Did not see any posts directly concerning the recent Hyperloop's so-called successful test so here it is:
http://fortune.com/2017/07/15/hyperloop ... hallenges/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O_FyOBCVGWE

My main question is what are the long term implications of the Hyperloop to the aviation industry IF it actually becomes operational?
Would it displace airlines?
Would it make traveling easier?

Would airlines only exist in 50-100 years for overseas travel?
Many more questions but please offer opinions and insight. Thanks.

I think that many of their claims are just a little premature right now.

A small sled travelling at 70mph is more of a threat to 1930s automobiles than 21st century jets. Also, claims that the technology is safer than aviation? Well, I'd need some convincing. 700mph in a partial vacuum where catastrophic collision is always just a few centimetres away. Get some safety history behind you before claiming you're safer than the safest mode of transport in history.

I do wish them every success.

Hey guys,
Elon Musk is very big news here in Australia for arguably the first time ever due to his selection by the South Australian state government to build a battery farm in South Australia to assist with their energy needs. He has been on the front page of newspapers and in major reports on TV etc.
Hyperloop has not gotten a mention here yet in Australia that I am aware of. It is an interesting concept but it does appear to be a very 'immature' technology in terms of cost, safety and regulations. It may affect civil aviation for sure in the way that (for example) high speed rail has decimated domestic flying in Taiwan and to a lesser extent, Japan, and Eurostar dramatically affected the aviation market between London and Paris. Like France and Germany however, HSR may compliment rather than replace domestic / short haul flying.
IF Hyperloop is successfully developed, proven and funded, it could change the nature of civil aviation in specific markets/scenarios like I have provided examples of above. However, its a big 'IF' and it certainly wouldn't happen within the next twenty years I would argue.
Maglev was once thought of as the future for 'rail' travel ... and it is marvellous, having traveled a few dozen times on the Shanghai Maglev, but look at the technology now. Has it been developed to the best of it's potential? Has it made a change to the civil aviation market anywhere in the world?
Like Virtual737 says above, I wish Elon Musk and his team every success. Even if a few Hyperloop lines are built and become operational, it will be a worthy achievement.
Cheers,
Bunumuring

bunumuring wrote:

Hey guys,
Elon Musk is very big news here in Australia for arguably the first time ever due to his selection by the South Australian state government to build a battery farm in South Australia to assist with their energy needs. He has been on the front page of newspapers and in major reports on TV etc.
Hyperloop has not gotten a mention here yet in Australia that I am aware of. It is an interesting concept but it does appear to be a very 'immature' technology in terms of cost, safety and regulations. It may affect civil aviation for sure in the way that (for example) high speed rail has decimated domestic flying in Taiwan and to a lesser extent, Japan, and Eurostar dramatically affected the aviation market between London and Paris. Like France and Germany however, HSR may compliment rather than replace domestic / short haul flying.
IF Hyperloop is successfully developed, proven and funded, it could change the nature of civil aviation in specific markets/scenarios like I have provided examples of above. However, its a big 'IF' and it certainly wouldn't happen within the next twenty years I would argue.
Maglev was once thought of as the future for 'rail' travel ... and it is marvellous, having traveled a few dozen times on the Shanghai Maglev, but look at the technology now. Has it been developed to the best of it's potential? Has it made a change to the civil aviation market anywhere in the world?
Like Virtual737 says above, I wish Elon Musk and his team every success. Even if a few Hyperloop lines are built and become operational, it will be a worthy achievement.
Cheers,
Bunumuring

I'm a huge fan of Elon Musk. He coined the term "Hyperloop" but has no involvement with Hyperloop One, which is the company at hand (although the OPs post doesn't make that totally clear). If Elon was involved then yes, aviation better be aware.

Airplanes and Ships only need infrastructure at each end. Trains, Trucks and Hyperloop need infrastructure at each end and all along. There is a reason HSR is so expensive .. land acquisition and hyperloop will face the same problem.
Technology wise evacuated tube travel, ducted fan and maglev have all been demonstrated, but combining them is a whole another ball game. Nevertheless Mr. Musk has a penchant for taking seemingly far fetched ideas and bringing them to the present successfully.
If anything could ruin hyperloop, it might be politics and law suits.

I don't think Hyperloop is going to fly (pun intended). One of the projects they are studying is a Helsinki - Stockholm Hyperloop which requires a 400 km underwater tunnel among other things. Completely unrealistic.

