Pipeline Mass Transit? 557
pipingguy writes "'Evacuated Tube Transport (ETT) is a new kind of transportation system that requires less than two percent of the energy of current transportation methods. It is also much safer, and can be faster. [...] Anyone can visualize 2 tubes (one for each direction) along a travel route. Air is permanently removed from the tubes; so travel takes place without friction. Pressurized passenger capsules (like a 2 - 8 person airplane cabin), travel in the tubes on thin steel wheels or on nearly frictionless Maglev. Airlocks allow access without admitting air to the tubes. Linear motors (as used on new rollercoasters) accelerate the capsules. During most of the trip the capsules coast; using no power. When the capsules slow down, linear generators recover most of the electrical energy used to accelerate the capsules.' Some CG images and drawings here, the FAQ is here." MSNBC had an article on monorails a few days ago. Don't bother making Simpsons jokes, the article has them covered already.
Hm (Score:2, Insightful)
From now on, we'll all travel in TUBES! (Score:5, Insightful)
Why, you ask? Not because it's not interesting and efective technology, but because we Americans don't like mass transit. We want cars. We have a *right* to cars. Look in the Bill of Rights. It's there. Or if it's not, I think it should be, so it might as well be there right next to my right to own a minigun.
Seriously, though, there are hundreds neat ideas for viable mass-transit available, but I'm stuck riding a 30 year-old, beaurocracy-lader system called BART to work everyday. That has, to put it mildly, soured my viewpoint somewhat. Until we remove the corruption that wil always accompany mass transit, we might as well forget about it.
A fascinating Idea... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Infrastructure. (Score:3, Insightful)
Which, of course, is why Chicago has never had a widely-used mass transit system consisting of, say, an elevated train of some sort.
I don't see why this sort of system couldn't be used to replace an existing one. Living in the Bay Area, however, I can testify that the major problem with mass transit isn't the technology behind it, but rather the corrupt, power-hungry shills who plan and execute it. Our BART system, for example, has been in service for something like 30 years and still doesn't run to the Silicon Valley or any of the airports.
The next step: (Score:2, Insightful)
I hope that by the 30th century, we too will have mastered the technology required to insert a human being in a vacuum tube without them exploding or asphyxiating
I see some errors in this reasoning (Score:2, Insightful)
"During most of the trip the capsules coast; using no power."
Um, no. It either has to be running on wheels or constantly supported by electromagnets the entire time. If the first, there is a constant requirement of energy to continue moving a massive object against ground friction. If the second, well, maglev isn't cheap. Even if, as suggested, "linear generators recover most of the electrical energy used to accelerate the capsules", that is certainly not a lossless process.
Second, how do you maintain a seal on a tube the length of a subway tunnel? That's a huge surface area, and not particularly easy to make either waterproof or airtight, even underground. And what happens if there is a breach in a passenger car? Your passengers will suddenly find themselves in an oxygen-less environment. Even a cabin depressurization on an aircraft at 10 km doesn't subject the passengers to total vacuum.
This proposal doesn't strike me as being fully thought out.
whooosh.. (Score:4, Insightful)
Can't say I'm sold into this... (Score:2, Insightful)
I can see it now. They'll get Gates to finance this thing (he just loves innovation, and giving money, doesn't he?). Now, he'll make them use Windows boxes for traffic control. Next thing you now, some controller downtown will get a blue flash on his face, and you'll find yourself in a cute little cylindrical coffin stuck in a tube-traffic jam, in vacuum, with 18 minutes of oxygen left and a real urgent need for a bathroom. You can say I'm old fashioned, but I'll stick to my bike for a while, thank you very much.
Maintaining the Vacuum (Score:4, Insightful)
personal rapid transit (Score:3, Insightful)
Note that for local transportation, the problem isn't speed but coverage. I can't realistically take public transportation to work because it would take me far too long to get to the nearest station and because trains take far too long to get to the destination (because of a lot of stops).
For local transportation, another concept makes more sense to me: Personal Rapid Transit [1] [cprt.org], [2] [washington.edu]. Personal Rapid Transit consists of small passenger cabins (1-3 people) that you call to the nearest station and take to the station nearest to your destination, almost like a taxi or chauffeur. And unlike evacuated tube transports, they do not require a lot of digging or construction.
And, politically, personal rapid transit seems more promising in the short term: it's something that can be done at the local level.
Several Comments (Score:5, Insightful)
Another thing is suppose one of the cars gets stuck. These things are going 300-4000mph in an environment that's supposed to be virtually frictionless. How do you stop all the other "cars" behind the broken one in time?
How gradual do the turns have to be? You can't exactly make a quick right turn at 300+mph and still have a comfortable ride. Maybe there will be no turns and it will stop every time it needs to change direction.
And doesn't this kinda remind people of network switches? Computerized management of "people packets" zooming through tubes?
