Elon Musk's grand transportation vision

[orulz]

Originally Posted by ardecila

But as orulz pointed out, horrendously expensive in a tunnel environment. You're installing, maintaining, and running cable between many complex and sensitive pieces of equipment, all in an extremely harsh environment subject to noise, vibration, moisture/flooding, vermin, etc.

If you can put all that tech in the vehicles themselves, then all installation and maintenance of those systems can be done above-ground in a shop instead of down in an active tunnel. That's a big if; I have to imagine the constrained sightlines of a tunnel will make truly wireless detection very difficult. At the very least it will require robust and redundant sets of wireless repeaters so a message can be carried down the tunnel from vehicle to vehicle.

Also the elimination of true stations removes a huge expense. A station cavern with elevators, escalators, etc costs hundreds of millions to build underground. An elevator shaft and the structure to connect it into the tunnel should be cheaper. For a point-to-point shuttle system like the O'Hare proposal without intermediate stops, you just need to build inclines or elevators at each end up to the surface, and all the passenger facilities can be built in a traditional, above-ground structure.

I suspect that they will not use wireless anything. I suspect that they will use autonomous vehicle tech (lidar, sonar, even cameras) and operate based on line-of-sight. They will have to make their tunnels very straight, and slow down tremendously around curves, to overcome this problem.

Perhaps it will be possible to do ultrasonic rangefinding around curves by reflecting the sonar pulses off the walls, in which case this is mitigated somewhat. But this technology would have to be purpose-built and does not leverage economies of scale with AV systems already under development for cars.

[jmecklenborg]

Originally Posted by Leveled

Deceiving? Are you projecting or something? Did he promise you this, directly?

Super genius? That’s an internet meme. Jealous about it?

Abandon traditional public transit? Yeah we were building the crap out of that, then he showed up, and we stopped.

Your motivations make no sense.

Musk is a cold-blooded capitalist disguised as a benevolent nerd. Familiarize yourself with the business attitudes of Peter Thiel and you will realize that Musk's activities are just a setup for another Dutch East India Company.

[chris08876]

Motivation for the human race.

I don't care what folks say about Musk, his companies and vision are clear. Yeah they need money to make them happen, but I do believe the motives are clear.

• Video Link

Places like SpaceX are bringing innovations that will shape the world.

[Pedestrian]

Elon Musk is in increasingly serious trouble and could end up in jail if he isn't careful (which he has not been up to now):

SEC asks judge to hold Elon Musk in contempt
By Julia Horowitz, CNN Business
Updated 9:21 AM ET, Tue February 26, 2019

New York (CNN Business) - The Securities and Exchange Commission has asked a federal judge to hold Tesla CEO Elon Musk in contempt for violating a settlement deal reached last year.

Musk tweeted on February 19 that "Tesla made 0 cars in 2011, but will make around 500k in 2019." Hours later, Musk sent a follow-up tweet indicating that the company will actually deliver just 400,000 cars this year.

Although Musk corrected his mistake, regulators scolded Tesla's billionaire CEO because he "once again published inaccurate and material information about Tesla to his over 24 million Twitter followers," according to court papers filed Monday. The SEC noted that he did not ask for or receive company approval before publishing his tweet.

His October 2018 settlement with the SEC mandates that he receive pre-approval of any social media posts with information that's "material" to shareholders. Tesla agreed to establish a board committee to oversee those posts . . . .

https://www.cnn.com/2019/02/25/tech/...mpt/index.html

[chris08876]

Everyone seems to want him to fail. But yet again, some of the visionaries of the world have always been given a hard a time. One must fail, many, many times to achieve greatness. I think the legacy will show. I support Mr.Musk in his visions.

He is at least attempting to change the world in someway. The same cannot be said with some of our leaders in power.

[Pedestrian]

Originally Posted by chris08876

Everyone seems to want him to fail. But yet again, some of the visionaries of the world have always been given a hard a time. One must fail, many, many times to achieve greatness. I think the legacy will show. I support Mr.Musk in his visions.

He is at least attempting to change the world in someway. The same cannot be said with some of our leaders in power.

I want him to do one of several things:

1. Do like Bill Gates did and become "chief technology officer" (call it "chief visionary" if you prefer) of his companies while turning the day-to-day management over to someone experienced in running profitable companies; or

2. Just move on from Tesla especially to the operations like SpaceX that are still in private hands and not yet ready to be profitable. He can retain a Tesla Board seat if he likes. But he is clearly a better visioanary than businessman.

[Pedestrian]

Tesla backtracks on store closures, plans top-end price rise
REUTERS - 9:34 AM ET 3/11/2019

(Reuters) - Electric carmaker Tesla Inc ( TSLA ) backed off its plan to close all of its U.S. stores in a blog post and instead will raise prices of its high-end vehicles by about 3 percent on average, as it strives for profitability.

The company said late Sunday that it would now be closing only about half as many stores than initially planned in a widely criticized move earlier this month to cut overhead and shift its whole distribution network online.

"Over the past two weeks we have been closely evaluating every single Tesla retail location, and we have decided to keep significantly more stores open than previously announced," the electric carmaker said.

"As a result Tesla will need to raise vehicle prices by about 3 percent on average worldwide" . . . .

https://www.fidelity.com/news/articl...1QS0JF-OUSBS_1

The management of Tesla by Musk is becoming a bad joke. They had to decide to keep many of the stores because they figured out after they announced the closings that they had LEASES on them and couldn't just move out and stop paying rent (saving over a billion $ in rent money was the goal).

