

How human mobility has changed over time, distance and energy use - sien
http://thebreakthrough.org/index.php/programs/economic-growth/cars-and-civilization

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thret
"Because the maglev system is a set of magnetic bubbles moving under the
control of a central computer, what we put inside is immaterial. It could be a
personal or small collective vehicle, starting as an elevator in a skyscraper,
becoming a taxi in the maglev network, and again becoming an elevator in
another skyscraper. The entire bazaar could be run as a videogame where
shuffling and rerouting would lead the vehicle to its destination swiftly,
following the model of the Internet."

Well, I have to say I love that image. A national, physical implementation of
something like TCP/IP.

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golergka
Very interesting read. However, I was a bit disappointed that it didn't take
neither cost nor flexibility of transport mode. Airplane tickets are much more
expensive than a car trip, and road network is much more dense than railroad,
airport or maglev is or ever will be.

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qwerta
> Airplane tickets are much more expensive than a car trip

In Europe it is opposite, thanks to petrol taxes and road tools, flight is
often cheaper than car, and always cheaper than train.

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gambiting
Flying from my city in Poland to where I live in the UK costs me 50-100
pounds,depending on the time of the year. Taking a car costs 300 pounds in
fuel alone + ~150 pounds to take the ferry across the sea. Of course the car
works out better than plane if you have it filled with people,but that is not
always the case.

>>and always cheaper than train.

That is the only thing where I will disagree with you - Europe is not one
large country with the same rules everywhere. In the UK trains are absurdly
expensive and sometimes it's cheaper to rent a car, fill it up,drive to where
you need to be and back than to take the train. But again, in some countries,
like Poland, the trains are state-owned and cost tiny sums(taking a 2 hour
journey costs literally a pound, taking the longest, 10 hour journey from the
mountains to the seaside costs slightly more than 10 pounds).

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golergka
But that's just for you, alone. If you would travel with family, the picture
would be the opposite.

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qwerta
There is interesting picture of hyperloop in article:
[http://breakthrough.turing.com/images/elements/A26.jpg](http://breakthrough.turing.com/images/elements/A26.jpg)

I wonder, why not just build regular bullet train? 380 miles seems like ideal
distance. 1:30 minutes (center to center) would be great improvement. And it
could be done in a few months.

