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Transportation

Elon Musk's Boring Company To Build High-Speed Transit Tunnels in Chicago (chicagotribune.com) 179

Posted by msmash from the up-next dept.
Chicago has picked Elon Musk's Boring Company to build a futuristic transportation link to the city's airport, The Boring Company said late Wednesday. "We're really excited to work with the Mayor and the City to bring this new high-speed public transportation system to Chicago!' it said in a statement posted on Twitter. Chicago Tribune: Autonomous 16-passenger vehicles would zip back and forth at speeds exceeding 100 mph in tunnels between the Loop and O'Hare International Airport under a high-speed transit proposal being negotiated between Mayor Rahm Emanuel's City Hall and billionaire tech entrepreneur Elon Musk's The Boring Co., city and company officials have confirmed. Emanuel's administration has selected Musk's company from four competing bids to provide high-speed transportation between downtown and the airport. Negotiations between the two parties will ensue in hopes of reaching a final deal to provide a long-sought-after alternative to Chicago's traffic gridlock and slower "L" trains. In choosing Boring, Emanuel and senior City Hall officials are counting on Musk's highly touted but still unproven tunneling technology over the more traditional high-speed rail option that until recently had been envisioned as the answer to speeding up the commute between the city's central business district and one of the world's busiest airports.
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Elon Musk's Boring Company To Build High-Speed Transit Tunnels in Chicago More

Elon Musk's Boring Company To Build High-Speed Transit Tunnels in Chicago

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  • Just to head off the inevitable... (Score:5, Informative)

    by Rei ( 128717 ) on Thursday June 14, 2018 @09:32AM (#56782806) Homepage

    This is for Loop, not Hyperloop.

    Think SkyTran, but faster and underground. And with both passenger capsules and car capsules.

    Also, to anyone who doesn't know how Boring Company is working to reduce tunneling costs... Link [youtu.be].

    • This is for Loop, not Hyperloop.

      /quote>

      This is really just Hype . . . plus a Loop . . . so therefore, it really is a Hyperloop.

      We'll see how the stock market reacts to the Hype.

      • Re: (Score:2, Informative)

        by mspohr ( 589790 )

        A few things. The Boring Company is private, no stock, funded fully by Musk himself so no stock, no stock hype.
        The Boring Company actually builds tunnels, not hype. The LA tunnel is ready to open.

    • I have a better idea... (Score:5, Funny)

      by Viol8 ( 599362 ) on Thursday June 14, 2018 @10:06AM (#56782978) Homepage

      How about you join a load of larger versions of these vehicles together (perhaps 100 people per vehicle, 10 vehicles in total) and call it , I dunno, a "train" maybe? Then put it on steel rails to reduce rolling resistance and hence energy consumption and make it powerful enough to get to 100mph (I've heard strange rumours that in france trains can do over 200mph, but no, that much be witchcraft!), then run each "train" at a 10 minute headway and guess what - you transport far more people! Its obviously a crazy idea, but you never know...

      • You've missed the point... see, the internet is like a series of tubes... or tunnels

        • Trains are slow and expensive. The Boring company won this contract because they offer something faster and cheaper.

          It is easy to be snarky, but Elon has a long history of actually doing what he said he was going to do. If we are going to fix the world's problems, then transportation needs to be transmogrified. Boring machines are way better than they were a decade ago. It is time to start using them to build stuff.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by haruchai ( 17472 )

            "Boring machines are way better than they were a decade ago. It is time to start using them to build stuff."
            Are they really? How so?
            Let's hope they pay attention to safety. One collapsed tunnel and they'll have dug a grave.

            • I believe there's essentially 2 main approaches they are proposing to take to make boring faster.
              1) Smaller diameter. Because the amount of spoil is a squared function of the diameter, a reduction in diameter helps a lot.
              2) The traditional machines bore a section, then stop to put in the tunnel lining. The proposal is for continuous boring, with tunnel lining put in whilst the boring machine is still propelling itself forward.

              They also propose to create the tunnel linings on site, using the spoil material c

              • Re: (Score:3)

                by djinn6 ( 1868030 )
                I saw a documentary about continuous boring years before Elon "invented" it. They used pre-fabricated concrete panels that gets attached to the walls as soon as the bore head goes past it. Another documentary I saw had them spraying fast-curing concrete instead.

                As for using materials from what was dug up, that really depends on what you're digging through. If it's mud slurry, you're going to have a big problem trying to turn it into concrete.

                • Who are you quoting with the "inventing" in quotes?

                  Musk is not an inventor. Who's saying he is? He is what he says he is - an engineer. And engineers construct from existing technologies and improve them.

