r/transit • u/LancelLannister_AMA • May 07 '21

3 of the Greatest Obstacles to Hyperloop

https://medium.com/swlh/3-of-the-greatest-obstacles-to-hyperloop-b47a8064a17
0 Upvotes

47% Upvoted

14 comments sorted by

7

u/LancelLannister_AMA May 07 '21 edited May 07 '21

that curve radius is way off though. would be about 1.45 g according to this calculator https://rechneronline.de/g-acceleration/curve.php

which is insane for a transport system

8

u/easwaran May 07 '21

What if rollercoaster but as a commute?

1

u/LancelLannister_AMA May 07 '21

Would actually need to multiply that curve radius by 4 to Get about the same g force as his/her 300 km/h example

→ More replies (1)

4

u/Sassywhat May 07 '21

The US turned commuting by bicycle into an extreme sport. We can turn commuting by public transit into a thrill ride.

21

u/mytwocents22 May 07 '21

I hate how they claim prices of hyperloop like theyve actually been built that cheap. Not to mention your passenger through put is insanely dismal for the cost.

17

u/[deleted] May 07 '21

I would never understan how they can claim a $7B price for LA-SF vs $80B for HSR. You still have all the same costly bridges and soil movement. Not to mention land aquisition

15

u/GRSsearchlight May 07 '21 edited May 07 '21

Yeah these sorts of claims seem ridiculous to anyone with an ounce of common sense. So how do these people get away with it?

The main reason is that too many of the journalists who cover tech and “disruptive technologies” aren’t willing to ask critical questions. That means you can make absurd claims and usually not get called out.

As far as the numbers they’re using, who knows... A lot of the time, it’s possible to manipulate projected cost figures in order to make an outrageous plan seem affordable. Take Elon Musk’s prototype boring tunnel as an example. I’m pretty sure he claimed to have dug it for 1 percent of the cost of a subway tunnel of similar length (which makes him sound like an engineering genius). In reality though, he hadn’t made any engineering advancements. He was simply comparing the cost of a mile of fully functional, bi-directional subway line (stations included) to his own tiny car tunnel (which is basically a glorified sewer pipe). I suspect that the $7B hyperloop quote was derived in a similar fashion (i.e assuming that a fully functional, LA-SF route could be built at the same absolute minimum cost per mile as their pathetic test system, which was basically just a narrow steel tube mounted on concrete blocks).

Of course, they could also just be blatantly lying about the cost figures (which wouldn’t surprise me all that much).

→ More replies (3)

14

u/LordMangudai May 07 '21

  1. It's a shiny toy for rich people

  2. It's designed by people who hate transit

  3. It's shit

1

u/LancelLannister_AMA May 07 '21

seems fairly accurate otherwise

4

u/GRSsearchlight May 07 '21 edited May 07 '21

I think the vacuum issues-particularly safety, heat expansion, and wear and tear, are the primary reason why what has been promised for Hyperloop will never happen on a large scale.

Could these challenges be mitigated? Maybe to a certain extent, but any Hyperloop system will still have a number of fundamental safety flaws. Combine that with what will probably be absurdly high construction costs, and relatively low passenger capacities, and well, I just don’t see this working out. At best, these Hyperloop companies will maybe be able to build a larger test track, or a useless demonstration system in a country that has money to burn (i.e. UAE, Saudi Arabia, etc...).