Speculative Impact of the Hyperloop

[andert]

As some of you may be aware, several hours ago Elon Musk released the detailed outline of the Hyperloop transit system to connect LA and SF -- www.teslamotors.com/blog/hyperloop

Now, whether this will actually happen is, of course, pretty speculative, but some points to consider are that it would have a 35m travel time, an estimated ticket cost of $20, and an estimated total cost of 1/10th of CAHSR -- but it would also, in his configuration, run in the median of the 5 for most of its route on elevated pylons, and so would probably require the state of California to scrap CAHSR in favor of this (which is his goal) were it to be built this way.

Now, how this affects the Sepulveda pass rail project -- Musk's LA-end station in this design is actually in Sylmar, not far from the proposed terminus of this rail line, as opposed to Union like CAHSR.

Considering Musk's track record and his seeming devotion to getting this up and running, even if he has to sink some of his own time and money into it (as he hinted at today), I think it's worth considering how the coming Hyperloop would affect the plan for this Sepulveda rail project -- presumably, it would create a massive demand for transit into Sylmar to get to the Hyperloop station, spiking the ridership expectations north of the Orange Line on the Sepulveda line and making heavy rail more feasible than light rail (and much more so than BRT) in order to move passengers to this next node of transit.

Were the Hyperloop idea to gain traction in the coming year (particularly with yet another delay of CAHSR construction announced today), would Metro have the ability to incorporate the increased ridership expectations toward San Fernando, or would they have to start from scratch again on the EIR?

[culvercitylocke]

"Meet George Jetson!"

I would support the CAHSR if it were actually high speed, did not share any existing rail tracks, if it were built in existing corridors (like the 5 freeway) and didn't wobble all over the state to every small town along the way and if I had any faith it was going to cost under a 100 billion (it'll probably cost 150, I'm guessing) and if they were building the first leg in SoCal rather than from Nowhere to Nowhere. But taking a train where I have to tour the entire state and waste a 150 on a ticket and an entire day (6 hour travel time on the CASlow speed rail, plus station time plus travel to station time and I'm sure the USA's only HSR network will have security very similar to airports with a comparable amount of time required to transit the security) on travel when I can get to SF for $60 and about two and a half hours total (45 minutes in the air, and some time in the airport/traveling to the airport).

I don't mean this to sound super negative, I am a MASSIVE booster of rail and lover of all things trains and I can see absolutely zero upside to the CAHSR, there's not one single positive to the entire project. And when I consider what 30 or 60 or 150 billion could do for local rail projects if we spread it around the state and my heart breaks. It's that lost opportunity that makes the CAHSR out to be the greatest public works failure of all time.

Oh and it would help if the CAHSR did not have a massive question mark as to where all the power was going to come from to run it. Oy.

So considering all that? The Hyperloop looks like a GREAT alternative.

[masonite]

Aug 12, 2013 16:36:27 GMT -8 culvercitylocke said:

"Meet George Jetson!"

I would support the CAHSR if it were actually high speed, did not share any existing rail tracks, if it were built in existing corridors (like the 5 freeway) and didn't wobble all over the state to every small town along the way and if I had any faith it was going to cost under a 100 billion (it'll probably cost 150, I'm guessing) and if they were building the first leg in SoCal rather than from Nowhere to Nowhere. But taking a train where I have to tour the entire state and waste a 150 on a ticket and an entire day (6 hour travel time on the CASlow speed rail, plus station time plus travel to station time and I'm sure the USA's only HSR network will have security very similar to airports with a comparable amount of time required to transit the security) on travel when I can get to SF for $60 and about two and a half hours total (45 minutes in the air, and some time in the airport/traveling to the airport).

I don't mean this to sound super negative, I am a MASSIVE booster of rail and lover of all things trains and I can see absolutely zero upside to the CAHSR, there's not one single positive to the entire project. And when I consider what 30 or 60 or 150 billion could do for local rail projects if we spread it around the state and my heart breaks. It's that lost opportunity that makes the CAHSR out to be the greatest public works failure of all time.

Oh and it would help if the CAHSR did not have a massive question mark as to where all the power was going to come from to run it. Oy.

