This morning we wake to the news that Elon Musk’s futuristic transportation, Hyperloop. For those not familiar with the concept, almost 2 years ago, Elon Musk, the founder of SpaceX, Tesla and SolarCity, turned his mind to the vast sums of money that governments are spending on transportation infrastructure. Surrounded by the best minds in science and technology, he thought there could be a better way.
Hyperloop would work like a monorail, in that it’d be elevated above cities to reduce costs, as well as critically expose the tube to the sun to be powered by electricity. To increase speed of travel, the whole think would be wrapped in a tube and the air depressurized, lowering the resistance experienced by moving objects at space. People would be transported through the tube in small pods, housing 6-8 people, rather than larger train carriages that we’re used to. This is all in an effort to speed up travel and stop the waiting for the train to fill before leaving the station.
Will be building a Hyperloop test track for companies and student teams to test out their pods. Most likely in Texas.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) January 15, 2015
The theoretical transportation has never been built and now Musk wants to move it from theory to reality. The 5 mile trial doesn’t have a firm location, but it looks like Texas is the current favourite.
A trial is certainly a long way off a wide-scale roll out, but it seems no-one has been able to provide reasons why the system won’t work. If it does, it’ll likely cost less than constructing high speed trains across the US. It’s been an awfully long time since the last new transportation method was introduced, so you can be the world will be watching this one.
Also thinking of having an annual student Hyperlooppod racer competition, like Formula SAE http://t.co/HV9BLCoMb8
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) January 15, 2015
Read more about it at http://www.spacex.com/hyperloop
