Nope. No
flying cars, like in “Blade Runner 2049” movie. But before we get started...
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Problems with traffic congestion.
As we know,
there are a lot of people in the world, especially in metropolises and big
cities. We are developing, we are moving a lot from one place to another. For
this purpose, very often people mainly take the car as a form of transport,
because it is convenient and fast. However, such thinking does not really work
in a big city and causes traffic congestion.
Los Angeles authorities complains about traffic
jams.
LA is the
most populous city in the American state of California. The metropolitan area
of City of Angels, inhabited by 15 million people, has been recognized by INRIX
(global company that specializes in connected car services and
transportation analytics)
as the most congested city in the world. According to the report, a statistical
driver from the City of Angels spends 104 hours a year in traffic jams, and spends
unproductive time and consumed gas costs $2,408.
A vision to deemphasize cars - Mobility Plan 2035 created by authorities of LA
- Driving
on bus lanes will be allowed for cars with more than 1 passenger,
- additional
charges for using roads during peak hours,
- making
work hours more flexible,
- expansion
of public transport and promotion of alternative ways of moving around the
downtown (bike, scooter),
- construction
of a light city railway network to the airport.
Elon Musk’s crazy idea - underground transportation
tunnel.
Elon Musk
announced some time ago that his company called Boring Company has an idea to revolutionize
transport in cities around the world. Now, this idea comes into effect. The
first tunnel officially opened in December 2018 in LA.
The
construction of the first episode of The Hawthorne Tunnel consumed 10 million
dollars. Elon Musk, at an almost half-hour speech before the official opening,
explained that the amount could have been much higher if traditional methods of
drilling were used - he mentioned about 1 billion dollars. The tunnel, whose
current length is 1.83 km, will allow traveling at speeds of up to 250 km/h.
That’s impressive!
Tesla
through the tunnel traveled the entire section indicating the counter only 56
km/h. However, it is not surprising. This is the first venture of this type and
there is nothing to rush - security is the most important thing. Elon Musk,
however, ensures that the tunnel as well as a specially designed driving system
allows for the development of speeds planned at 250 km/h. Journalists who had
the opportunity to take part in the show pay attention to the not very
comfortable journey - mainly due to the car being torn in the tunnel itself.
Is this the future of transport?
In my
opinion – yes. This is a whole new, amazing idea. We have to wait a dozen years
to make it happen true. The representatives of Elon Musk are convinced that a
network of such solutions can allow to completely eliminate the problem of
traffic congestion in the Los Angeles. In the future, these tunnels are to be
built in other cities, but first in LA.
Questions for you:
1. What is your point of view about the
Mobility Plan 2035 created by the LA
authorities?
2. What do you think about The
Hawthorne Tunnel built in LA?
3. Would you like to see flying cars in
the future? How do you imagine them?
Sources:
Comments
2. I can’t imagine how should it work. In order to make this convenient the web of such tunnels would have to reach a lot of places, and the way those cars are entering the tunnel seems to be very inefficient. In overall the idea is very interesting, but I fear that it is too expensive to build the sufficient amount of tunnels.
3. For now, flying cars sounds like an extremely dangerous idea, but in the future, it would be awesome to see something like this. I imagine that such cars would have to go along predefined tracks in order not to collide with each other, or a sophisticated route planning device would have to be used. Anyway, I think that manual control of such car is not an option.
I completely agree with you about that authorities should not ban cars at certain places. Certainly car is a very good, comfortable and flexibility type of transport. With the car you get comfortably and everywhere.
You know, traffic lights are not everything. Condition of roads, position of the intersection, frequency of traffic and all these factors cause traffic congestion to a lesser or greater extent.
About flying cars... Song of future, right? :D But it is not impossible.
And yes, manual control is bad idea in flying cars. Certainly, there will be AI which will control driving vehicle, detecting and avoiding collision tracks choosing routes accordingly.
2. I think The Hawthorne Tunnel in LA is a great idea how deal with traffic. But is it a great idea for ecology? I understand that traffic on the ground is also not the best situation for ecology, but is it better to heat the Earth even deeper?
3. Of course, I would like to see flying cars! But the main idea how to make it fly is also matters. If it will be based on magnetism, it may cause problems with electricity, but any way it sould be something very very interesting
2. I think there are cheaper ways to deal with this problem. I respect the ideas of the visionaries very much, but I do not fully understand where the money is. The construction of a tunnel under the city, especially in that geographical area, seems very expensive and who would pay for it.
