3 ms·
Does anyone else think that underground tunnels are a superior way to solve the last few miles problem? Tunnels about 1 foot in diameter with little wheeled veh
by anon4this1 11y ago
Does anyone else think that underground tunnels are a superior way to solve the last few miles problem? Tunnels about 1 foot in diameter with little wheeled vehicles pushing around payloads of takeaway food, groceries , parcels at reasonable speed with control computers determining routing and stopping collisions. A functioning network of this type would be more valuable than power or cable utility networks, and horizontal tunnel drilling tech means that you dont have to dig up huge swathes of road to put tunnels in.
- axiak 11y agoMore likely than not, these drones are for the rural last mile problem, where drivers aren't worth the cost. In that case tunnels wouldn't be worth the cost.
- ghaff 11y agoIt's most likely the last 20 miles problem where delivery costs are a problem. I live in an exurban area but I imagine UPS economics works fine here. If I live in the back of beyond I imagine it's hard to make any delivery system work without subsidies.
- rtehfm 11y agoCreating tunnels would be several orders of magnitude more expensive than creating the technology for drone delivery, lobbying for it's adoption across various municipalities and so on.
- dikdik 11y agoNew York City tried something like this with pneumatic tubes for delivering mail. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pneumatic_tube_mail_in_New_York_City https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pneumatic_tube_mail_in_New_Yor...
- jeffbarr 11y agoSeattle's current tunnel project isn't going all that well...
- vidarh 11y agoI wonder what the economy of dealing with stuck packages, flooding, rodents etc. would be...