                  And there's plenty of value in that. The Slashdot hive-mind is fucking ridiculous with this stupid idea that nothing ever has an value if there was prior art. There's always prior art.

                  • Re: (Score:2)

                    by djinn6 ( 1868030 )
                    Plenty of value in... doing exactly what other people are already doing? I mean, I don't see how he's improved anything. Maybe there is value in creating more competition, but any other company could've done the same.

            • "Boring machines are way better than they were a decade ago. It is time to start using them to build stuff."
              Are they really? How so?

              Modern TBMs have better materials for the cutting face, and automatically adjust alignment. Smaller TBMs, used by hyperloops, are much more cost effective than big TBMs used in railroad or highway tunnels.

              Let's hope they pay attention to safety. One collapsed tunnel and they'll have dug a grave.

              Smaller diameter tunnels are inherently safer.

              Any way you look at it, this is superior to a train. Faster to build, faster to run, cheaper, safer.

              The naysayers' arguments are basically:
              1. This is new and different.
              2. This isn't the "Chicago Way"
              3. I don't like Elon Musk.

        • Oh no see you've got it all wrong, in post-post-Net Neutrality America of 2018, you Base Monthly Fee only buys you limited access to the tubes; if you want access to the tunnels, too, then you have to pay an extra Tunnel Subscription Fee.

      • Re:I have a better idea... (Score:5, Insightful)

        by Applehu Akbar ( 2968043 ) on Thursday June 14, 2018 @10:26AM (#56783080)

        The fundamental problem with subway trains is that because they hold a large number of passengers they have to stop at every station. This limits the number of stations each line can have.

        I can see a market for small, autonomous vehicles that behave like elevators operating horizontally, so they only need to stop at stations where someone needs to get on or off. In this usage there would also have to be 'step aside' capability, allowing multiple cars to operate on one line by being able to pass stopped cars. It would then be feasible to have a hundred tiny stations on your subway line, each one being nothing more than an elevator lobby with a short hop to the surface. An automated system could optimize travel so that each passenger would experience no more than a few sops on the average trip.

        • It still has to load and unload passengers plus luggage. The larger the capacity the longer that turnaround time takes.

          • Re: (Score:3)

            by mspohr ( 589790 )

            Not if the loading is done "offline". Small vehicles can be quickly loaded (or even slowly loaded) then shuttled into the main tunnel.

        • The fundamental problem with subway trains is that because they hold a large number of passengers they have to stop at every station. This limits the number of stations each line can have.

          Yes, this is an annoying limitation. You could solve it simply, however...

          I can see a market for small, autonomous vehicles that behave like elevators operating horizontally,

          Sure, that's called PRT. But why not just use trains? You eliminate the engine (and the driver) and control all train cars from a central location. The cars are smart enough to do certain things on their own, like safely approach a leading car and couple to it, or decelerate and stop at a siding once sent to it. Put motive force and energy storage on each car, with each car strong enough to push or pull at least one other car so you c

          • As soon as you have multiple 100-passenger cars, you're back where you started with conventional local subways that have to stop at every station. Surface trains can at least have stops off the mainline for local vs express service, but doing this underground in the conventional way is expensive and takes up too much space.

            Musk's 16-passenger single car is basically an enlarged elevator car, and an ideal size for the service I have in mind. It could have a few fold-down seats around the walls, but rides wou

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by swb ( 14022 )

          The fundamental problem with subway trains is that because they hold a large number of passengers they have to stop at every station

          I don't claim to be a mass transit expert, and the proof is getting on a NYC 6 express when I should have paid more attention and gotten on a 6 local.

          As it turns out, express trains don't stop at all the stations.

          The real complication seems to be that adding an express line to a route means you need an extra set of tracks since the express is bound to pass the local at some point and this is a problem if you didn't dig the tunnel with this in mind.

          • This is what I mean when I cite the conventional surface train approach to offline platforms. Underground, you can afford the space and extra tunneling this requires on only a few crowded big-city lines. Having elevator-sized cars that are able to slide perpendicularly into an "elevator lobby" doorway at stops gives you offfline stops and bypass capability without all the extra space needed by bypass trackage and/or dedicated express tracks.

