Elon Musk's Boring Company has completed the first 'segment' of a tunnel in LA

[CK_John]

http://www.wired.co.uk/article/elon-musk-tunnel-boring

It all started with a tweet. Elon Musk proclaimed at the start of the year that his new

venture, a tunnel boring machine, would start digging "in a month or so" – and he's already made good on his word.

In fact, Godot, which is Musk's name for the giant tunneller, has started digging in Los Angeles. In a tweet, the entrepreneur said the "first segment" of a tunnel has been completed in the state.

So far, he hasn't revealed details of how long the tunnel is, where exactly it's located, or how deep the machine has dug. But the first stage of digging in LA does follow "promising conversations" with the local Mayor Eric Garcetti. Garcetti has suggested that tunnel digging tech improvements, including those being created by the Boring company, could make it possible to create an express line to LAX airport from LA’s Union Station central ground transit hub. These express links would fall in line with Musk's vision for
the project.

[Lee-Lee]

1. How does nobody know where or how much?

If your tunneling under a major metropolitan area that requires tons of permits, environmental studies, safety inspections etc that will all be public record.

You can’t even dig a tunnel out in the middle of Montana as a commercial enterprise without complying with a lot of different regulations and requiring lots of permits.

Somehow I suspect this is like his “flamethrower”- a ton of hype around something that is far less than it is billed and hyped as being.

[CK_John]

2. There was a vote yesterday to split Caliform into 3 states

was that hype???

[Lee-Lee]

3. Not sure what that has to do with the subject at hand

But there actually wasn’t a vote yesterday, so if you are claiming a vote happened that would be, in fact, hype.

[CK_John]

5. Voted to put on Nov 6, ballot.

as a controversial plan to split the Golden State into three new jurisdictions qualified Tuesday for the Nov. 6 ballot.

(Jon Schleuss / Los Angeles Times)

If a majority of voters who cast ballots agree, a long and contentious process would begin for three separate states to take the place of California, with one primarily centered around Los Angeles and the other two divvying up the counties to the north and south. Completion of the radical plan — far from certain, given its many hurdles at judicial, state and federal levels — would make history.

[Blue_Adept]

8. It wasn't voted to be put on the ballot

It had enough signatures to get on the ballot.

[Codeine]

10. We don't "vote" to put things on a ballot.

Whackadoodles and cranks can collect signatures to have initiatives added to the ballot. No “voting” is involved.

The initiative has little chance of passing, and even if it did both legislative houses would have to approve it, which isn’t happening.

TLDR; hype.

[LanternWaste]

16. Proof-of-concept constructs are rarely hype.

As per the story...


"Musk's initial digging is taking place on private land but if the project gets to a stage where it expands, permissions will be needed from planning authorities."

Further, in April, an LA City Council committee approved permits for excavating Elon Musk's 2.5 mile long proof-of-concept tunnel along Sepulveda. The Public Works and Gang Reduction Committee reviewed and approved it.

Proof-of-concept constructs are rarely hype. They often precede massive engineering projects.

[MineralMan]

4. I'm not using any tunnel in the Los Angeles area.

Not a chance. No matter how well engineered it is, earthquakes are incompatible with tunnels.

[CK_John]

6. It will go faster than earthquakes.

[MineralMan]

7. Very doubtful, I think.

When the "Big One" hits, it will go nowhere any longer, I'm quite sure.

[Codeine]

11. That statement makes less than zero sense. nt

[A HERETIC I AM]

20. Depends....

on whether or not you are stoned.

[Blue_true]

14. Another thing about LA.

The area has lots of abandoned petrochemical wells, some with explosive gases trapped in them. I hope that Musk has a plan to deal with any that his boring machine comes across.
The Bay Area has earthquakes, but BART has ran there for decades. Trains stop for a bit after a quake, but service resumes.

[brooklynite]

9. ...and today he's getting a contract to build HS transit from Chicago to O'Hare.

[CK_John]

12. Its 700mph from NYC to Wash DC.

[Codeine]

13. No high speed rail even gets close to that speed.

No idea where you got that figure from but it’s nonsense.

[CK_John]

15. Read More:

https://www.dezeen.com/2018/02/20/elon-musk-boring-company-receives-permission-start-digging-washington-dc-new-york-city-dc-hyperloop-tunnel/

Dan Howarth | 20 February 2018
10 comments
Entrepreneur Elon Musk has been given written permission to begin digging a transportation tunnel in Washington DC, which could eventually facilitate a 29-minute journey between the capital and New York City.

Musk's infrastructure firm The Boring Company now has the paperwork to start work on a Hyperloop transport link in the US Northeast, after receiving verbal government approval last summer.

The permit, issued in November 2017, allows preliminary tests and digging on the site at 53 New York Avenue NE in Washington DC – close to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives and next to a McDonald's restaurant.

Hyperloop could eventually connect America's Northeast corridor

The currently empty plot could eventually become a station for the super-high-speed transit line, which is planned to connect DC, Baltimore, Philadelphia and New York City.

[Codeine]

17. That article doesn't say anything about 700mph.

Tests have been run at just under 200moh, and the projection is a half hour from DC to NYC. That’s around 450mph, which Would be a world record, and still well short of your claim.

[CK_John]

19. It would still be a fast train, I hope I live long enough to go to WashDC in 30min.

[Codeine]

21. Then why would you say something

patently ridiculous and then try to argue about it?

And you wonder why people don’t take you seriously.

[miyazaki]

18. When he made the comment of public transportation and serial killers

I dared to mention to myself that the chances of being crushed in one his machines was probably greater than falling victim to a serial killer.