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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: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 20 2018, @01:45PM (1 child)
> Then a third pulls in and must stop behind the second, even if the first cart has already left.
Thanks for the summary, all good as far as it goes. But you are a using a linear or serial model based on one track (in each direction). Since these are "cars" that run on a fairly normal flat road and not "trains" on tracks, there is no elevated platform and additional cars pulling into the station can just pull up alongside other cars. As soon as any car is full (or full enough, off-peak) it can leave at any time, as long as it leaves suitable headway between cars. If any station gets too busy, just dig some more and make it wider.
Separate question, what are typical loading and unloading times on the London Underground?
(Score: 2) by Nuke on Tuesday May 22 2018, @10:48AM
London Underground trains can have doors open for as little as 10 seconds if there are not many passengers around. OTOH at a busy station in the rush hour it could be a minute, or more if there is a total log-jam of passengers. It is this time that is the main limit on the service frequency, which is typically 2 minutes on busy stretches, although I have seen as little as 90 seconds - ie the next train is pulling in as soon as the previous has left the station.
Good point about the parallel "roads" in the station, although it is nothing to do with whether it on rails or not, or whether there are raised platforms or not. Parellel roads are used at both busy conventional railway stations and at road bus stations. But it does add a lot to the expense of the station in terms of surface land area or underground tunnelling. Under London it is difficult to find more subterranean space these days with so many existing tunnels, sewers, cable tunnels and tower block foundations, and I guess it is similar in many other cities.