        • Maybe subways as designed today are obsolete. It is worth trying a very different approach in New York City. [theatlantic.com] If the idea works in Chicago, it may work on a larger scale in NYC.
      • note that Musk is promising 100 MPH on the loop. they believe that they will be doing closer to 200 mph.
        And as others pointed out, the train is inefficient. It is fine if you are going 500 miles with no stops, but when going under 30 miles and with multiple stops, the train, like LRT, is a horrible choice. OTOH, if you can get in a small pod and travel at 100-200 mph and go from start to destination directly, it is far far more efficient than a train.
        This is even more true in a tunnel. With above ground

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Viol8 ( 599362 )

          "And as others pointed out, the train is inefficient. It is fine if you are going 500 miles with no stops, but when going under 30 miles and with multiple stops, the train, like LRT, is a horrible choice"

          What a load of crap. Clearly you don't live in a large city with a metro and have probably never even been on one. They work extremely well, far better than a few hundred "pods" would.

          "OTOH, if you can get in a small pod and travel at 100-200 mph and go from start to destination directly, it is far far more

          • I live in Highlands Ranch outside of Denver. We take the LRT and regularly it takes LONGER than the roads. Why? Due to large numbers of stops esp in short periods.
            Here is the map. [rtd-denver.com] Look at the bottom right and follow e line. 18 stops. Roughly 20 miles. It takes 40 minutes for what I can drive AND PARK in 20 minutes. [rtd-denver.com] That is inefficient.

            Now as to drag, the faster that you, the more that aerodynamics figures in. BUT, travelling at an average of 30 mph, like the LRT (20 miles in 40 minutes), means that a

            • Some modern commuter systems use regenerative braking and feed energy back into the power grid while slowing down, so there's not necessarily all that much waste.

              Power required due to drag, OTOH, is proportional to the speed *cubed*. And you additionally have to multiply that by the number of pods vs. one train.

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by Ichijo ( 607641 )

              Your map doesn't specify which stops are express stops, so it must be incomplete because only a total idiot designs a train system with all local trains.

              • there is no express. It stops at ALL STOPS, ALL THE TIME. That is why it is a horrible mistake.
                Heck, it would make sense to have an express, but in typical LRT they did not design it that way. In addition, it would make sense if for events, when they end, if outbound trains would turn to express, stopping at a couple of stops along the way, but continues to hit them all on in-bound. BUT, they do not do that.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by ( 4475953 )

            If Musk's plan includes autonomous PODs without drivers then the OP seems to have a good point, not "crap" at all. Small pods can overtake each other, stop anywhere, leave out stops, go on parallel lanes, take different crossroad tunnels, etc. The possibilities are mainly limited by the money to build the tunnels. Trains were built so one human driver could transport the maximum number of people and good at the cost of flexibility. With autonomous steering, this concept is obsolete.

          • Clearly you don't live in a large city with a metro and have probably never even been on one. They work extremely well, far better than a few hundred "pods" would.

            Take Sacramento light rail, since I've ridden it. To go from Folsom to Downtown takes about 50 minutes via train, or 20 minutes to drive. That's the best case direct route. If you have to transfer to a different rail line, it'll take you 90 minutes to go a distance you could've driven in 20. Why? All the stops. Can it work out better for you if y

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by Ogive17 ( 691899 )
              Japan does well with their express trains that skip a majority of the stops on longer routes. They cost more and the tickets often sell quickly but it can cut hours off commute time per week, depending on how far you must travel.

              • Japan is one of the very few places on Earth with a sufficient number of huge cities close enough to each other. That's why high speed rail has been so successful there. It doesn't mean it can be applied to most of the planet.

                • Re: (Score:2)

                  by Ogive17 ( 691899 )
                  Why not? I cannot think of a reason express routes cannot be created in certain large US cities, especially when a new line is in the process of being created.

                  An express line does not have to move any faster than a normal train, it just does not stop at every station along the way. Simply have a way for the train to get around any stopped trains and everything else is simply scheduling correctly.

                  I think the biggest concern in the US would be having trains actually run on time.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by mspohr ( 589790 )

        There already is a train to the airport. It's slow and difficult to access.
        But thanks for the idea, anyway... whatever... go back to your basement.

      • Great idea. And we'll just increase the tunnel diameter from 14ft to 21 feet. What's that tunneling complexity increases exponentially based on diameter?

      • You can take the Blue Line from Clark and Lake to O'Hare, but it's going to take close to an hour. It's only 15.5 miles from Block 37 to O'Hare; a pretty short trip at 100mph.

        Travel times by car can be even longer; you can look at historical travel times at travelmidwest.com. It's not uncommon for it to be a 2+ hour trip in the winter.

        The location seems slightly odd to me since it's in a business district. It is only two blocks away from City Hall though and there's an underground pedway.

