Beautiful
Now, after Loop demonstrated vehicle rates that would beat most light rail projects and many subway systems too - assuming they get adequate automated larger vehicles - the criticism seems to be that it's not build out yet to a significant size, or that it has minor usability quirks.
I sure hope these people understand just how foolish that position risks to become if Boring Co continues good execution and build outs the entire system as planed.
A heavy rail subway line can transport 30,000+ people per hour compared to vegas loop which maxes out at 4500 people/hr. Plus every single Tesla in the tunnel requires a human driver, unlike trains. Even IF Elon managed to create these larger Tesla vans, they won't reach those numbers on a single route.
This was the original concept no? It seems like valid criticism that the original prototype is immensely inefficient and slow compared to something even remotely comparable.
> Now, after Loop demonstrated vehicle rates that would beat most light rail projects and many subway systems too
Genuinely curious where you’re getting this.
There is as yet no fire department vehicle that can enter the tunnel. And from here [1]
"Evacuation procedure basically consist of driving the car out of the tunnel, via the next station. If evacuation must be made in the opposite direction, the manual says the driver must await instructions from the OCC, as they are not generally permitted to drive in reverse."
[1] https://computer.rip/2024-08-12-a-pedantic-review-of-the-las...
Asserting that Loop is beating any form of normal rail is a wild claim that I don't think I've ever heard a transit engineer agree with.
In short, I'm not worried about Boring Co continuing good execution, but it would be nice to see Boring Co initiate good execution.
> it was claimed Boring Co has no chance of duplicating or significantly improving on the speed
The claim holds up. The article shows evidence that this is not faster than existing transport at all. It is in fact slower. How did you not read this??
> Now, after Loop demonstrated vehicle rates that would beat most light rail projects
They did not demonstrate this. Why put this lie out there?
> that it has minor usability quirks
Major usability problems. It is strictly worse than every existing transportation system.
(asking a bit naively, it's the first time I hear about it)
AVs in tunnels allow for a wide range of density from 2-seater to high density bus/train-car like vehicles that can convoy through tunnels but still do point-to-point and on-demand.
The main challenge is convincing the train-obsessed that 3d travel is better than 1d travel.
I suppose you do that by making the system as convenient and efficient (cost effective both for the operator and the users, energy efficient, good capacity, good speed, not more wasteful hardware wise, good longevity in the long run) as, or more than a properly setup train system?
Another commenter has a good point though, in a place that's not willing to invest in good public transport, there's a void to fill I suppose.
2. Aren't AVs suppose to greatly alleviate the traffic problem on existing roads since AVs can/will coordinate efficiently. I'm actually surprised that the loop doesn't operate autonomously and requires drivers
3. Wouldn't flying cars be the ultimate 3D model, as oppose to digging limited tunnels.
How many exit tunnels will need to exist for the final above-ground stage of the trip to be quick and not increase the total length of the route significantly?
If there are exit tunnels all over the place, how long would it take to build all of them? If there aren't, how do you avoid massive jams as the multiple lanes merge to the single exit tunnel lane?
How do all the exit tunnels connect to the surface streets in the many areas where there's no room for another lane to be built anywhere?
As for the idea of a convoy of magic cars, it’s a nice idea but I don’t think it holds up to actual math. Specifically, area used. There are plenty of variants of this graphic, and here’s a tongue in cheek one:
The fundamental issue is that individual low-capacity vehicles are large and use lane space inefficiently. Sure, perfect self driving might improve the situation, maybe by a factor of two or, extremely optimistically, a little more. But a factor of two isn’t really good enough.
Consider the 405 freeway in Los Angeles through the Sepulveda pass. It carries over 300k passengers per day (I’m not sure whether this counts Sepulveda Blvd as well, but, either way, we’re talking about 12+ traffic lanes), and traffic sucks. Maybe really advanced self driving could double capacity. Sticking a freeway lane in a narrow tunnel does nothing to speed it up or increase capacity.
In contrast, Wikipedia’s estimate of light rail capacity is about 8x as high for a rail track as compared to a lane of traffic. A single pair of light rail tracks could perform comparably to the entire Sepulveda Pass mess of roads. If actual intelligent, retroactive planning happened, there would be four tracks for one express and one local each way, New York style, and the whole assembly would be quieter, cheaper, far faster (at least during rush hour), and use massively less energy. But self-driving Teslas would not get most of those gains.
(E-bikes and the kind of culture that would get a hundred thousand or so people to ride them over the pass on their commute would also do the trick, but good luck with that. Although… the pass isn’t that long, and maybe Dutch-style levels of dedication to cycling might actually make it work. Los Angeles with real bike infrastructure would be quite a sight!)
Vegas has never had meaningful public transit investment, and a real subway would cost billions and take decades of political will that simply doesn’t exist here. The Loop fits the actual use case: moving convention attendees between LVCC halls and eventually casino properties, quickly, in a city where distances are deceptive and walking in 115° heat is brutal.
For that narrow purpose, point-to-point, climate-controlled, short-hop movement in a dense tourist corridor, it works reasonably well. The comparison to a subway is a bit of a category error; no subway was ever on the table. The real question is whether it beats surface-level shuttles and moving walkways, which it probably does.
The critique is fair though: it’s not scalable the way a subway is (throughput is limited by number of cars), and it’s privately owned infrastructure serving commercial interests rather than a public transit network.