Strange New World (Score:2, Insightful)
It was a transcontinental and transoceanic system that ran a mile or more underground. The system did not necessarily require a true vacuum, just enough to permit travel at Mach 2+. Once established the vacuum would be easy to maintain since their is very little air or other gases a mile down. The reason for the depth was that it eliminated the need to go around obstacles, just straight lines. Safety wise, it is similar to the Chunnel, with a smaller maintenance tunnel running parallel to the main tunnel which could be used for emergency exists.
How safe is it? Remember modern airplanes have similar problems at 40,000 feet. Outside temperature is -40, almost no air pressure, and a loss of power or structural integrity is almost always fatal. Your choice of asphyxiation or hyperthermia in 20 seconds!
All of it assumed that we would have nuclear powered tunneling machines that could allow the construction off a coast to coast tunnel in a decade. Basically you would take an elevator down to a subway station and travel from New York to Los Angeles in an hour.
Re:Um... (Score:4, Insightful)
How exactly does this qualify as pneumatic? I think this would be "anti-pneumatic" if such a term existed...
Pneumatic implies they are using air-pressure as the driving force. Most pneumatic systems (like money tubes at some theatres and large stores) actually suck air out, and as the air at the intake of the tube rushes to fill the vacuum, it has to push the capsule. This system talks about using evacuated tubes (ie: a vacuum), so that the capsules can travel with pretty much no friction. The entire tube system is a vacuum, so there's no suck and no blow; the actual driving force would likely be electric...
This is the most retarded idea ever (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Not much different than with a plane... (Score:2, Insightful)
Or, at the very least, God forbid let's say there was some emergency to do with cabin air when they were over water at least an hour out from any landmass. The plane could descend and as a last resort, crack a window or two (literally).
But this capsule thing.. No different from being out in space. If there's a serious problem with the system, such as the city suffers a power failure, like has happened to me once on the SkyTrain in Vancouver, or perhaps an earthquake kills the power station(s)... well... I sure wouldn't want to be in those little coffins...
Problems (Score:3, Insightful)
1. Cost. How much will it cost to put down those tubes everywhere, keep them vacuum, maintain them, etc? How much does it cost to manufacture a vehicle for this system? Is this all going to be cheaper than driving an automobile (especially in countries with lower fuel prices)?
2. Popularity. Although I don't know the situation in the rest of the world, I know that in Holland people prefer going to work by car over going there by train even if trains are cheaper, faster, more comfortable, safer, better for the environment, don't have parking problems, and allow them to do some work or socialize while traveling. For some, this goes even if the train stops just as close or even closer to work than they could part their cars.
3. Usefulness. A transportation system is only useful if it gets you where you want to go. How precise this needs to be depends on the distance traveled and the frequency of the visits to this destination. The greater the distance, and the lower the frequency, the more willing people are to use additional means of trasnportation to get to their destination. Since it would probably be impossible for this system to achieve anywhere near the granularity of the road infrastructure, it's use is probably for longer distances. There, it competes with cars, trains, and aircraft. This syste will never be able to beat the flexibility of cars, nor the speed of aircraft. Trains are higly impopular with travelers. What niche will this system occupy?
Just some thoughts...
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Caution: breathing may be hazardous to your health.
Mass transit costs not driven by energy (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:From now on, we'll all travel in TUBES! (Score:5, Insightful)
Looks like the busses here don't serve their passengers, but serve those traveling by car (by removing other's cars during peak hours).
So I use the car only because I may sometimes (3-5%) need it. If the bus was available (at least once an hour) anytime it is needed, I would not use my car and switch to bus.
I talked with American (car mechanic ironically) who just returned from a trip to Russia, and he was amazed by availability of all the options of mass transit - buses that go 24 hour a day, trams, trains that go to almost every town (and do this often and fast). He traveled by mass transit, and he traveled a lot. Tired after the plain, he was so annoyed that he had to drive 4 hours to his home town, instead of sleeping those 4 hours in the train :)
Re:don't mean to be a pessimist, but... (Score:5, Insightful)
- As you say, keeping the vacuum would be a significant problem, which conveniently is ignored in the writeup. Saying that, if a very gas impermiable material is developed the rate of gas inflow could be limited such that low level pumping would keep the systems stable.
- The idea that this company holds a patent is a bit of a joke. Anyone who wants to do something like this can avoid the patent, or invalidate it. Prior art is everywhere. Sounds like someone has convinced a VC to provide money on the basis that there is the potential to rake it in in future. That's good, nice to see something useful being done with the money, but god, I hate using patents to do it, it just brings the whole thing into disrepute.
- Terrorist action would be a significant problem. Take out one of these carriages and the fact that all the rest are close behind, travelling at 400-4000 mph, makes for a tempting target. The system is in no way robust enough.
