by the infrastructure, which is designed, owned, and maintained by freight companies. I know it's accepted in the HN community to be down on government monopolies, but a quick glance at the privatization disaster of British Rail…
I'm not at all discounting your point, but isn't Japan's rail system made up of various private rail companies? Or are those quasi governmental?
Re: Elon Musk is boring a tunnel to skirt gridlock
#88Isn't this the same principle that subway/bart trains in some cities use? He is right, it is time to increase apaption of this 50+ yr old idea and apply it to other modes of transportation. Not only you operate in 3D, there is less disruption to existing inhabitants and roads.
Re: Elon Musk is boring a tunnel to skirt gridlock
#89This is a good idea, and I like to watch Elon be ambitious, but it's probably pretty annoying to work at SpaceX right now. One day you show up to work and, where you used to park your car, there is a giant hole in the ground. It's there because the CEO of the company you work for, who is already splitting his time between two companies, wants to put some of his energy towards a third unrelated company. You are spendi…
Not at all. The reason for wanting a tunnel at SpaceX headquarters specifically is to help the employees access their parking structures without being run over crossing the street: http://www.parabolicarc.com/2016/12/30/video-3-spacex-employ... "A news report about three SpaceX employees who were hit by a car on Dec. 17 after leaving work. The incident occurred at 2:15 a.m. About three hours later, SpaceX CEO Elon Mu…
> leaving work [...] 2:15 a.m.
There's the problem.
Re: Elon Musk is boring a tunnel to skirt gridlock
#90I generally find Elon Musk to be an offputting individual, but I struggle to disagree with most of his ideas. In dense urban areas, skyrocketing property costs and the erosion of eminent domain have made mass transit expansion unsustainable in terms of time and money. Tunneling under it all has the potential to sidestep so many costs. To do so, of course, he'll need to reduce the costs of tunnel boring by an order of…
One thing that isn't as obvious at first is how tunneling traffic under a city can greatly increase the walkability of the city. Look at Boston after the Big Dig. Neighborhoods that were previously cut in half are coming back together. Downtown is seen as a desirable place to be. It's a big QoL improvement for a city.
I'm not sure if he will be able to bring the costs of tunnel boring down as much as you would like, but I'll hold out hope. At the very least he does have a flair for picking company names, "The Boring Company".