I don't want to be a party popper... I once seriously costed out an electric (or mag/lev) high speed train between Minneapolis and Chicago, complete with elevated bridges, etc to keep away from everything else and prevent heavy snows from interfering with it; with the assumption that the state would force eminent domain legislation for right of way (which is far from assured as a private project). The land and right of way cost were many times more than the cost of constructing a set of elevated tracks (even if mag/lev) and the required power stations were not trivial either. Estimated maintenance cost were not cheap either. I just don't see it happening on any kind of scale. It would be likely cheaper to send people to Mars and back. A few test tracts or runs that do not get near any major population hub is all I see; just like many of the other various high speed trains in the US. At best you could only it to like a Denver Airport location - 15 -20 miles outside of a city).

It's one of those grand ideas.... which will make $billions disappear in any attempt to implement it on more than a test scale.

Have a great day,

I don't see Hyperloop tech challenging aviation for a long, long time, if ever. I see hyperloop as a technology that will target transit distances of 10-100 miles. I see it connecting adjacent metro areas and also potentially providing mass transit inside metro areas. In that regard, I see it as a potential competitor for local and regional mass transit authorities as well as the trucking industry. However, we are years (more than a decade?) away from seeing any viable, large scale system setup IMO.

The little one planned across the desert (Dubai) might work I guess

2175301 wrote:

I don't want to be a party popper... I once seriously costed out an electric (or mag/lev) high speed train between Minneapolis and Chicago, complete with elevated bridges, etc to keep away from everything else and prevent heavy snows from interfering with it; with the assumption that the state would force eminent domain legislation for right of way (which is far from assured as a private project). The land and right of way cost were many times more than the cost of constructing a set of elevated tracks (even if mag/lev) and the required power stations were not trivial either. Estimated maintenance cost were not cheap either. I just don't see it happening on any kind of scale. It would be likely cheaper to send people to Mars and back. A few test tracts or runs that do not get near any major population hub is all I see; just like many of the other various high speed trains in the US. At best you could only it to like a Denver Airport location - 15 -20 miles outside of a city).

It's one of those grand ideas.... which will make $billions disappear in any attempt to implement it on more than a test scale.

Have a great day,

These are the reasons why Hyperloop is very well suited for Indian market.

1. India needs a high speed land based transport. The aviation infrastructure is reaching its limits, while more and more of the 1.3 billion population can afford and need fast means of transport.

2. The existing railway network is a slow one.
3. Labour costs are low. Consequently, construction and maintenance costs would be lower.
4. Most of the rural land is used for agriculture only. Land acquisition is a problem in cities only, and it's quite cheap in villages.
Hyperloop would spend most of its time in passing through villages for connecting any 2 major cities like Delhi or Mumbai.

5. India is considering bullet train in a big way already. Plans are being made for country wide construction of bullet train. In such a situation, if a path breaking tech like Hyperloop is practically available, it would be a game changer for everyone.


Yeah I agree with everyone else. Hyperloop would only complement aviation, like everywhere where fast trains already exist.

Seriously 0% risk until 2050 maybe longer. We cant even build true high speed rail in the United States. True high speed rail like in Europe or Japan would certainly threaten commercial aviation way more then this.

Elon Musk has, so far, burned 14 Billion US§ of Investors Money. There seems to be no Limit as Long as fools Keep on pumpimg Money in.

Hyperloop is another tool to burn Money. At least, serious firms like Lufthansa look into it. At the end of the day, the outcome cannot be much different than the antiquated System "Transrapid" which has the same flaws and These are:

You Need an x amount of infrastructure just to connect A with B. If the distance is 500 km you Need to build and maintain These 500 km. There are few City combination in the world that justify and can possibly amortize such a Project.

In aviation, you Need 3 km runway to connect A with any other Airport worldwide. Aviation, is clearly superior and more flexible in serving City pairs over 400 to 500 km

It will be the same as the TGV. It will take away a small chunk of air travellers, but not a lot. Those that'll use it mainly will be train travellers.

"Hyperloop" is just some kind of marketing swindle. That technology had been very wide-spread during the 19th and 20th centuries. Every major city in the developed world had a pneumatic tube network for postal services and the idea of human transport via pneumatic tubes goes back to the 1860-ies, including real-life experiments.



https://www.vox.com/2015/6/24/8834989/w ... e-and-cats

PanHAM wrote:

Elon Musk has, so far, burned 14 Billion US§ of Investors Money. There seems to be no Limit as Long as fools Keep on pumpimg Money in.