    • Re:Just to head off the inevitable... (Score:4, Interesting)

      by vtcodger ( 957785 ) on Thursday June 14, 2018 @12:12PM (#56783844)

      Nobody seems to be mentioning the fact that boring a tunnel in Chicago may not be entirely straightforward. Anyone who has driven through Chicago on Interstate 80/90 may have noticed that it runs through a huge quarry (the Thornton Quarry) in Silurian Limestones/dolomites. That rock is a lot harder than the Tertiary dirt formations Musk has been experimenting with in Los Angeles. I'm sure that they allowed for the geology in putting together their bid, but it's not like the Boring Company has a vast body of experience to build on. There's also the problem of having to not damage existing infrastructure (water lines, electric cables, etc).

      It'll be interesting to see if they get things right on their first real try.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by sphealey ( 2855 )

        The Metropolitan Sanitary District of Chicago (now the Midwest Water Reclamation District - I liked the old name better) was during the 1970s and 80s the world's leading user of tunnel boring systems for non-train-tunnel purposes such as the gigantic (wait for it) Deep Tunnel Project. They were a consultant to Fermilab on that organization's Superconducting Supercollider bid which involved a circular tunnel 100 miles in diameter. There's plenty of experience in Chicago in building and operating large dee

    • I have a suggestion. Dig a tunnel under Lake Michigan at my hometown of Ludington, Michigan to Wisconsin. In the middle dig another tunnel perpendicular to this one. Above that tunnel put several windmills. The first tunnel would have the transmission lines to either side for the electricity produced by the windmills. The second tunnel would be used to pump air into it when there is excess electricity produced. When there is a need for electricity and little or no wind than the compressed air would be

  • We're really excited to work with the Mayor and the City to bring this new high-speed public transportation system to Chicago!'

    How can they be excited, since they work in a Boring company ?!?
  • Comment removed based on user account deletion

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by jbengt ( 874751 )
      Don't worry, Musk will keep costs down by using innovative subtractive 3-D printing technology to make the tunnel.

  • Bit low capacity (Score:4, Interesting)

    by AC-x ( 735297 ) on Thursday June 14, 2018 @09:45AM (#56782854)

    The Chicago system is expected to be able to handle nearly 2,000 passengers per direction per hour

    Capacity's a bit low, isn't it? That's the equivalent of something like a conventional metro train running once every 30 mins...

    • Or something.

      Quite why this is better than a train that could also do 100mph (yes, amazingly there are such trains Elon, they even run in tunnels too!) which could carry 100x the number of passengers at a time is anyones guess though it probably has something to do with clueles politicians thinking they're being On Message which this expensive sci-fi BS.

    • I'm not sure that it's too low, because this is just servicing O'Hare.

      The interwebs tell me that O'Hare hits just shy of 80m passengers per year. Lets say a quarter of the passengers use this, that's 10m. Per day that's about 27,000 passengers. Lets assume that they're concentrated during the roughly 12 daylight hours - that's 2,300 per hour. And since it's listed at 2,000 per direction each hour, and O'Hare passengers are counted coming or going, that puts us around half capacity on average.

      Lots of spitbal

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by jbengt ( 874751 )

      Capacity's a bit low, isn't it?

      Considering O'Hare gets around 60,000,000 passengers a year, 2,000 an hour would be a good hunk (maybe 25% on average). And many of the 60 million passengers are making connecting flights and many others not going downtown.

      What I don't get is the need. You can already get to O'Hare on the Blue Line for $2.50 and about 40 minutes; or take the Metra, which costs more and has fewer trains, but is more comfortable and faster, or drive; or take a taxi, Uber, Lyft; or take a l

      • Are the factoring in all those folk's luggage? Load/unload time is important and I don't see that mentioned. Oh wait, this is Elon Musk. Makes sense now.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by mspohr ( 589790 )

          Not a factor because the loading is done "offline". When the vehicle is loaded, then it enters the main tunnel.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Rei ( 128717 )

        "40 minutes" is greater than "12 minutes".
        The bid had a requirement that any proposal has to be cheaper for passengers than a taxi, Uber or Lyft.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by bigpat ( 158134 )

      The Chicago system is expected to be able to handle nearly 2,000 passengers per direction per hour

      Capacity's a bit low, isn't it? That's the equivalent of something like a conventional metro train running once every 30 mins...

      A bit low if they need to transport more than 2000 passengers in each direction per hour. Or just right if they need to transport 2000 or fewer passengers per hour. Or overkill if they need to transport substantially fewer than that amount. All depends on the forecast usage which can also be limited by limiting supply.

      These are numbers that apparently the government was comfortable with when determining this as the winning bid and putting together the requirements.

