incredible to me that europeans are getting in on this grift https://twitter.com/MimiBilling/status/1310475034855645184

at least in America, "let's invent an entirely new technology stack for mass transport with benefits ranging from marginal to nonexistent" at least has the defence "well we don't have many trains so whatever we do has to start from scratch"

Americans are saying "should we buy a bike or a flying car, well, a flying car looks cool and the bean salesman says it will for sure deliver in the next 5-10 years!"

Hyperloop is one of those things that really exposes the failure of "tech" thinking. Like, have you seen a high-speed train? Have you sat down and read even the bare minimum of what it takes to enable movable-block signalling at 350kph? That is deep, deep tech my friend

A thing I'd forgotten until I went back and read my now-seven-years-old piece on why Musk's Hyperloop napkin sketch was nonsense is that the proposal was aimed at destroying real public transport from day one https://www.newstatesman.com/economics/2013/08/overhyped-hyperloop-elon-musks-plan-superfast-load-nonsense

Literally the very first document ever published about the Hyperloop was entirely about crushing support for California's high-speed rail proposal, from a man whose wealth is built on selling expensive cars to eco-conscious Americans

Hyperloop will never be a useful mass transit system, but it's doing its job without a centimetre of track being built, because its job is to offer politicians an excuse to scrap funding for railways

oh wait wait one last coda: you know the one thing hyperloop has going for it? its speed?

it's slower than trains. normal-ass trains.

it's slower than trains *from 1990*