Elon Musk's grand transportation vision

[ardecila]

^ If Musk can really deliver big improvements on the TBM that deliver significant cost savings vs. existing machines from Herrenknecht, etc then I'm sure he will look to license the technology or even set up a construction company to take on outside contracts from transit agencies.

But the cost of tunneling in US cities isn't really a technology problem, it's a labor problem and a regulations problem. The MTA could find a giant worm that eats rock for breakfast, but it would still be required to employ a large crew of highly-paid workers. The threat of lawsuits and political interference by residents, business owners and electeds would still force endless rounds of environmental studies and more expensive construction techniques to minimize disturbance.



Everyone's reaction to last night's event is colored by your perception of Musk as a love/hate kind of figure, but he accomplished a successful tunnel bore and claims to have achieved cost savings while doing it. This was a publicity stunt, nothing more, and it sounds like they're still figuring out the best way to move people through the tunnels. The weird roller-coaster Tesla attachment is just a kludge, because they have not designed or tested dedicated vehicles for the tunnel while they have plenty of Teslas on hand. But I fully expect the next round of updates to reveal a minibus-style Tesla like that seen in the renderings. It will be necessary for the O'Hare and Dodger Stadium projects. Future rounds could even move closer to London tube-style trains.

[Busy Bee]

You look at the concept and (if your head is screwed on correctly) ask yourself "why not on rails?" … and then your back to a train tunnel, which this whole thing should be.

[k1052]

I don't know if he can really make the whole concept work but I don't care if he has a crack at it, especially for ORD.

Maybe it would be a good idea to negotiate making the tunnels he builds here compatible with the dimensions of say the Innovia APM 256 though...

[M II A II R II K]

Maybe he should create tunnels with 2 end points to cut down on station costs.

[dubu]

with stations for every mile you would think theres slow streetcars and podcars in these tunnels. just have stairs and a elevator.

it would be a streetcar you couldnt stand in but it woul probably still work.

[jmecklenborg]

Originally Posted by ardecila

but he accomplished a successful tunnel bore and claims to have achieved cost savings while doing it.

He hasn't done jack squat. His company has yet to build its own TBM. How can he claim to have new technology when all he did was buy an off-the-shelf TBM from another manufacturer?

The actual boring and lining of a tunnel by a TBM is just one part of a tunnel project. Has he developed new launch pit methods? No. Has he developed new ways to build crossovers and stations and safety exits and fire suppression and drainage? No.

He hasn't done anything other than fool people into giving him another huge round of free publicity.

[ardecila]

Originally Posted by Busy Bee

You look at the concept and (if your head is screwed on correctly) ask yourself "why not on rails?" … and then your back to a train tunnel, which this whole thing should be.

Yes, the current solution shares the downside of guided buses in terms of pavement wear. A steel wheel on steel rail solution, though, will not be able to leave the tunnel and operate on streets. The ultimate solution for the wheels may be closer to a rubber-tire metro, but with Tesla battery technology to avoid the need for an electric traction system (third rail or overhead).

Again, this isn’t a finished, 100% workable, totally bug-free concept. But it seems like most of the hate comes from people who deliberately want all private-sector solutions to fail in order to bolster their vision of government doing everything. Or they want it to fail because they have a vested interest in the current system.

I mean honestly, if you squint this is basically the same as a subway. If Musk can find methods to speed up the construction and reduce the cost of underground tunneling, how can that NOT be a good thing for cities?

[GlassCity]

Originally Posted by ardecila

Yes, the current solution shares the downside of guided buses in terms of pavement wear. A steel wheel on steel rail solution, though, will not be able to leave the tunnel and operate on streets. The ultimate solution for the wheels may be closer to a rubber-tire metro, but with Tesla battery technology to avoid the need for an electric traction system (third rail or overhead).

Again, this isn’t a finished, 100% workable, totally bug-free concept. But it seems like most of the hate comes from people who deliberately want all private-sector solutions to fail in order to bolster their vision of government doing everything. Or they want it to fail because they have a vested interest in the current system.

I mean honestly, if you squint this is basically the same as a subway. If Musk can find methods to speed up the construction and reduce the cost of underground tunneling, how can that NOT be a good thing for cities?

Because as a result, there is a not insignificant number of people who see this and think "so transit is the past and we should stop investing in it"

More generally, it perpetuates the fantasy that it's possible to escape congestion in dense urban areas with private automobiles remaining the dominant form of transportation.

[jmecklenborg]

Originally Posted by ardecila

If Musk can find methods to speed up the construction and reduce the cost of underground tunneling, how can that NOT be a good thing for cities?

He's not going to. 25+ companies around the world manufacture tunnel boring machines. The technology improves incrementally all the time. That's why there is virtually zero market for old tunnel boring machines, even though the 21-foot bore is pretty standard for light rail and rapid transit tunnels.

