Elon Musk, the billionaire smart guy and face of Tesla and SpaceX is back and this time he’s thrusting us straight into Blade Runner 2049 with a subway on steroids. Really, it’s called Hyperloop and it’s a tunnel based transportation system that’ll favour pedestrians and cyclists over cars.
Boring Co., a start-up company Musk founded, is behind the project and they hope to completely rejiggle the subway system.
Boring Co. are proposing an urban loop system where, instead of just a few major stations scattered throughout a city, there’d be “1000s of small stations the size of a single parking space that take you very close to your destination and blend seamlessly into the fabric of a city.”
If you’re more a visual person, there’s a little vid below. Ryan Gosling where you at?
Better video coming soon, but it would look a bit like this: pic.twitter.com/C0iJPi8b4U
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 9, 2018
If you missed it in the video, these electric pods can run at 201 kilometres per hour. Talk about getting onto campus quickly.
In theory, the loop system would still transport cars but only after pedestrians and cyclists. Musk says this “is a matter of courtesy and fairness. If someone can’t afford a car, they should go first.”
Boring Co. was founded in 2016 and as you can see, they don’t waste time. Their sole purpose is to solve gridlock traffic and believe there are only two options to do so – make cars fly or tunnels. For now, they’re choosing to go with the latter but knowing Musk’s capabilities, flying cars could be a reality in a decade.
According to their website info page, Hyperloop could enable travel between New York and Washington DC in less than 30 minutes.
If you’re having a suss on the website, do note that the company has legitimately considered flying cars but according to their research, “flying cars have issues with weather, noise, and generally increase anxiety levels of those below them.” Okay…
Now to the specs. Building tunnels and futuristic pods will cost a pretty penny and not even Musk is that loaded. So, the plan is to reduce the tunnel diameter from 28 feet to 14 feet, which in theory is possible if the vehicles move on a “stabilised electric skate” . This would slash costs by a lotttt (3-4 times in reduction). Part two of make-it-cheaper is to increase speed by one of five ways and I’m going to be honest, I only understand the ‘go electric’ option so hit the website for the real talk.
Sooo, again – Hyperloop is a high-speed underground public transportation system. Commuters would travel in electric pods and because you’re going so fast, the pods are pressurised and only 8-16 passengers are allowed inside at one time. How fast are we talking? 600 miles per hour which in translation according to Google is 965.6064 kilometres / hr. Fook. Like some planes travel at that distance but in the AIR.
Alright, I’m going to go find my broken charger now.
Also, here’s an old pic of Elon Musk pre-Tesla.
https://twitter.com/HistoryInPix/status/972514290526769152
