5 ms·

If someone can get from Baltimore to NYC in about 20 minutes you're changing the scale of where people can live and commute from. I have plenty of friends that

If someone can get from Baltimore to NYC in about 20 minutes you're changing the scale of where people can live and commute from. I have plenty of friends that spend 45 minutes commuting from Brooklyn to Manhattan and I'd guess a not insignificant number of them would be willing to live in Baltimore where housing is cheap if they could get to the city in 20-30 minutes.

uptown 9y ago
"I'd guess a not insignificant number of them would be willing to live in Baltimore where housing is cheap if they could get to the city in 20-30 minutes." And I'd bet the cost of Baltimore housing would no longer be cheap when commuting options are expanded.
gk1 9y ago
It won't stay cheap for long in that scenario. (I moved from Brooklyn to Baltimore, in part because of the >30% difference in housing prices.)
- mtalantikite 9y ago
  Yeah, prices would certainly move and rebalance in this scenario. Not just in Baltimore, but in Philadelphia and D.C. as well. My point is mainly that we'd start thinking about commuting distance differently if we had a system like the hyperloop (assuming the cost isn't prohibitively high). We could conceivably even build other dense cities somewhere in the radius of 225 miles outside of places like NYC, LA, or SF to offload people if commute times are around 30 min. It can take me an hour to go see friends in Harlem or The Bronx, so you'd even open up the possibility of going to see friends or family for the evening 200 miles away for the same door to door travel time. Of course this is all futurist speculation, who knows what the numbers would actually add up to until a pilot program happens.
- protomyth 9y ago
  That's pretty much going to be the story of Hyperloop if it succeeds. Sprawl will move to a nodal form with the cost of housing being greater next to each node (station in this case). I am hoping that consideration is being taken at the station-level to insure that more modes of transportation are available to reduce the commute time further and extend the new sweet spot of housing.
colanderman 9y ago
You'll never be able to get from Baltimore to NYC in 20 minutes. You'll be able to get from the Hyperloop station in Baltimore to the Hyperloop station in NYC in 20 minutes. To get to/from the station from/to your place of residence/work will take most people another half hour on each side. So… more like an hour and 20 minutes. Yes, it makes living in Baltimore and working in NYC reasonable, but not easy as "20 minutes" implies. Not to mention the difference in housing cost would have to support the cost of travel. Who knows what a single Hyperloop ticket will cost but a 3-digit figure wouldn't surprise me, especially during rush hour. You could be looking at $3-$4k/month for a daily commute (which granted, is not too far from the difference in housing costs between parts of NYC and parts of Baltimore).
- Retric 9y ago
  40min each way is a common commute. Living 5min from Baltimore hyperloop station would give you 15mim on the other side for a 40min overall commute each way. If you are saving 2k/month on rent you could pay up to 50$ each way and break even. Though, I don't know what tickets would actually cost, that not ridiculous.
  - mcguire 9y ago
    5 min from the Baltimore station is a very small real estate market.
    - Retric 9y ago
      The limit on the number of hyperloop riders is probably a larger limitation. 0.6 miles radius = 1 square mile which could have 50,000+ people.
- teej 9y ago
  The thing is, the exact customer you are describing already exists and takes the Accela. And that trip takes 2 hours one way! Cutting that by 5x would be transformative. Plus, lots and lots of commuters in the del-mar-va area are already used to 120min+ round trip commutes and I imagine NYC/NJ commuters are similar.

uptown 9y ago

"I'd guess a not insignificant number of them would be willing to live in Baltimore where housing is cheap if they could get to the city in 20-30 minutes." And I'd bet the cost of Baltimore housing would no longer be cheap when commuting options are expanded.

gk1 9y ago

It won't stay cheap for long in that scenario. (I moved from Brooklyn to Baltimore, in part because of the >30% difference in housing prices.)

mtalantikite 9y ago
Yeah, prices would certainly move and rebalance in this scenario. Not just in Baltimore, but in Philadelphia and D.C. as well. My point is mainly that we'd start thinking about commuting distance differently if we had a system like the hyperloop (assuming the cost isn't prohibitively high). We could conceivably even build other dense cities somewhere in the radius of 225 miles outside of places like NYC, LA, or SF to offload people if commute times are around 30 min. It can take me an hour to go see friends in Harlem or The Bronx, so you'd even open up the possibility of going to see friends or family for the evening 200 miles away for the same door to door travel time. Of course this is all futurist speculation, who knows what the numbers would actually add up to until a pilot program happens.
protomyth 9y ago
That's pretty much going to be the story of Hyperloop if it succeeds. Sprawl will move to a nodal form with the cost of housing being greater next to each node (station in this case). I am hoping that consideration is being taken at the station-level to insure that more modes of transportation are available to reduce the commute time further and extend the new sweet spot of housing.

colanderman 9y ago

You'll never be able to get from Baltimore to NYC in 20 minutes. You'll be able to get from the Hyperloop station in Baltimore to the Hyperloop station in NYC in 20 minutes. To get to/from the station from/to your place of residence/work will take most people another half hour on each side. So… more like an hour and 20 minutes. Yes, it makes living in Baltimore and working in NYC reasonable, but not easy as "20 minutes" implies. Not to mention the difference in housing cost would have to support the cost of travel. Who knows what a single Hyperloop ticket will cost but a 3-digit figure wouldn't surprise me, especially during rush hour. You could be looking at $3-$4k/month for a daily commute (which granted, is not too far from the difference in housing costs between parts of NYC and parts of Baltimore).

Retric 9y ago
40min each way is a common commute. Living 5min from Baltimore hyperloop station would give you 15mim on the other side for a 40min overall commute each way. If you are saving 2k/month on rent you could pay up to 50$ each way and break even. Though, I don't know what tickets would actually cost, that not ridiculous.
- mcguire 9y ago
  5 min from the Baltimore station is a very small real estate market.
  - Retric 9y ago
    The limit on the number of hyperloop riders is probably a larger limitation. 0.6 miles radius = 1 square mile which could have 50,000+ people.
teej 9y ago
The thing is, the exact customer you are describing already exists and takes the Accela. And that trip takes 2 hours one way! Cutting that by 5x would be transformative. Plus, lots and lots of commuters in the del-mar-va area are already used to 120min+ round trip commutes and I imagine NYC/NJ commuters are similar.