3. An idea from the 1960s. Over the years, some have not changed and time has shown that this is not possible. The technology of course allows you to make such a construction. I have private pilot licenses and I know that it is not possible to share the possibility of flying for most people. Such vehicles would have to be autonomomic and besides, the cost of getting up into the air is much higher than the savings resulting from the time saved.
I think that a plan presented by Elon Musk is really interesting and government should invest in it.
2. What do you think about The Hawthorne Tunnel built in LA?
I saw it earlier in one of Casey Neistat's vlog and it was really interesting to see because I saw something like that for the first time. I think its really good but it will be hard to make it work for that many cars.
3. Would you like to see flying cars in the future? How do you imagine them?
I always imagine them as a small ships similar to this in star wars but more like normal cars with a trunk and so on. I think they can be really helpful to travel but having in mind people that cant drive on a normal road I guess it might be a total disaster and it should be really hard to pass a "flying licence" to fly one of this machines.
Why do you think that underground tunnel is bad idea for ecology? Could you explain that?
But yes, I agree with you, that US government should invest in his plan.
Haha, interesting theory about flying cars, nice.
Don't you think that flying cars could be fully automatic with detecting collision tracks? Of course this is more safe.
I think their ideas are good but not so cutting-edge. They are quite obvious, maybe except for driving on bus lanes. But it's fantastic to see that LA's authorities try to make the situation better, I appreciate it.
2. What do you think about The Hawthorne Tunnel built in LA?
In my opinion it's a brilliant idea and it's even better when we see that this is already done (not in 100% but still, it's real not only some imaginary concept). I really respect people like Elon Musk who not only come up with ideas but also use his resources and knowledge to make it real and push the world forward.
This way of transport could be a problem solver but they have to implement it in a rational way, what's not that simple.
3. Would you like to see flying cars in the future? How do you imagine them?
I don't know if I like to see flying cars in the future. Maybe because I'm afraid of flying... ;d
But if the whole transport moved to the sky, we would have more space on the ground.
I also agree with other comments that driving such cars manually would be a disaster, so I could only imagine it when they were autonomous.
2. I like it. I would like to ride it.
3. I would like to see them and fly them. Unfortunately, it seems to me that they bring a mess.
This can be a good solution not only for LA, but for many cities where there is a problem of traffic jams.
2. What do you think about The Hawthorne Tunnel built in LA?
You need to use all possible space to reduce traffic will not only underground tunnels but also ground.
3. Would you like to see flying cars in the future? How do you imagine them?
I would very much like to see flying cars, I hope I will be able to fly it :D
At the expense of the tunnel, I have mixed feelings, since I understood that there might be a little cars going there at one time and I’m not sure that it would greatly reduce the road congestion. But if they approach this idea more carefully and refine it, then maybe everything is fine.
I still can not imagine the era of the flying cars. And even if in the coming years someone develops it, it will not soon enter into mass consumption.
Tunnel is a good idea but I asume that vehicles inside will be controlled by computer ? Beacause we can't alow people to drive theirs own car with 250 km/h it will led to massive catastrophe if just two vehicles will have and accident.
I dont see flying cars in the nearest future, I think maybe in 2100. But from what I see now humanity is not prepared for air traffic.
This plan is not only good for LA but also any other big city which faces traffic jam problems.
2. What do you think about The Hawthorne Tunnel built in LA?
I think it can be a good idea to some extent but it needs some sort of strong law regulation because as we saw many times in the past, car accidents in tunnels are very dangerous and usually lead to a big death toll.
3. Would you like to see flying cars in the future? How do you imagine them?
No. Car is a car. I guess that if we consider a “flying car” project then we can assume that by that time aviation industry will be developed enough so that everybody would accept the price of the ticket so the “flying car” will be redundant.
I think instead of thinking how to transport faster on man at a time in his car, even if it is electric, is the less efficient way to solve the problem. We need to ban cars in downtown, and make people to use public transport. Of course this solution needs improve of public transportation, and in LA it's just cannot be made. Because Americans and cannot give up their cars and divide their vehicle with someone else.
2. What do you think about The Hawthorne Tunnel built in LA?
As for know those tunnels are really slow and people that was on presentation told a lot about this was really shaky, and if they would go faster it can be dangerous, despite I really like Elon Masks ideas, I think that to make transport better, people should use personal vehicles less.