So considering all that? The Hyperloop looks like a GREAT alternative.

I'll take the other side in that HSR works well in most of the rest of the developed world (even some in the not so developed world). Fresno, Bakersfield, and the other cities in the Central Valley are not as small as everyone makes them out to be. They would actually be considered quite major cities in most of the US. Even if the funds could be used to build local rail, there wouldn't be money to operate them, which is the problem with local transit as operationally it is a financial disaster. Soon as we build more rail locally, we'll either have to raise fares significantly or use the funds that would otherwise go to build more rail, to operate the system. This has already largely happened with Prop A and Prop C. HSR rail has a good record around the world of being operationally profitable. A big difference from local transit that is hardly ever discussed.

Hyperloop would be great if it were feasible. My guess is that you'll never ride in your lifetime in that it is completely unproven.

[matthewb]

HSR is a proven technology, the "hyperloop" is a made up name with a blog post. Elon Musk has done a lot of really great things, and I would be more excited about his idea if he had already started it, sunk some money into it, and had a test track running.

His cost estimates are entirely unfair and unrealistic as they rely on essentially no property costs. CAHSR might have up to a factor 2 cost increases, but I imagine the hyperloop might be off by an order of magnitude or two. Given that Musk's idea would in an ideal case (with added construction costs above his rosy estimate) serve a small fraction of city pairs that would be served by HSR, I'm really not convinced its a good or realistic alternative.

I'm all for him exploring the idea, but I'm not for stopping construction on CAHSR, a proven technology that has worked well all over the world in economies of comparable size and geography to California.

[bzcat]

[davebowman]

I'm all for cutting-edge transportation technology, and would buy a Tesla Model S if I could afford one, but I'm skeptical about the claims Musk makes for the pneumo-train, and I think a lot of people will use its pie-in-the-sky scenario to justify killing the California bullet train. First of all, riding in a train that fast you would be pulling a lot of Gs. That could be very uncomfortable. Second of all, machines sometimes malfunction, so if a capsule car inside a big tube breaks down in the middle of nowhere, how would passengers get out of it? Third of all, I'm claustrophobic and there's no way you would ever get me to ride in a contraption like that.

Courtesy of the California High Speed Rail Blog, here's a link to a website explaining how the hyperloop would probably be slower and more expensive than Musk claims: stopandmove.blogspot.com/2013/08/hyperloop-proposal-bad-joke-or-attempt.html

[andert]

I'm certainly not advocating that we immediately sink CAHSR at all, just that serious consideration is given to idea of the Hyperloop. In all likelihood, it won't be a feasible alternative, but if it is, then certainly it should be given the time of day. I was more curious on its effects on the LA rail network IF it were to come about.

As to the Hyperloop itself, the document actually stresses that the passenger experiences only 1G throughout the entire trip -- it's acceleration, not velocity, that determines how many G's you're pulling. As for malfunctions, he outlines a number of safety scenarios and the failsafes in place to address them. Claustrophobia? Certainly a concern. I'm claustrophobic, too. Most of the points on that website though seem like legitimate concerns, in particular the ones about cost overruns and the 'last mile' problem.

[hooligan]

I'm more in favor at looking at the route the hyperloop wants to travel on, for High Speed Rail. Going up the 5 through Central California with spokes going to Fresno and Sacramento and bakerfield. looks a lot less expensive than the current route.


you dont need high speed rail service between those central valley cities what is really needed is better high speed conventional rail

[culvercitylocke]

I've always thought that was a better idea as well (short spokes connecting to the main line). I think that's what the European HSR builders recommended as well, since it's easier to expand the right of way parallel to the 5 than it is to acquire/generate an entirely new right of way for the wobble-all-over-the-state route.

[masonite]

Aug 15, 2013 16:44:26 GMT -8 culvercitylocke said:

I've always thought that was a better idea as well (short spokes connecting to the main line). I think that's what the European HSR builders recommended as well, since it's easier to expand the right of way parallel to the 5 than it is to acquire/generate an entirely new right of way for the wobble-all-over-the-state route.