      The goal of transportation planning isn'

  • Airport connectors are almost always a boondoggle. I dislike boarding a shuttle bus to connect to the airport as much as anyone else, but it's infinitely cheaper, more adaptable, etc than building a crazy above ground or below ground, permanent, Disney-style train.

  • needs stops at cumberland / Rosemont (river road) For local (non airport) express traffic to the big parking lots.

    • we already have that, it's called the Blue Line. heh.

      Really just need to make a set of express rails for Blue Line, no need for tunnels and no need for Musk. In some places the 2nd lines would be up in the air over grade track, which of course is how most the CTA train tracks are anyway, it's 125+ year old proven Chicago tech, we're good at it.

      The stupidity and waste of this proposed project is unbelievable.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by sfcat ( 872532 )

        we already have that, it's called the Blue Line. heh.

        Really just need to make a set of express rails for Blue Line, no need for tunnels and no need for Musk. In some places the 2nd lines would be up in the air over grade track, which of course is how most the CTA train tracks are anyway, it's 125+ year old proven Chicago tech, we're good at it.

        The stupidity and waste of this proposed project is unbelievable.

        Clearly you have never taken the Blue Line. Widening that elevated track would be quite expensive, especially in Chicago and especially on the public dime. Think multiple times the cost of the big dig in Boston. While this might not be the best application/location of this type of transportation, if you are doing it in Chicago doing it privately this way might be the only possibility.

        • you're funny, I live here, have lived here over half a century. take blue and other lines all the time since childhood. would NOT need to widen the portion of blue line that is underground downtown for an express line. that would be above ground and same cost as any other elevated track (and might not even be necessary to build much new track if joined and run around loop with other lines)

          there are already multiple existing plans for doing this over the decades by the way. I'm old, I've seen them

  • Alts for O'Hare-Congress Line? Like express tracks or full under ground?

    They can have better speeds by just bypassing stations as is used to have A/B stations on that line.

    An small build out by added some more 3rd track parts / more X overs even better. Use the 3rd tracks / X overs to hold local trains to let an express pass.

    Now if they go under ground use the room to add lanes to kennedy expressway Like the pre CTA plan for the road.

  • 18 mile loop 150 mph (Score:3)

    by trb ( 8509 ) on Thursday June 14, 2018 @10:53AM (#56783200)

    They say 18 mile loop, but I think they mean 18 miles one way. At 100 mph it's 12 minutes. At 60 mph 18 minutes. I don't see the point in making it go 100 mph plus, to save 6 minutes. It would be different if the trip took hours.

    • Throughput. 18 miles each way in a systems they call "Loop" as opposed to HyperLoop or TheLoop.

  • Autonomous 16-passenger

    That's not going to fly in Chicago. If nobody is going to be in the train running it, there's going to have to be an employee sitting in a room monitoring a screen for every active train. The transit unions won't have any of this "autonomous" nonsense.

  • This seems to be all very mundane. They are going to make tunnels, which are well understood. Then they are going to put something in the tunnels. From TFA, that something is not anything crazy. For a system like this, there's no reason the capsules can't be automated as long as sensible safety precautions are taken, which are also fairly well understood. It's a closed system so there are no external conflicts to be managed. And if the fancy-ass capsule system doesn't work as expected, it can drop back to a

    • Not sure how easily the tunnel could be repurposed, since a single path for the bulk of the distance each way with branches off the main line, in a small diameter tunnel isn't really universal infrastructure.

  • Well, I use to live along the blue line between the loop and O'Hare, and I would welcome the new system. What people don't realize (that haven't ever taken that trip), is that blue line Loop to the airport is between 45-50 minutes one way. Faster and cheaper than a taxi during rush hour, but still slow. They say the target ticket price is $1, but I would gladly pay double or triple the L fare to get there in the 10-15 minutes.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by AC-x ( 735297 )

      Or just add a little extra track at stations to the blue line to allow for express trains...

  • Comment removed based on user account deletion

    • I would reject it.

      It shows the short sighted stupidity of Chicago (and cook county for that matter) not having long term revenue sources.

      Chicago already have sold off other assets for short term book balancing that would have provided many times the revenue for OVER A CENTURY. It's disgusting.

      The mayor of Chicago is one such idiot, that sawed off incompetent runt Rahm Emanuel.

  • Was anyone at the handshake event for this? Were they able to tell if folks broke out into song singing the praises of the monorail... err.. ahh.. "loop train"?

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]

  • The city's so far in debt that they're staving off a Detroit incident by a degree measured in angstroms.

    And they're going to spend out for this? What IS it about the problems of public transit that politicians just don't understand?

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