Hyperloop is another tool to burn Money. At least, serious firms like Lufthansa look into it. At the end of the day, the outcome cannot be much different than the antiquated System "Transrapid" which has the same flaws and These are:

You Need an x amount of infrastructure just to connect A with B. If the distance is 500 km you Need to build and maintain These 500 km. There are few City combination in the world that justify and can possibly amortize such a Project.

In aviation, you Need 3 km runway to connect A with any other Airport worldwide. Aviation, is clearly superior and more flexible in serving City pairs over 400 to 500 km

Then you need to find a good substitute for fossil fuels in 2050.

The hyperloop is overhyped. It builds in the promise of being significantly cheaper to establish than ordinary high speed rail. I just dont see that happening. There is no way that they can get the production costs of a 100+ km vacuum tube complete with electromagnets down to the price of two steel rails resting on concrete sleepers. The capacity will also be mediocre compared to a high speed train. At best it will transport about 500 passengers per hour, compared to upwards of 12000 for high speed rail.

PanHAM wrote:

Elon Musk has, so far, burned 14 Billion US§ of Investors Money. There seems to be no Limit as Long as fools Keep on pumpimg Money in.

Elon Musk is not involved in Hyperloop.

Direct or indirect, I have in my Memory that Musk is involved somehow.-

OA940 wrote:

It will be the same as the TGV. It will take away a small chunk of air travellers, but not a lot. Those that'll use it mainly will be train travellers.

You do realize the TGV wrecked air travel in most sectors under three hours right ?

Paris to Lyon went from daily A330s (Air Inter) to almost nothing. Air France has claimed they will go from 30% market share to 10% on Paris to Bordeaux now the new HSL is open.
Then we have the obvious Paris to London or Brussels that have also weakened since HSR was introduced.


I think hyperloop will replace shuttle services, say LA to San Franciso. Flights will be cut by half AT LEAST. But the technology isn't really there yet so we have some time before that happens.

Quite interesting technical achievement. Not there yet, but we'll have to see if it is going to mature in say 20 years. http://delfthyperloop.nl/#intro

Dutchy wrote:

Then you need to find a good substitute for fossil fuels in 2050.

Do you really think ME economies will cease to exist by 2050? OR we will have 100% electric planes by 2050?
Fossil Fuels are limited, agreed. But its a big myth that they are going to be used up over next 30-40 years.

Specially the dip in oil prices from $100 about 5 years ago to $40 currently (same as 1980) has made me confident that there's much more oil than I am told.

PanHAM wrote:

Direct or indirect, I have in my Memory that Musk is involved somehow.-

He proposed the idea of Hyperloop, and later open sourced its development.

anshabhi wrote:

Dutchy wrote:

Then you need to find a good substitute for fossil fuels in 2050.

Do you really think ME economies will cease to exist by 2050? OR we will have 100% electric planes by 2050?
Fossil Fuels are limited, agreed. But its a big myth that they are going to be used up over next 30-40 years.

Specially the dip in oil prices from $100 about 5 years ago to $40 currently (same as 1980) has made me confident that there's much more oil than I am told.

If the world is serious to keep the planet within 2 degrees or as close to 1,5degrees warming, around 70-80% of the known oil reserves needs to say in the ground: the carbon bubble. It isn't a matter if it is going to be used up, it is a matter not to exceed the threshold.

As for the ME, they are starting to diversify.

For the discussion it's important to clearly separate issues and understand the potential of the system.

This is in very early stage development - somewhere closer to the Wright Flyer than a Ford Trimotor, to make the obvious analogy.

Furthermore, it can be a more "packet" based transport system than current trains, meaning finer grain and higher frequency.

The Stone Age didn't finish because they ran out of stones.Oil is not going to run out - ever.But the ICE will be replaced sometime.But as everybody knows the energy density of batteries is not their yet.Its closer on cars as one is not fighting gravity or traveling at 600mph !

Hyper loop.Elon floated the idea but is far too smart to invest in it! For many city pairs (say up to 500 miles) there is really nothing wrong with good old high speed trains (HST).They travel between 150-175 mph and go city centre to city centre.Its a proven known technology what's wrong with that? Oh and they run on nice clean electricity.

FromCDGtoSYD wrote:

OA940 wrote:

It will be the same as the TGV. It will take away a small chunk of air travellers, but not a lot. Those that'll use it mainly will be train travellers.