[SIGSEGV]

Originally Posted by Pedestrian

https://www.fidelity.com/news/articl...1QS0JF-OUSBS_1

The management of Tesla by Musk is becoming a bad joke. They had to decide to keep many of the stores because they figured out after they announced the closings that they had LEASES on them and couldn't just move out and stop paying rent (saving over a billion $ in rent money was the goal).

they can probably cut down on store staffing by letting fanbois volunteer their time though.

[accord1999]

Originally Posted by SIGSEGV

they can probably cut down on store staffing by letting fanbois volunteer their time though.

https://model3ownersclub.com/threads...er-here.11532/

[M II A II R II K]

State to begin study of hyperloop technology, potential Pittsburgh-to-Philadelphia route

https://www.post-gazette.com/news/tr...s/201903080139

.....

- The Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission this week approved a four-year contract worth up to $2 million for consultant AECOM to review the potential for a hyperloop system that would extend across the state. The turnpike and the state Department of Transportation, which is part of the advisory group working with the consultant, were ordered to do such a study in a resolution approved last fall by the state House. --- The study also will look at regulatory or environmental concerns about the technology and study whether a cross-state route linking Pittsburgh, Harrisburg and Philadelphia, plus an extension from Philadelphia to Scranton and Wilkes-Barre, should be pursued. One key will be whether the technology is practical here, given the state’s hilly terrain.

.....

[City Wide]

Originally Posted by M II A II R II K

State to begin study of hyperloop technology, potential Pittsburgh-to-Philadelphia route

https://www.post-gazette.com/news/tr...s/201903080139

Sounds to me that somebody needed alittle kickback time. How do you study the possible statewide application of a technology that doesn't yet exist in any meaningful way. This is wasted money.

[jmecklenborg]

Originally Posted by City Wide

Sounds to me that somebody needed alittle kickback time. How do you study the possible statewide application of a technology that doesn't yet exist in any meaningful way. This is wasted money.

Silicon Valley is gaming governments left and right. The whole "smart cities" thing is a scam. Hyperloop is a scam.

[M II A II R II K]

A hyperloop between Toronto and Montreal is moving closer to reality

https://www.blogto.com/city/2019/04/...closer-reality

.....

- Transport Canada is officially funding a study of the hyperloop train: an electric tunnel that will be able to take passengers from Toronto to Montreal in just 45 minutes. The government agency has announced that it's looking for researchers to look into the new transportation method, which is still in prototype mode.

.....

[City Wide]

Originally Posted by M II A II R II K

A hyperloop between Toronto and Montreal is moving closer to reality

https://www.blogto.com/city/2019/04/...closer-reality

Well, you could say that 2 is closer to a 1000 then 1 is, but really! What's there to study----build a 350 mile long air tight tunnel, or maybe two of them, and solve 10's of thousands of other complicated problems, and you're ready to go. This has as much life as the Philly to Pittsburgh 'plan'. The only way hyperloop is going to move forward is if DC or a group of nations treat it as a present day moon shot program and dump mega billions of dollars into R&D. I'm afraid that's not going to happen as long as we have Mr. Happy along with his ego driven desire to build a beautiful wall.

[jmecklenborg]

Space X rocket sticks high-tech landing, then topples off the boat in rough seas:
https://www.space.com/spacex-loses-f...er-at-sea.html


The Space Shuttle didn't have this problem because the solid rocket boosters were simply towed back to Florida behind the recovery ship.

This is a big problem going forward for Space X because the launch of the bigger rockets will depend not just on favorable launch weather but 1-2 days of calm seas to bring the rocket sections back to shore. NASA could just let the boosters bob out there until things settled down.

[jtown,man]

Originally Posted by jmecklenborg

Space X rocket sticks high-tech landing, then topples off the boat in rough seas:
https://www.space.com/spacex-loses-f...er-at-sea.html


The Space Shuttle didn't have this problem because the solid rocket boosters were simply towed back to Florida behind the recovery ship.

This is a big problem going forward for Space X because the launch of the bigger rockets will depend not just on favorable launch weather but 1-2 days of calm seas to bring the rocket sections back to shore. NASA could just let the boosters bob out there until things settled down.

Dude, you're obsessed with Elon Musk. What is it about a dude who has his own company that pisses you off so much to constantly post in here?

[dubu]

he doesnt really need a thread unless he does something good and thats very doubtful since he hates public transport.

[dubu]

though it would be cool if cars were underground and trains were at-grade and elevated. maybe in 100 years.

[Innsertnamehere]

Originally Posted by jmecklenborg

Space X rocket sticks high-tech landing, then topples off the boat in rough seas:
https://www.space.com/spacex-loses-f...er-at-sea.html


The Space Shuttle didn't have this problem because the solid rocket boosters were simply towed back to Florida behind the recovery ship.

This is a big problem going forward for Space X because the launch of the bigger rockets will depend not just on favorable launch weather but 1-2 days of calm seas to bring the rocket sections back to shore. NASA could just let the boosters bob out there until things settled down.

I understood that the long term plan was for the rockets to land back on their land based launch pads - they simply do the landings on water right now for safety reasons as the landings are not yet reliable enough.

[Kenmore]

libertarian escape fantasies