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Elon Musk pitches 150 MPH rides in Boring Company tunnels for $1
Earlier in the evening Musk retweeted an LA Metro tweet that said it's coordinating with The Boring Company on its test and said the two will be "partners" going forward. Much of what Musk discussed about how his concept in-city Loop would work has been answered in concept videos and the company's FAQ, but he specifically said that the plan is for rides that cost a $1, and carry up to 16 passengers through hundreds of tunnels to those small, parking space-size tunnels located throughout a city.
The big problem is digging those tunnels to start with, and while part of the session included video of a speedy test run through the tunnel Musk has already dug on SpaceX property, the plan is to pick up the pace. Davis said Musk has challenged his team to match the digging pace of a snail (0.03 MPH), and get up to 1/10th of the average walking speed of a human at about 0.3 MPH -- compared to its current top speed of about 0.003 MPH.
Previously: Elon Musk Wants to be Boring
Elon Musk's Boring Tunnel Near Los Angeles
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 19 2018, @04:13PM (8 children)
16/car x $1 = $16 per trip and trips take 8 minutes.
Let's be optimistic and say the car loads/unloads in 2 minutes = 6 one-way trips/hour
6 x $16 = $96/hour gross revenue if every carload is full.
$96 x 24 = $2304/day, x 365 = $840960 per year is the max possible gross, but it's unlikely to be busy all night.
Now, how many millions will the tunnel, cars, software & maintenance cost? Pretty hard to see how this could operate without an enormous subsidy.
But then again, we know that Elon is very good at prying money out of government...
(Score: 3, Interesting) by BsAtHome on Saturday May 19 2018, @04:34PM (2 children)
That suggests you are looking at a half-duplex system.
Once you can do full-duplex, then the interval between cars can be f.ex. 1 min and running both ways. Then the gross would be $16819200 at continuous full load. Half the interval, double the gross.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 19 2018, @05:44PM
The truck stopped. A man jumped off from the back and ran over to the garbage bags on the side of the road. Working quickly, the man loaded all the garbage onto the truck and jumped back on. The truck then sped off to the next house. Anyone could guess this man's - Tommyson's - occupation; he was a trash collector.
Tommyson's job was rather mundane, but he had no complaints; it put food on the table, after all. As he was working through his normal routine, Tommyson spotted some garbage on the sidewalk that he could not ignore. The man, after having loaded the roadside garbage onto the truck, decided to do the community a favor and take care of the trash that polluted the public's infrastructure; he ran over to it.
When the man reached the sidewalk garbage, he immediately punched it and knocked it over. Screaming. The garbage screamed. However, Tommyson had no mercy to spare for trash like this that seemed to pollute everything around it, and so he violated her while his fists rained down on her from above. Every fist that slammed into the woman brought her closer and closer to True Silence. Then, finally, the garbage perished. Tommyson smiled and tossed the corpse into the truck, which promptly drove off.
A certain man received the 'The Trash Collector of the Year' award. Soon after, this man became known far and wide as 'The Proactive Garbageman'.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 19 2018, @07:42PM
I believe that full-duplex requires two tunnels. Once you have a tunnel for each direction, then you can "pipeline" and run multiple cars in each tube (at, for example, your suggested 1 minute headway/interval). This does require turn-arounds at each end, either a circular track, or a turntable -- more expense. Also, with more than one car at a time moving in a tunnel, any failure or accident will likely involve more than one car.
Since nothing is perfectly reliable, there will need to be service vehicles at each end that can pull disabled vehicles out of the tunnel and rescue the passengers. I helped design one of these for a rubber tire "train" that connects different parts of an airport--it was based on a Unimog truck that had been modified for 4-wheel steering to follow the guideway.
There is also the question of how many people need to get from LA to LAX (or between any two end points). This article https://www.dailybreeze.com/2016/01/26/lax-sets-record-for-passenger-volume-in-2015/ [dailybreeze.com] states there are 70+ million passengers a year through LAX (about 200000 per day), but of course most of them don't come from downtown LA, they come from all over the area.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by tftp on Saturday May 19 2018, @06:35PM (3 children)
The $96/hr will pay salary of only one lowly tech who will be servicing this line. If you double the rate - two techs. I doubt that this will be sufficient, as there no money left to even buy them a uniform, let alone some specialized inspection equipment that in itself has to be inspected periodically. But a transport system needs a few more workers, like cleaners, security. Spare parts are necessary. Management and finances can be shared among all lines.
In other words, Musk voices an unrealistic ticket price in well-founded hope that when the system opens, nothing can be done. It's a standard tactic of many construction projects that end up late, worse and expensive. Everyone can name a few of those.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 19 2018, @07:46PM (1 child)
Don't you mean three lowly techs? Or does Elon expect one tech to live down there and be on call 24/7? {grin}
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 20 2018, @12:51AM
(Score: 2) by canopic jug on Sunday May 20 2018, @09:39AM
The $96/hr will pay salary of only one lowly tech who will be servicing this line. If you double the rate - two techs. I doubt that this will be sufficient, as there no money left to even buy them a uniform, let alone some specialized inspection equipment that in itself has to be inspected periodically. But a transport system needs a few more workers, like cleaners, security. Spare parts are necessary. Management and finances can be shared among all lines.
Wait till you hear the rest of the pitch. It depends heavily on enforcing a gig economy model on the staff, each of whom will be an independent contractor supplying their own uniforms and anything else needed for the job out of their own pockets. They'll pool money every month to pay for inspections and spare parts.
Money is not free speech. Elections should not be auctions.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 19 2018, @10:34PM
Old Muskie is banging one Grimes per night, which is a pretty impressive accomplishment.