3. Would you like to see flying cars in the future? How do you imagine them?
No I wouldn't like that. Because I don't want to have vehicles dropping onto the city.
I will keep my fingers crossed for you to able to flying car :D
I believe that any change can lead to something good. We must remember about the environment because it is thanks to him that we live. The idea seems to be ok.
It seems to me that it must be difficult for drivers. I do not think I have an opinion.
It would be nice to see flying cars. The only picture that comes to my mind when thinking about this is the Jetsons flying cartoons.
It makes for a great example on how to approach life especially if you are "rich" he saw a problem, and went on to solve it instead of avoiding it, and thats how everyone with means to do so should approach problems.
When it comes to its usability, if enough tunnels get created that could offload a lot of traffic to underground.
When it comes to flying cars im not excited to see them, but undoubtfully those would solve some of our traffic problems.
The idea of The Hawthorne Tunnel sounds really interesting, but there are so many unanswered questions. What does it take to ride?, How many rides can be done per hour? I think there are better and cheaper ways to deal with traffic jams.
Flying public transport would be cool. I always imagined flying cars with pre-defined multi-levelled tracks like those in the “Fifth Element”. But I don’t think letting everyone flying manually is a good idea.
I believe that the introduction of flexible working hours and alternative ways of public transport will enable us to fight and reduce the traffic jams. However, this will not eliminate traffic jams completely, but it will reduce their intensity.
2. What do you think about The Hawthorne Tunnel built in LA?
This is one of the great ways to deal with traffic congestion. Unfortunately, I do not understand why the decision was made to create an underground tunnel. The cost of such a tunnel is very high, and we know the above-ground transit tunnels, which are built above ordinary streets and perform very well.
3. Would you like to see flying cars in the future? How do you imagine them?
See the flying car would be great, but I think we should not call it a car then :P I also think that a very specialized education would be needed for such transport. In addition, an accident involving such a car can be much more tragic than it is today.
The Hawthorne Tunnel build in LA is also such a great idea. I can't imagine that it comes already, but it is really interesting and useful thing. Thanks to guys, how are taking care of our life and making it easier to live in.
I can imagine flying cars all over the city, but i can't imagine how it will be organized in terms of roads, traffic lights. We have some kind of limits on the roads, walls, building, road marking, but how we can implement those things to the air space.
I think that it is a really good idea and agree with a majority of proposed points.
2. What do you think about The Hawthorne Tunnel built in LA?
It is crazy, but great idea that can solve all the problems with traffic in big cities.
3. Would you like to see flying cars in the future? How do you imagine them?
Of course I would like to see flying cars! In my imagination the look like typical cars, but instead of wheels they have airscrews.
2. I think it's always good to search for new ways to upgrade anything in the world. In my opinion sending all or most of cars underground would open cities for people also some space could be reshape and add additional infrastructure like parks or bicicle roads.
3. Yeah! I would love to see flying cars right from the movie "Blade Runner". But in my opinion more realistic vision is fully automatic transport system. Populate cities with hamster ball like vehicles that would works as taxi and took people all over the place.
About ecology I mean that a lot of organisms are leaving in the ground and we have already changed their environment a lot and want to change it even more.
Seems good, but i think need to do something like driving on bus lanes will be allowed for cars with more than 3 passenger, and do in some area or firm some thing like take a way to home, because some people who work in one building can live on one street, and thay can pick up and dont ride one by one
2. What do you think about The Hawthorne Tunnel built in LA?
it’s strange i think we need to wait and look how will be it
3. Would you like to see flying cars in the future? How do you imagine them?
i image that it will be like in film 5th element or Blade Runner
All of point of this plan are able to solve traffic problem during peak hours.
For me Hawthrone tunnel are suboptimal solution. I don't thik tkat expensive construction of underground tunnels could be effective solution of traffic problem.
I can't imagine flying cars. I think teleportation would be the best.
2. I think the idea is amazing, it seems very expensive but if we compare it as Elon Musk said to the prices of a regular road suddenly we realize that the price difference isn't that big when considering all the extra work that needs to be done for a tunnel like this to be built. I am looking forward towards seeing how this project is going to grow in the future.
3. I think it would be cool to experience and see that but as Mr. Musk mentioned- it wouldn't be very practical.