- Construction costs would be MASSIVE. This thing has to be fairly straight and flat, otherwise the stress of the forces as these carriages 'go round the corner' will pull it apart. We are back to the situation of the railways. Laying two strips of metal is fairly cheap. Laying two strips of metal straight and flat, by cutting through hills and building viaducts is very expensive.
- The carriages are too small and cramped to be serious for travel. With so few passengers per carriage the cost of the upkeep and construction starts to dominate. Better to use a train concept, with large carriages and longer trains, and only a few with drive units etc.
Saying all this, there is a way that something related to this type of concept can be made practical - but it won't be in the US. Its much more likely in Japan or China.Re:personal rapid transit (Score:3, Insightful)
Except they don't. Read the hundred or so comments criticizing this idea on the grounds of practicality (that much vacuum is effectively impossible) and safety (that much vacuum is effectively a giant bomb).
As for personal rapid whatever you said, it suffers from exactly the same problem as all other rail-based transportation: there will always be many more destinations than there are stations. For the majority of the population, such a system would be an inconvenience at best.
Re:It will never happen (Score:5, Insightful)
Notice how "mass entertainment" in movie theaters is facing a challenge from the home theater trend. People are increasingly choosing to watch movies at home on their DVD players and big-screen TVs with surround sound systems. It puts the individual in control of geographic location of viewing, start time, end time, pausing, instant replays, volume, language, viewing angle, viewing chair/sofa/bed/carpet, lighting, smoking/non-smoking, drinking if you please, any food allowed, and countless other variables that affect the entertainment experience.
Intellectual Banking (Score:2, Insightful)
So no, I wouldn't expect to see any tubes erected by ET3. Now or ever. This is just another example of the deep flaws [quebecoislibre.org] in the patent system.
Re:Yeah, lots of people don't use public transport (Score:3, Insightful)
I can't do the math, as I haven't the figures available. I suspect you can't do the math either, as you don't quote any figures. :-) What I can say is that I've been to a number of countries that run very efficient public transportation (I'm especially thinking of the Netherlands, and the Amsterdam trams). India, Japan, northern Europe all have at least adequate public transport systems. You don't say how far Jersey City is from your fiancee, so it's hard to say if the train cost is reasonable or not. The question to ask is how much it would cost her, considering fuel and maintenance to run a car for that same commute each month (and don't forget parking fees, of course).
Now, your crack about the middle east is low. I like driving my PERSONAL automobile. It is gas fueled, but it isn't a gas-guzzling SUV....it's a VW golf, and it gets great gas milage. I'd use an ethanol-gasoline mix if I could buy it somewhere near me.
Nice car, I'm a big fan of the Golf (my advisor runs one). While you have a point that personal transportation is more useful in general than public transport (no schedules, service to everywhere there's a road, etc.), this doesn't preclude public transport at all. Most people put a large chunk (most?) of the miles on their vehicles going to work every day, and this ratio likely increases if one works in a city one can't afford to live in (working in NYC, living in Jersey). Use public transport during the week, drive to your vacation paradise in your gas-electric hybrid on the weekend...
Public transport, when properly executed, doesn't just cut on gas usage, but also smog, noise and traffic. It puts less strain on a city's infrastructure (bridges, tunnels, parking ramps, &cet.) And it also encourages slightly more walking, which is vastly better for the population for other reasons.
Your point about Amtrak is well-taken, but I don't see it as particularly relevant. Do most roads pay for their own maintenance? Isn't that what part of a state's gas tax goes towards? Aren't there Federal highway subsidies? Toll roads may mitigate the cost of upkeep, but I hardly think they are self-sustaining. Why should public transport networks be less worthy of tax dollars? Why a different standard, especially given the health and environmental bonus?
For examples, New York has an adequate public transport network, and Washington D.C.'s is absolutely first-rate. So, it can be done, at least on an intra-city level. Most of America's public transport problems come from attitude, not because the concept is inherently unworkable.
Cheers,
The Mouser
Re:It could be practical for sending materials (Score:3, Insightful)
The fact is, speed doesn't kill, acceleration kills. Especially sudden deceleration. That's why the Apollo astronauts were able to reach the Moon in just a matter of days. By going very fast.
Re:From now on, we'll all travel in TUBES! (Score:4, Insightful)
I remeber one morning walking to vauxhall train station to get the train to victoria and seeing cherie blair (the pm's wife) walking to to train, and she was pregnant at the time, and had just 1 unarmed bobby (uniformed police officer) with her, and he was just escorting her till she got on the train.
Thats the big difference, in the UK public transport IS just how you get from one place to another, not a social idelogical or ecological choice, and thats the way it should be.
Screw travelling in tubes, point to point transport, high speed transport is not what you need. What you need is a broad interconnected, slow safe and frequently opperating network.
Re:From now on, we'll all travel in TUBES! (Score:3, Insightful)