I think they'd still have to acquire a lot of land by the 5 if they used that route. The 5 is not entirely straight and in most spots is not wide enough to accomodate a high speed train as well. Of course, the spokes you talk about would require a lot of land acquisition themselves and would also require a large operational budget too.

[bobdavis]

This discussion can now be moved to the Maglev and Monorail board, where most discussions of non-conventional fixed guideway systems are found. There's a new thread for HyperLoop comments.

[bzzzt]

Elon says he'll be done with his car-carrying tunnel from LAX to the Valley in a year or so. I'll give him three, and still call it quite an achievement if it's done.

[exporider]

Yeah, and Tesla will be producing 20,000 cars per month by the end of the year. You can't blame the guy for a lack of ambition.

[culvercitylocke]

well it looks as though Tesla is producing about 500 model 3s per week at the moment, so they've leaped the first exponential hurdle in the scale up.

considering the boring compnay only started tunneling a little bit ago, 500 feet is an excellent pace. if they're projecting 2 miles in 90-120 days, that is a stunning pace.

but it also makes sense. Musk is using a water TBM, not a rail TBM.

This small bore tunnel has a diameter half the size of an LRT tunnel, which allows it to tunnel faster because the cross sectional area being excavated would then be one fourth the cross sectional area of an LRT tunnel.

iirc, metro tunnels have a diameter of 6-8 meters (I can't remember which it is!), therefore musk's tunnel would need to be 3-4 meters in diameter

It also looks like Musk is planning on increasing the motor power of a TBM, makes sense, the drive train technology tesla has been developing to power electric vehicles could theoretically scale up to larger machinery. Since electric cars provide such vast quantities of power that makes them so much fun to drive, that same feature could be directed to providing more power to the TBM.

And the boring company is also proposing additional automation into the TBM factory. Namely they are going to tunnel continuously and reinforce continuously. Since TBMS operate for about 50% of the time, and then the second shift does all the reinforcing work while the TBM is idle, this is the obvious low hanging fruit to harvest.

Musk is also proposing using autonomous technology to remove the need for a human pilot of the TBM.

And they want to electrify the diesel trains that supply a tunnel during its construction, (probably with electric motors rather than a third rail), this could substantially reduce the temporary ventilation installation requirements during construction.

Overall, it is quite a sound plan with several different achievable goals that could greatly enhance how TBMs operate and how tunnels are built.

whether or not single vehicle skates transporting cars or pedestrian pods at 200 kph is a suitable or affordable plan for commuters is another question entirely. And naturally there is nothing known about ingress and egress and how the traffic will be managed at ingress and egress points. this will probably be the most contentious points for residents with any Musk system, where to put the exit and entry.

But for the most part, Musk's business plan and innovations could substantially improve everything we know about tunnels and how to build them, and that means that Metro could wind up with substantial cost savings on many different measure M projects, even if they continue building 6-8 meter tunnels, those tunnels construction could be vastly improved by the innovations musk is proposing.

I imagine the cost per "ticket" to ride Musk's disneyland ride bypassing the sepulveda pass will be fairly cost prohibitive, it will have to be very expensive if he's only capable of transporting 3000 vehicles an hour, because he has to discourage most commuters from using it.

But me? I would totally pay that ticket every single time I had to fly out of LAX (which is only a couple times a year, as it would be completely worth it to bypass the sepulveda pass traffic. I very much doubt I would use it for daily commuting unless it were subsidized by my employer.

Say Musk charges $50 per vehicle. This could create a HUGE market for a van-pool Lyft type of service, the Lyft-van-pool picks up ten people from a simlar area going to a similar area, and they split the cost of the $50 ticket and the cost of the Lyft service. So they all pay $5 for the tunnel fare, and probably another $5 for the lyft service, rather than each paying $50. it would be rather amusing if these sorts of innovations created a market for car pools!

I could even foresee California dedicating some cap and trade money to car-pool companies which would subsidize the cost of any car pool trip (because it reduced emissions in a very trackable way), that could possibly reduce the cost to each commuter by a few dollars., which would further increase demand to carpool

it's 30 km from LAX to the 101, at 200kph, that is 9 minutes of travel time. add probably 4 minutes of ingress + acceleration and 4 minutes of deceleration and egress you can traverse those 30 km in about 18 minutes and still be functioning within the roadway system built for cars rather than being limited by the whims of the public transit system. That's a hell of a time savings, pretty unbeatable.

