At about three times the speed of a bullet train and about half the speed of a speeding bullet, the hyperloop concept for mass transit has found a new firing range.
Hyperloop Transportation Technologies announced on Thursday that it has secured space in Slovakia. From there, the company will settle on a route to run its hyperloop concept, "which later is planned to be connected to Austria and Hungary," said the company.
For those who haven't heard of hyperloop technology, and for those unsure, it is what they think it is and it is exactly what it sounds like.
Much like the tube shuttling deposits and deposit slips between cars and teller, the concept of hyperloop technology is based on the same principles of pneumatic mass transfer. But instead of sending container to and from via a sealed tube, a couple of startups are researching and developing means to move people in the same manner.
The tube could move people and goods at speeds of up to 760 mph, which is about 8 mph shy of the sound barrier.
"A transportation system of this kind would redefine the concept of commuting and boost cross-border cooperation in Europe," said Vazil Hudak, the Slovak Republic's minister of economy.
Elon Musk, the genius behind Tesla Motors' electric cars and private spaceflight firm SpaceX, first proposed the idea of hyperloop technology back in 2013. Musk has had his hands full with commercializing space and revolutionizing the automobile industry, so he urged someone else to take up the hyperloop concept.
"The Hyperloop (or something similar) is, in my opinion, the right solution for the specific case of high traffic city pairs that are less than about 1500 km or 900 miles apart," Musk reasoned back in 2013.
For distances greater than 900 miles, supersonic air travel would be more feasible, he said. Hyperloop technology would be the fifth form of transport "after planes, trains, cars and boats."
About three years later, progress continues to be made in making hyperloop transport a reality. But still, these efforts still face challenges such fleshing out designs and having a regulatory framework on their feet.
