Based on some notes I made during a presentation at the NSW Infrastructure Projects Conference in Sydney this week.
Rapid ground transportation will change the way we work and live. Fast trains (say 150-250km/hr), very fast trains (say 300-550km/hr) and hyper fast “trains” (to say 1200 km/hr), the latter getting you CBD to CBD between Sydney and Melbourne in about 40 minutes.
Hyperloop is apparently a cross between a Concord, a rail gun and an air hockey table ... a series of independent mag lev pods operating within a closed vacuum tube ... requires virtually no new technology ... it is an amalgam of existing technologies ... proof of concept has been achieved on a 500 m long test track and there are about four countries/cities vying to host the initial operating project.
The near vacuum means a Hyperloop pod can reach incredible speeds at amazing energy efficiency. It has acceleration equivalent to a Boeing 777. The closed loop means no weather impacts. Travel is so fast it is literally cheaper to go around obstacles rather than though them.
There isn’t a Hyperloop industry anywhere yet in the world, but it is apparently closer than we might think. An Elon Musk concept. Virgin Atlantic is now a strategic partner looking into taking cutting edge engineering to a global passenger service.
Hyperloop is being positioned as the lowest cost form of transport over the distance. It is scalable, with 50 person pods able to autonomously operate with 3 seconds separation. There can be point to point travel on demand, with switching to different tube lines.
Hyperloop travel could enable the development of super regions (let imaginations flow on this).
The infrastructure is relatively small diameter, light and can run above median zones on motorways and dual carriageway roads, requiring minimal land acquisition and causing minimal ground surface impacts. An elevated “gasless” pipeline. Because of the vacuum and the mag lev, it is possibly remarkably quiet.
Apparently it is lack of government support not technology or funds holding things up.
Dream to game changing reality in potentially under a decade, starting from 2013?
Regional development ... a Sydney/Melbourne urbanisation buster?