[culvercitylocke]

Let's say Musk decided to build all the way up to Santa Clarita (Railroad blvd is an obvious goal for a private company, the same as it was for the private companies ran by Stanford and Newhall, as the right of ways continue up to san francisco or can head east to the rest of the country)

the distance from santa clarita to lax is 56 km, at 200 kph, that's a travel time of 17 minutes. plus 8 minutes means Santa Clarita to the airport in 25 minutes. Wow.

[culvercitylocke]

www.kcrw.com/news-culture/shows/design-and-architecture/tunnels-planes-and-art-and-architecture-in-the-desert#seg-does-la-have-tunnel-vision

KCRW ran a story on the regional connector and they touch on the Boring Company and Musk's innovations

Garcetti mentions, offhand, that the biggest real world constraint Musk is looking at right now is that if he doubles tunneling speed, he doubles excavated material per day. Currently they excavate 300 truck loads of material per day. Garcetti, jokingly, says they might have to shut down streets just to get the trucks of dirt out of an Elon construction site.

One thing to consider is how Musk and Tesla might change electric trains around the world.

Consider: Currently electric trains have two big problems, they are powered either by overhead catenary or by a third rail. A LOT of expensive infrastructure has to be built to support both of these electricity delivery systems, and third rails are dangerous, leaving them suitable only to grade separation.

What if neither was used, because Tesla puts their batteries into a train chassis. the trains are then freed from either option.

Suddenly you have to build a lot less infrastructure. While batteries are heavy, it may be possible to build new rolling stock that requires a lot less weight, that increases the range of the vehicles, and decreasing the weight of the rolling stock increases the life of the rail, and decreases maintenance schedules. That is a winning positive feedback loop.

If the batteries are cheaper than over the long run, then freight companies begin to replace their diesel rolling stock with battery powered stock, which is a net positive for climate change.

But if the trains get smaller and less heavy and do not require the electrical support system of catenary or third rail, then you can fit a train into a smaller tunnel. Perhaps the individual rolling stock does not have as much capacity, because it got smaller, but a smaller and less heavy train will have a shorter stopping distance. Stopping distance is the primary constraint on headways, so if you decrease stopping distance you can increase headways, meaning you probably don't have any capacity loss with a smaller less heavy train. Another positive feedback loop.

A smaller tunnel is faster to excavate, thus it is cheaper to excavate.

hmm, seems like a positive feedback loop.

I don't know. it smells to me like rail is about to be radically disrupted by BEV technology and all the assumptions and infrastructure requirements we're used to causing astronomical price tags may not be the status quo of the future.

here's an article on how BEV technology is rapidly gaining ground with Buses.
www.vox.com/energy-and-environment/2017/10/24/16519364/electric-buses

It makes me think that Elon is planning on bidding a BEV rolling stock for the High Speed Rail.

[bzcat]

I don't think BEV is going to have the capacity for high speed rail. Distance and speed both will require very large battery packs that makes it impractical.

But certainly for local transit options, BEV is quite feasible. Take Expo line for example... the end to end operating time is around 1 hour including layover time for recharging.

[culvercitylocke]

Ah but if all the rolling stock are built with BEV undercarriages you could maybe do it.

additionally some of the recharge tech being developed for buses could be adapted to rail uses.

But in general I agree, Hsr is probably nigh impossible.

But light rail seems like a ripe, fat target for disruption. The same as buses are.

[bzcat]

It's the speed of HSR that drives up energy requirements. I can't foreseen batteries that large yet light weight enough to make constant 150mph over long distance possible.

Urban application is totally different... Expo line top speed is about 50mph and only in small bursts. I can definitely see BEV (or other catenary-free energy storage systems) being in serious consideration now on any new build light rail or tram line.

For example the Kaoshiung light rail circle line: www.metro-report.com/news/single-view/view/kaohsiung-picks-caf-to-build-catenary-free-trams.html World's first true catenary-free light rail line. The trains have batteries on board and are recharged at stations by contact less rapid chargers. Generally low speed operation (up to 45 mph) means the battery doesn't need to be very big.