Comically, Musk's Boring Company is in the market for old TBM's, because it lacks the capability to manufacture one itself.

[Busy Bee]

edit

[Busy Bee]

Originally Posted by glasscity

because as a result, there is a not insignificant number of people who see this and think "so transit is the past and we should stop investing in it"

more generally, it perpetuates the fantasy that it's possible to escape congestion in dense urban areas with private automobiles remaining the dominant form of transportation.

+1

[dtc]

I really like the Hyperloop but this car tunnel is pure garbage

Visionary Brain Genius Elon Musk Has Invented The World's Worst And Most Expensive Subway

Reader, dear reader, I have some great news for you. Tesla’s Elon Musk, definitely a visionary brain genius and not at all a manic idiot spaz and brazen fraud, has invented the future of mass transit for which we so desperately clamored: A narrow, jagged death-tunnel through which, uh, one Tesla-brand car at a time can, ah, drive ... the person who owns it, plus maybe two or three other people ... from one place to another ... at 49 miles per hour.

Okay so wait, I think I’m explaining it wrong. Picture this! It’s, it’s, you see, it’s a subway, only instead of trains filled with many dozens or hundreds of people at a time, riding through a grid of large tunnels, in a grand choreographed underground ballet capable of moving tens or hundreds of thousands of riders per hour, it’s ... Tesla-brand cars ... with their owners and maybe a couple other people ... driving at moderate speed ... through narrow, bumpy tunnels with no emergency exits.

No, goddammit, no, stop looking at me like that, it’s revolutionary technology. It’s high-speed rail, is the thing—only without the high speed, and with the “rail” part kind of arbitrarily added onto what’s otherwise just a single-lane Tesla-only subterranean roadway, for the purpose of securing public investment in it by calling it “mass transit” and not “driving a car from here to there.” And at either end of the trip, instead of just walking into or out of a train station you have to navigate your entire Tesla-brand autonomous electric car down or up a single-car elevator. Also each “train” can only carry as many people as can fit into a single Tesla-brand autonomous electric car.

[electricron]

Originally Posted by dtc

I really like the Hyperloop but this car tunnel is pure garbage.

It would move far more people over a mile if there were two escalators at both ends and two moving sidewalks in between (in all cases one for each direction).
Eliminating the vehicle and maknig the pavement the vehicle would work better at moving more people, but I'll readily admit at the cost of going much slower.
How quickly do you need to be at a distance just one mile away?

[GlassCity]

I like Jarrett Walker's take on this:

..As we’ve discussed before, a car-based tunnel also requires elevators. You zip your car into a parking space and it descends to the tunnel. Cool, but have they run the numbers on how many of these they would need, assuming it takes, say, a minute to do a full cycle of the elevator? How much real estate would it require to get cars into the subway at a rate that even maximizes the tiny capacity of the subway?

Anyway, those are some questions to ask today.

And yes, it would be great if this dalliance produces genuine improvements in tunnel technologies useful for building actual train-sized tunnels that can move the number of people who need to move. But Musk’s prairie-dog burrows are mostly hype, confusion, and elite projection. While delivering almost nothing useful, they are confusing elite opinion about whether we still need to build mass transit, which we do. Is any marginal benefit worth the resulting delay in getting the infrastructure we really need?

Two lessons to remember:

- If it doesn’t scale, it doesn’t matter. The media are easily excited by demonstration projects, but this idea doesn’t scale. You could build lots of tunnels, and they would each move so few people that they wouldn’t make a dent in a city’s transport needs.

- If it doesn’t scale, it’s for the rich. Or to put it another way: Inefficiency is inequality. Anything that spends a lot of money to serve small numbers of people raises the question “why are those people so important, and what about everyone else?

Full blog post here: https://humantransit.org/2018/12/elo...nt-matter.html

[dubu]

this would be nice for skateboards and bikes, except i dont think you can build underground roundabouts.

driverless enclosed motorcycles and just find a way for underground roundabouts? that could maybe work.

[texcolo]

• Video Link

Why go underground?

[dubu]

both above ground and underground is bad because you can get stuck. thats why i made a many spoke on ground train system a month ago
http://forum.skyscraperpage.com/show...4&postcount=96

[Dale]

*chortles at derisive comments*

The guy's got spent rocket fuel boosters landing by themselves. Got one of his cars orbiting the Sun.

Think I'm going to give Musk the benefit of the doubt.

[SIGSEGV]

Musk doesn't believe in public transit, he just wants him and his rich buddies to have an easier way to avoid traffic.

[jmecklenborg]

Originally Posted by Dale

The guy's got spent rocket fuel boosters landing by themselves.

Yeah, welcome to 1994:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JzXcTFfV3Ls


Musk's star depends on the public not knowing that everything he's doing has already been done. His fanboys think he invented the TBM. Home battery packs for solar power already existed. Electric cars are 100 years old. etc, etc.