You do realize the TGV wrecked air travel in most sectors under three hours right ?

Paris to Lyon went from daily A330s (Air Inter) to almost nothing. Air France has claimed they will go from 30% market share to 10% on Paris to Bordeaux now the new HSL is open.
Then we have the obvious Paris to London or Brussels that have also weakened since HSR was introduced.

The same with the ICE in Germany and AVE in Spain.

Not really, will be interesting to see the Impact the cut of Transit time from 6 to 4 hours between BER and MUC will have.

Besides that, poly centric Germny cannot be compared with singular centric countries.There are still 17 to 18 flights per day on high density routesand that will stay.

Finn350 wrote:

I don't think Hyperloop is going to fly (pun intended). One of the projects they are studying is a Helsinki - Stockholm Hyperloop which requires a 400 km underwater tunnel among other things. Completely unrealistic.

And that was probably said about the airplane and the automobile all those years ago.......

jomur wrote:

Finn350 wrote:

I don't think Hyperloop is going to fly (pun intended). One of the projects they are studying is a Helsinki - Stockholm Hyperloop which requires a 400 km underwater tunnel among other things. Completely unrealistic.

And that was probably said about the airplane and the automobile all those years ago.......

It took the interstate system to take the automobile from within a city and in select within a region.

Will trains take market share? Sure. Hyperloop? Maybe. But I'm looking at this from a Western US perspective. Due to congestion/TSA/costs, I don't bother flying less than 400 miles (call it 650 km). Now improve the destination's mass transit, and I would be more likely to leave the car behind.

Europe will do better than rail thanks to the high density population. The advantage of aviation is that one 3km long runway can connect a huge number of destinations. Hyperloop needs the interstate system. I cannot even get from rail to most of the US; the system is so unreliable here out west that I do not know anyone who has traveled over a thousand miles with less than a half day delay.

Hyperloop is dependent upon:
1. Cheap electricity generation. For 24/7 power, France has the advantage of nuclear power. The rest of the world still needs to invent something as solar, wind, and waves are not aligned with when it is most needed.
2. Mass transit at both ends of the hyperloop (as is today's rail).
3. Trunk routes to pay for the long haul connections
4. The network effect. Connecting everything to everything.

Aviation has an inherent advantage of the network effect. Getting from Los Angeles to Tucson Arizona is a direct flight. To Sarasota Florida, it is done in one connection. Hyperloop has smaller granularity, but it still is subject to the same rule that each transfer reduces the number of people willing to take that transit by 75%. I know more people willing to charter a plane (usually a cheap turboprop) or drive hours than to bridge hub (double hub).

It is a matter of degree of replacement. In high density Europe, where aviation is shorter than the USA, we'll probably see a bunch. But we'll need multiple Chunnels to Ireland, Scotland, and England. Those won't be cheap. Nor the tunnels under the Baltic. Nor the tunnels through Switzerland. They'll eventually happen. The cities attached will benefit economically (otherwise, the network will cease expanding).

So we'll see rail (maybe hyperloop) expand.

But in 2050, I hope to see humans living off this ball.

Lightsaber

PanHAM wrote:

You Need an x amount of infrastructure just to connect A with B. If the distance is 500 km you Need to build and maintain These 500 km. There are few City combination in the world that justify and can possibly amortize such a Project.

VSMUT wrote:

At best it will transport about 500 passengers per hour, compared to upwards of 12000 for high speed rail.

Those are the 2 key points that will limit Hyperloop.

1) Hyperloop is a point-to-point system, not a network. Consider a potential Hyperloop connecting hub. You would need dozens of connecting tubes descending on a central transfer point. Located above or below ground that becomes a lot of infrastructure to maintain. Instead my guess is that Hyperloop will probably be limited to some larger P2P markets.

2) All of the proposals have a limited capacity. Tube and pod size, safety cushion spacing between passenger pods, number of tubes between cities, etc. will all limit the number of passengers. I have seen estimates of a maximum capacity between 500 to 1,000 passengers per hour each direction (assuming it is built as a two tube route). But again that is also just point-to-point.

3) Like airlines, Hyperloop will see peaks and valleys in the times passengers want to travel. But the passenger capacity constraints are lower than for other transportation modes, limiting the ability to respond to the peak times.

If developed, Hyperloop systems will siphon off some passengers in some larger city pairs from other transportation modes. Those passengers will save time. But I don't see it eliminating the need for other short and mid distance transportation modes to handle additional passenger demand or smaller routes.

