http://www.teslamotors.com/sites/default/files/blog_images/hyperloop-alpha.pdf

I love to travel. By that I mean that I love going to different places; getting there, however, can sometimes be less than enjoyable. I’ve had the best experiences taking high speed trains in Europe, especially on France’s TGV that can hit speeds in excess of 300 mph, because it’s a relatively cheap and quick option to get from point A to point B. While these trains are commonplace throughout Europe and places like Japan and China, the US is not as up to speed. If you want to get from, say, New York to Los Angeles, you’ll most likely be buying a plane ticket (unless you’re down for 41 hours of straight driving). While it is possible to get a train for that trip, you’ll be in for a three day journey with multiple stops. Of course, there is a glaring reason that the US doesn’t have the connectivity of other regions: the sheer geographical size of our country. But in the next few decades, we could looking at a revolutionary mode of long-distant transportation: the Hyperloop.

A longtime brain-child of SpaceX and Tesla Motors’ Elon Musk, the Hyperloop is a transportation system consisting of low-pressure above-ground tubes that will transport pods of people at speeds double the average gate-to-gate times of flights. In 2013 Musk published a 57 page concept outlining the “the initial route, preliminary design, and logistics of the Hyperloop transportation system” for a San Francisco to Los Angeles route that would take approximately 35 minutes (a 382 mile journey). While it would cost an estimated $6 billion for two 1-way tubes and 40 pods, Musk states that it could transport 7.4 million people a year, the costs would be amortized over 20 years and the average passenger would pay $20 per one-way ticket (compared to flights starting at around $150). While this is an exciting concept, the outline doesn’t specify the aerodynamic system under which the hyperloop would operate. Navigating to SpaceX.com/hyperloop reveals the following message:

“Neither SpaceX nor Elon Musk is affiliated with any Hyperloop companies. While we are not developing a commercial Hyperloop ourselves, we are interested in helping to accelerate development of a functional Hyperloop prototype.”

So I guess Elon Musk has a lot on his plate (never would’ve guessed). But rather than SpaceX sponsoring this endeavor, they’ve announced an “open competition, geared towards university students and independent engineering teams, to design and build the best Hyperloop pod”, and will construct a one-mile test track at their California headquarters in time for the competition weekend next June (by the way, if anyone is interested, the deadline for submitting an intent to compete form is September 15, so hurry up!).

An interesting development in the Hyperloop saga was announced Aug. 20, when it was announced that Hyperloop Transportation Technologies had signed agreements to work with Oerlikon Leybold Vacuum and engineering design firm Aecom, and said that it already has 400 team members from NASA, Boeing, SpaceX working on the project in their spare time in exchange for stock options. These companies getting involved indicates that what might have been considered Elon Musk’s pipe dream only a few years ago could be creeping closer and closer to reality.

What do you think? Could this be the future of transportation, or is the idea still too far-fetched?

http://observationdeck.kinja.com/elon-musk-looks-to-texas-for-hyperloop-deployment-1679785425