When was the last time you thought of how great it would be to teleport somewhere? “Forget driving home in that mess, I’ll just teleport it instead. Shooop.”
Don’t lie and say you have never thought of it, because we know better. At some point in everyone’s life teleportation has been an object of deep desire. It’s faster, it’s easier and you get to bi-pass all the stress of modern-day travel. What could be better? Unfortunately, we haven’t gotten to that point yet. We could sit here all day and daydream about it, but the fact of the matter is we still have to get in our car and weather the traffic storm on the highways every day.
It is that ever-present dilemma that prompted Elon Musk, the co-founder of Tesla Motors and founder of SpaceX, to propose the Hyperloop– a rapid-transit system designed with the intent of transporting people, vehicles and freight between Los Angeles and San Francisco in just 35 minutes.
The Hyperloop
If the Hyperloop actually goes into production, people could travel the nearly 400 miles between the two cities in just 35 minutes- a trip that normally takes five and a half hours by car. To top it off, traveling with a car in the Hyperloop may be possible as well. That right there could end vehicle transport for good! If there really was a tube that made that trip nearly 6x faster, then chances are no one would be looking to ship their car by transport truck. In comparison to the Hyperloop, auto transport by truck- a service that today some don’t even know exists- seems antiquated and time-consuming. To top it all off, Musk proposes the Hyperloop cost just $20 for a one-way ticket.
So how would it actually work?
According to Tesla Motors, the Hyperloop would be a low pressure tube that transports pods at low and high speeds, albeit subsonic. If the Los Angeles-San Francisco tube works out, Musk proposes linking other pair cities as well at even farther distances such as New York and Los Angeles. Long-distance tubes would have to go at a much faster pace, but by then we are sure Musk will have that all figured out. If we see the Hyperloop come to fruition, it will be considered the fifth mode of transportation, behind planes, trains, boats and vehicles.
Musk has stated that new modes of mass transit, such as the new California “high speed” rail, don’t really solve the issues we are facing with transportation. If we are going to spend money on anything it should be: safer, cheaper, faster, more convenient, immune to weather, self-powering, resistant to earthquakes and not disruptive to those along the route.
He makes a great point. Can you think of any mode of transportation that currently fits within these qualifications? …neither could we. Musk predicts that the Hyperloop will be up and ready in about 7 to 10 years. “I’m not going to make a ton of money on this, but I would like to see it come to fruition,” said Musk.
Moving Like the Jetsons
Another proposed creation that could completely change the face of auto transport as we know it is Lockheed and Martin’s car-transporting drone for the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). Though it was designed for use in the military, if it is successful we can see it being used for consumers as well. The drone is called the Transformer TX and is currently in the process of having its design finalized before heading into the prototype phase. That said, it looks like this idea may actually turn into a reality.
The idea behind this one sprouted from DARPA looking to acquire a military-ready flying car. This takes us back to our daydreaming again, this time about the flying cars in the Jetsons. The design started out at first as a sedan-like vehicle with an attached propeller on top like a helicopter and wings like a plane. As the idea continued to grow, it turned into an “unmanned vehicle that can carry cars and other similarly sized objects.” The vehicle could even transport cars full of people. Cars or cargo would have to be secured to the drone, but at drop off the drone could simply land, drop the cargo and take off again. You can see how something like this would be convenient for the military- and the general public as well.
We’re thinking something like this could easily change the face of public transportation in just a few years time, too. While both of these proposed inventions could put an end to the auto transport industry as we know it, we are still excited to see what happens with their production. Even we can admit that a Hyperloop transporting people and cars from LA to San Fran in just 35 minutes is more than just convenient- it’s awesome. Plus, anything that can change things for the better is good in our book.