I am also thinking about multiple single point of failures. If a single pod is stuck in the tube, it basically renders the whole connection unusable. I don't see hoe this kind of a design could lead to a feasible transport system.

I'm not saying the hyperloop is impossible, but there are some technical problems that need to be solved. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RNFesa01llk

Hyperloop is not imminent, except in the UAE. Routes like SAN-LAX-SFO, BOS-NYC-PHL-BWI-WAS, LAX-ORD-NYC are the only ones I see as possible in the distant future for the US. However, European and Asian airlines are the most likely to be hurt. With regards to the Aviation industry, TPAC and TATL flights won't be affected and neither will most intra-north american/south american/african/oceanian routes, mostly because Hyperloop isn't a system that can implemented widespread without a steep price tag...

Replacing routes and airplanes is a stretch. But it will certainly get more people to airports/airplanes (when that happens, TBD).

Intra California routes, NE Corridor etc have more chance of disruption from flying cars than they do "hyperloop."

Hyperloop is still a train, there are the inherent risks and inefficiencies that others above have noted. A lot of the fantasy of hyperloop is "Get from LA to SF in under an hour"... which you can already do today, from many different airports in the LA Basin and Bay Area. Hyperloop will have limited end points, you will still need to get there.

The 737s and A320s today are getting new engines that keep getting more efficient. Even if these are 'just' iterations, air travel is getting more efficient, travel costs are beating inflation. What is the issue?

California travel is often talked about. There are so many airports with Zero commercial service that can handle commercial. JetSuite X and others will continue to grow. For O/D travel, major hub airports are less necessary. Hyperloop me from an airside terminal @ SFO under the bay to OAK where I can board my flight. That would be great and solve the delay problem at one of US's most delayed airports.

The same with the ICE in Germany and AVE in Spain.

The ICE, not really. It is conceived more as a medium distance transport system, with many stops in intermediate cities, few dedicated tracks, and lower speeds than France or Spain. It does not compete with air above 400km. Particularly between the four corners Munich, Hamburg, Berlin, Stuttgart, air travel dominates.

will be interesting to see the Impact the cut of Transit time from 6 to 4 hours between BER and MUC will have.

Unfortunately, regular scheduled travel times will be 4h25min, not the idealized 4h of the marketing material. If Spain & France are anything to go by, the ICE will certainly gain market share, but air will remain dominant. At 3h or below, HSR clearly dominates. Around 3:30h, you would hit a 50-50 market share.

The main gain will be for intermediate cities along the route like Nürnberg or Leipzig, not so much for Munich and Berlin. Shave off one more hour, and then we'd be talking.

If you put things in prospective, in just about 15 years following WWII the airlines saw the rail system here in the US off in a big way. They have never recovered.
with the advancements in rail technology, the future is going to be very different.
There is also a nearly endless market for something different considering the rapidly growing sector of our society that has been trained to hate flying.

r2rho wrote:

The same with the ICE in Germany and AVE in Spain.

The ICE, not really. It is conceived more as a medium distance transport system, with many stops in intermediate cities, few dedicated tracks, and lower speeds than France or Spain. It does not compete with air above 400km. Particularly between the four corners Munich, Hamburg, Berlin, Stuttgart, air travel dominates.

Not as much as the TGV and AVE, but since Germany has started building 300 km/h-lines there certainly has been impact on air travel. If I'm not mistaken, the Neubaustrecke Köln-Rhein/Main caused Lufthansa's withdravel from FRA-CGN. (And I am a bit surprised that there still are flights MUC-NUE.)

Bostrom wrote:

FromCDGtoSYD wrote:

OA940 wrote:

It will be the same as the TGV. It will take away a small chunk of air travellers, but not a lot. Those that'll use it mainly will be train travellers.

You do realize the TGV wrecked air travel in most sectors under three hours right ?

Paris to Lyon went from daily A330s (Air Inter) to almost nothing. Air France has claimed they will go from 30% market share to 10% on Paris to Bordeaux now the new HSL is open.
Then we have the obvious Paris to London or Brussels that have also weakened since HSR was introduced.

The same with the ICE in Germany and AVE in Spain.

Imo by the time the hyperloop is up and running (IF), demand will have grown so much that pax numbers won't be much lower than today's.

