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> In theory, this elevated tube system could be built for a tenth of the cost of high-speed rail and a quarter the cost of a freeway. How are they planning to
by yread 13y ago
> In theory, this elevated tube system could be built for a tenth of the cost of high-speed rail and a quarter the cost of a freeway.
How are they planning to build evacuated tube with magnetic rails for 1/10th of a price of railway?
- InclinedPlane 13y agoIt's not an evacuated tube, Musk has said so explicitly on more than one occasion. Also, the Hyperloop system is still extraordinarily expensive, characterizing it as "1/10th as expensive as a railway" is misleading. It's, potentially, 1/10th as expensive as the ludicrously expensive California high-speed rail system which comes in at an astounding $68 billion just to connect San Francisco and LA. Which might be more than the entire TGV system cost to construct, for that matter. It's certainly several times the cost of the channel tunnel, for example.
- guynamedloren 13y agoYeah, I've been following the project and have noted this as well. Curious that they calling the project Evacuated Tube Transport, though...
- InclinedPlane 13y agoThe hyperloop is a different concept than the one used by ET3, which Musk is not affiliated with.
- arrrg 13y agoWhy is it so expensive?
- InclinedPlane 13y agoCalifornia politics.
- jffry 13y agoLand rights. High-speed trains cannot travel in tight turns, so to build SF<->LA requires pretty specific right-of-way purchases.
- InclinedPlane 13y agoNope. Total cost of lease/purchase of all land in the right-of-way is estimated at $1.5 billion for the initial operating section and $4 billion (inclusive) for the full phase 1 system (this is only about 6-7% of the total cost), by far the biggest expenditures are for construction and in operational overhead.
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
- tempestn 13y agoThe article doesn't do a good job of making the distinction, but there's a big difference between an evacuated tube and an excavated tube. In the first case, you lay a tube along the ground and suck all the air out. In the second, you have to dig a tunnel underground. Also as mentioned by others, Musk is apparently not talking about an evacuated tube, but it looks like ET3 is. (Unless the quote from Musk was actually that it's not a tunnel, in which case maybe he was making the same distinction.)