Passenger Trains > Elon Musk's Boring Company Ghosts Cities Across America

Elon Musk's Boring Company's proposals do not come to fruition in several cities, but continue to be active in other cities.  

The following article was originally published in the Wall Street Street, but is available through MSN and there should be no paywall.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/travel/news/elon-musks-boring-company-ghosts-cities-across-america/ar-AA14EscC

I'm pretty convinced that this Boring Company is only meant as a fake flashy attention-getting deception to true transit projects in the same way that Elon's Hyperloop was a Trojan Horse trying to derail the CAHSR project a few years ago.

https://jalopnik.com/did-musk-propose-hyperloop-to-stop-california-high-spee-1849402460

Unless those vehicles traveling underground in those tunnels are high-density multipassenger vehicles (um.. that kinda sounds like a train, eh?), there is no way that the Boring Company or the Hyperloop can have the people hauling capacity of your average subway train at commute time.
Hyperloop and the Boring Company are just smoke and mirrors.. Just MHO.. and it seems to be so in real life too:
https://www.theverge.com/2022/11/3/23438755/elon-musk-hyperloop-tunnel-spacex-remove-parking-lot

Cheers,
Harry
 

> Hyperloop and the Boring Company are just smoke
> and mirrors.. Just MHO..
> Cheers,
> Harry

So the Las Vegas system of ever expanding tunnels
is smake and mirrors?

https://thehill.com/changing-america/resilience/smart-cities/3526289-elon-musks-boring-company-to-expand-underground-tunnels-in-las-vegas/

As for Hyperloop - sure seems a lot of entities have
invested millions, if not soon to be billions on systems
around the world - freight first, perhaps, but a few
passenger routes are still in the works, notably, in
India and Dubai.

https://www.reportsanddata.com/blog/top-10-hyperloop-technology-companies

/Mitch

 

The idea was rotten to begin with, just wait until there is one incident requiring an amergency response inside one of those tunnels and the whole concept will get shut down for good. Getting cities like Vegas to pay tax money for what is essentially an exclusive express lane for the rich is the peak of pro innovation bias.

Musk seems to be in crazy self destruct mode these days...so I'd say all bets are off on  lot of things.    Hopefully he wont screw SpaceX and Tesla.

Mgoldman Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> > Hyperloop and the Boring Company are just smoke
> > and mirrors.. Just MHO..
> > Cheers,
> > Harry
>
> So the Las Vegas system of ever expanding tunnels
> is smake and mirrors?

Ha! Let's see... original proposal and claim was automated mutli-person airport shuttle-like vehicles. Actuality is a tiny tunnel with regular cars driven by drivers at 30mph - but with color changing LED strips! That's connected to a company that's sold people "Full Self Driving" for (now) $15,000 while failing to ever deliver anything close to what they claim. In this case, they can't even automate cars in a short tunnel.

Then, the original tunnel was something like .9 miles between two points you could walk indoors. The moment any line formed the advantage of taking it is gone, if it ever was there in the first place. 

 

The most important flaw in his company was the simple fact that he couldn’t make the tunnels as cheaply as he claimed. He vastly underestimated the complexities of working in the subsurface (groundwater, formation collapse, tunneling through different materials using a single approach). All of these are deal killers, and in some cases potential people killers. 

Engineers and geologists have have been doing this stuff for centuries, and most of the ones I know thought this was a dumb idea. Despite the fact that we’d make a bit of cash doing it. 

The Boring Commpany bilked Ft. Lauderdale out of a train tunnel to help Brightlind and got them a mostly useless vehicle tunnel to the beach instead.

As far as Hyperloop, isn't Elon on record saying that it was just an attemtp to stop CAHSR?

Edit: Already noted above



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/01/22 06:37 by portlander.

I never saw any consideration of emergency access for the tunnels.
Life safety design criteria would have controlled a lot of the design and therefore the cost.
Even for freight/express there would have to be air exchange for maintenance and repair personnel to work in the tunnel, or on disabled vehicles.
Musk, like former President Trump, is an excellent promoter, both know how to get media attention and simply talk past techical or factual issues to the people who want to believe.
I, too would like to believe that useful tunnels could be punched through the earth with ease and economy.
But I have been inside one of the BART Berkeley Hills tunnels during construction and worked in many other transit and conventional RR tunnels and think I grasp the situation better than Musk does.

rgzfan Wrote:
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> Three Words: Chicago Tunnel Company
>
> Five More Words: Chicago Great Flood of 1992

It was not the tunnels that caused the flood but the careless driving of piles for bridge protection in the Chicago River.

The tunnel system served adequately for its original purpose for many years. It is still in use for utility conduit packages.

Posted from iPhone

Really, is "Elon Musk" even his real name? 

RRBMail Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Really, is "Elon Musk" even his real name? 

Yep. He was born in South Africa. His mom is Maye Musk who still is a model and she's in her 70's.

In my opinion, Musk, as far as public works go, will turn out to be one of America's great Flim-Flam men. He has all the signs.   

Wow  this really got the TO ranting crew upset. 

rgzfan Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Yes, I'm aware. 
>
> kevink Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > rgzfan Wrote:
> >
> --------------------------------------------------
>
> > -----
> > > Three Words: Chicago Tunnel Company
> > >
> > > Five More Words: Chicago Great Flood of 1992
> >
> > It was not the tunnels that caused the flood
> but
> > the careless driving of piles for bridge
> > protection in the Chicago River.
> >
> > The tunnel system served adequately for its
> > original purpose for many years. It is still in
> > use for utility conduit packages.
> >
> > Posted from iPhone

Tunnelling for passenger and freight rail systems in North America dates to the Staple Bend Tunnel opened in 1833 for the Allegheny Portage Railroad in Pennsylvania.  Why are you singling out Chicago Tunnel Company and the 1992 flood and how are they relevant to any of the Boring Company's proposals or endeavors?



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/02/22 18:38 by RuleG.