Like conventional high speed train, there is a range of market where the hyperloop system would compete in the best.
- In the lower end it have to compete with conventional HST and conventional maglev which hopefully can bring the operational speed up to 500 km/h, so perhaps for situation where main markets are within 1500km, there are probably little needs to upgrade the system toward hyperloop as the time saving would be relatively limited, unless the operation cost delta is ignorable.
- For intercontential market, it would be a matter of construction cost. Nowadays we already have fiber optics that connect different parts of the world together underseas, but how much would it cost if we are constructing tunnels instead of simply laying fiber optics down there?
- Then there are markets like US transcon or Trans-Asia in between these two end. Given apporipate cost, I guess these could work.

the Neubaustrecke Köln-Rhein/Main caused Lufthansa's withdravel from FRA-CGN. (And I am a bit surprised that there still are flights MUC-NUE.

That's why I said 400km. FRA-CGN is far below that, and at 1h duration, far below the magic 3h barrier. Obvioulsy, it has gone all rail.
As for MUC-NUE, the reason is simple: MUC's birth defect (no national rail connection) means that those flights are necessary for connections.
Nobody flies MUC-NUE O&D of course, because it is 1h.

The idea of hyperloops existed long before Elon Musk. Usually as some ideation or paper study. He has a brand and helped to give it traction. He published a brief pdf study about it years ago. How the space or electric car markets develop in the long run with Musk or without him is an entirely different matter. I don't have anything against Musk or his businesses and wish them luck. Wide and empty motorways are wonderful. Except that comes with economic , social , environmental and housing limitations. Perhaps self driving cars will improve the parking situation and otherwise improve traffic in urban areas. But especially in the largest cities of the world I just don't see how it is enough to get rid of transit. A freight train full of iron ore going trough some desolate wilderness is maybe the best way to transport that stuff.

In many parts of Europe budget buses are taking passengers away from rail. Commuter trains or bullet trains serving a different purpose are not threatened much but many other mid sized destinations I see rail doing poorly in all places I have seen in Europe. Backpackers or train enthusiasts might miss the slow and cheap train rides though. Hyperloop seems to be a bullet train on steroids . So it would compete with existing bullet trains and some with aviation. Mostly different uses. And even in the absolute worst case scenario would anyone ever build hyperloops over the oceans and biggest mountain ranges of the world? I'm no expert though. The advantages and limitations of those are already known. So one should guess where it could get some use. Airlines should try to coexist as much as possible with trains as possible Invent something to improve the luggage hauling.

Beacuse the Hyperloop between San Francisco and Los Angeles will have to cross multiple earthquake generating faults, it will be insanely expensive to build it earthquake proof. You need to somehow build in the ability to maintain the vacuum in the event of a fault offset that can be upwards of 50 feet in both lateral and vertical movement. The only real world example of such a thing is the alaskan pipeline that survived a magnitude 7 earthquake.

I would not want to travel down a vacuum tube when an earthquake take place if this is the outcome.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trans-Ala ... _shift.jpg

Autonomous autos will be the real challenge, both to trains and to airlines for trips under 300 miles (maybe even 450 miles). They likely will not look like a Tesla. You will book a trip, and comfort levels will be equivalent to airline Economy Plus up to International First Class. The existing highway system, once drivers are excluded in most lanes, have an incredible capacity for transportation. Long before Hyperloop.

Begues wrote:

Beacuse the Hyperloop between San Francisco and Los Angeles will have to cross multiple earthquake generating faults, it will be insanely expensive to build it earthquake proof. You need to somehow build in the ability to maintain the vacuum in the event of a fault offset that can be upwards of 50 feet in both lateral and vertical movement. The only real world example of such a thing is the alaskan pipeline that survived a magnitude 7 earthquake.

I would not want to travel down a vacuum tube when an earthquake take place if this is the outcome.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trans-Ala ... _shift.jpg

I have seen some drawings showing SFO-LAX hyperloop going entirely through the ocean. If tunnel is floating at certain depth, that makes earthquake zones a smaller issue, as well as property rights which may be a showstopper for the train.
Of course, that makes pressure vessel design even more difficult - but still an interesting approach to work around many issues "regular" HSR would face.

How can it be cheaper than a conventional high-speed rail when there is:
1) a need to build air-tight tubes lined with powerful electromagnets
2) a need to maintain vacuum in the tube at all times
3) a need to devise a way to rescue a stopped train in the tube
4) a need to devise a way to cool the train's propulsion system in a vacuum since no air-cooling is possible

?