Here is a good photo of the battery packs on the roof.

[culvercitylocke]

Nov 13, 2017 15:30:22 GMT -8 bzcat said:

It's the speed of HSR that drives up energy requirements. I can't foreseen batteries that large yet light weight enough to make constant 150mph over long distance possible.

Urban application is totally different... Expo line top speed is about 50mph and only in small bursts. I can definitely see BEV (or other catenary-free energy storage systems) being in serious consideration now on any new build light rail or tram line.

For example the Kaoshiung light rail circle line: www.metro-report.com/news/single-view/view/kaohsiung-picks-caf-to-build-catenary-free-trams.html

The trains have batteries on board and are recharged at stations by contact less rapid chargers. Generally low speed operation (up to 45 mph) means the battery doesn't need to be very big.

Thanks bz, that is more in line what I was thinking of

[bzcat]

Actually, not true contact-less charging... you can see a 0:43 of the video, it has retractable catenary. But the point is that it is a BEV system that get rapid charge at stations.

[bzzzt]

If batteries are comparable to BEV car batteries (warrantied 120K-150K miles), then the lifetime of the battery might be an issue as our LRVs travel a whole lot further than an average car, per year.

Also, I'm reading that the Kaohsiung circle line uses supercapacitors to hold the energy, which enables the quick recharging.  IMO, this is a more promising high energy storage than batteries.

[bzzzt]

urbanize.la/post/elon-musk-takes-step-forward-proof-concept-tunnel-la


I'm behind Elon trying his ideas out ... but, wouldn't this get in the way of a Sepulveda subway, if we ever get there? I would imagine there would be a conflict at Pico/Sepulveda or Expo/Sepulveda, for example.

The city ought to have him change the path a bit to avoid preempting a subway station.

Of course, maybe that's an unannounced goal of his company - to build a true subway...  I just don't estimate it as having the capacity that a Westside subway should.

[culvercitylocke]

He can’t change that path because it’s the most direct route to his house in bel aire and sepulveda is the only street wide enough to not require easements.

And cal trans would never let him tunnel under the 405.

The tunnels are fourteen feet wide, but he’s really only building it because he wants a private tunnel to transport him from his house to his el segundo work.

That is to say the whole Boring company thing is just a hoax, there’s no way to make it work, one only has to look at the Tesla model x pulling a sludge car out of the tunnel to realize the tunnel is barely big enough for a car on a sled to fit, there’s no emergency egress possibility, which means there is no commercial possibility.

[bzzzt]

He's revised it so now it's a bit of a people-mover, not Tesla-mover - cleantechnica.com/2018/03/10/elon-musk-revises-boring-company-underground-tunnel-plan/


... But it's still taking up space on Sepulveda, unless Metro is going with Westwood (and Overland?) south of the pass. Why not make him bury it deeper so it doesn't have to go directly under Sepulveda. The only entrances are elevators, so having an entrance at an intersection isn't really necessary.



You're right about the egress... I can't think of how his tunnels will meet emergency regulations. Surely he knows of this.

[JH_BW]

I'm cool with Musk burrowing under Sepulveda as long as the agreement includes Musk digging his sewer tunnels out of the ground and restoring the earth to be ready for Metro after his trial period. There's no way Musk gets to preempt one of LA's most important planned subways for a private experiment, that's just beyond the pale

[numble]

Metro sent a letter to Musk--they want to ensure it does not interfere with the Metro project:
clkrep.lacity.org/onlinedocs/2017/17-1342-S1_pc_4-17-18.pdf

[bzzzt]

I humbly suggest he dig in places where Metro ain't going to get to in the next fifty years.

For a pilot project, I think LAUS-Dodger Stadium-Glendale would be best. This would mostly avoid any busy corridors as there's nothing to avoid under Dodger Stadium and there's hardly anyone to complain. Maybe also Sunset Blvd below Hollywood Blvd or Melrose Ave or Westwood to Century City.

[culvercitylocke]

I would actually suggest la cienega as a viable alternative for musk. This way he has to deal with parks, oil, fault lines and more interesting geology.