Balaguru wrote:

Airplanes and Ships only need infrastructure at each end. Trains, Trucks and Hyperloop need infrastructure at each end and all along. There is a reason HSR is so expensive .. land acquisition and hyperloop will face the same problem.
Technology wise evacuated tube travel, ducted fan and maglev have all been demonstrated, but combining them is a whole another ball game. Nevertheless Mr. Musk has a penchant for taking seemingly far fetched ideas and bringing them to the present successfully.
If anything could ruin hyperloop, it might be politics and law suits.

Hyperloop can use lots of existing ROW along Interstates especially rural sections of major interstates like I-40 that's bascally coast to coast.

WaywardMemphian wrote:

Balaguru wrote:

Airplanes and Ships only need infrastructure at each end. Trains, Trucks and Hyperloop need infrastructure at each end and all along. There is a reason HSR is so expensive .. land acquisition and hyperloop will face the same problem.
Technology wise evacuated tube travel, ducted fan and maglev have all been demonstrated, but combining them is a whole another ball game. Nevertheless Mr. Musk has a penchant for taking seemingly far fetched ideas and bringing them to the present successfully.
If anything could ruin hyperloop, it might be politics and law suits.

Hyperloop can use lots of existing ROW along Interstates especially rural sections of major interstates like I-40 that's bascally coast to coast.

Cross-country is a different story (and more difficult one). Rural is easier (although ask those pushing for TX high speed rail). But last 20-30-50 miles... I-40 wouldn't help much with getting to Manhattan or Capitol, and without that value of the system is much lower.
But going from SF city center to LA city center on a seaside is not that crazy...

brianK73 wrote:

How can it be cheaper than a conventional high-speed rail when there is:
1) a need to build air-tight tubes lined with powerful electromagnets
2) a need to maintain vacuum in the tube at all times
3) a need to devise a way to rescue a stopped train in the tube
4) a need to devise a way to cool the train's propulsion system in a vacuum since no air-cooling is possible

?

Easy - you don't need to acquire all the land you would have to for a conventional rail line since it's supposed to be running in etubes that are most likely to be on elevated structures, so instead of a several dozen feet wide corridor for a double-tracked regular gauge rail line over the entire distance of the route "all" you need are pillars carrying the tubes, maybe 4 or 5 per mile.
And those tube segments can be prefabricated, possibly including equipment for emergency access

If this ever takes hold. At most it will compete with airlines between major hubs. Like Boston to NYC, NYC to PHL or DC. LA to San Diego. No way will they build something like from Chicago to Denver or LA. Building it will cost a lot of money. Running it will also cost a lot of money. High speed trains havent worked in the states. And without subsidy they dont really work in the EU. What is the latest price tag of the HSR between San Fran and LA? Like 70-100 billion? How many airports can be built at the cost of one 400 mile HSR link?

brianK73 wrote:

How can it be cheaper than a conventional high-speed rail when there is:
1) a need to build air-tight tubes lined with powerful electromagnets
2) a need to maintain vacuum in the tube at all times
3) a need to devise a way to rescue a stopped train in the tube
4) a need to devise a way to cool the train's propulsion system in a vacuum since no air-cooling is possible

?

You are forgetting the astronomical cost of base isolation for every single support pillar. The thing will have to be able to survive a M 8.3 earthquake which means upwards of 4 minutes of shaking of which atlest a minute of shaking in excess of the force of gravity. Also you have to avoid landslide prone terrain, so forget about the cheapest and most straight forward route. Then of cause you need to build fault crossings that can survive huge offsets, we are talking about well over a dossen fault crossings between SFO and LAX. On the San Andreas alone it can be anywhere from 20 to 50+ feet, how do you engineer that without risking the structural integrity of the tube?

Odd thing.Elon has succeeded to date by using existing technology and making it more efficient.This is a 'blue sky' type project into the technical unknown.Nearly always turns out far harder than expected.
As above High Speed Trains up to 3.5 hours is the right (known) answer.After that aircraft are really rather good! Especially with the new super efficient ones coming on stream

Hyperloop, as the name says, is just a bunch of hype. Musk knows that, that's why he's letting others develop the idea...and fail, rather than doing it himself. He can still take the credit for coming up initially with the great idea, while blaming others for a bad execution.

In these times of zero interest rates, there is far too much capital looking for a place to go, and people will invest in anything, particularly if there is enough hype going with it. One day the bubble will burst...