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L.A. to S.F. in 35 Minutes? Might Not Be a Pipe Dream

L.A. to S.F. in 35 Minutes? Might Not Be a Pipe Dream

L.A. to S.F. in 35 Minutes? Might Not Be a Pipe Dream

The man behind SpaceX and Tesla wants to shoot travelers in tubes that travel over 750 m.p.h.

Even though the state of California is in the early stages of construction for a high-speed rail system connecting Los Angeles and San Francisco, plans are afoot for something even faster.

Elon Musk, a co-founder of innovative companies like PayPal, SpaceX, and Tesla, has another passion project: super-fast public transportation. Musk is spending millions researching his HyperLoop concept, which would carry people between cities in elevated tubes. The pressurized capsules move at over 750 miles per hour thanks to a combination of factors that include magnetic technology and compressed air.

Graduate students at the University of California, Los Angeles are now helping Musk develop the system. Musk and his team seem very confident that the system would work, carrying people the 380 milies between the two West Coast cities in a little more than 30 minutes. Current drive-time is about six hours, while high-speed rail will get people there in two hours and 40 minutes.

“[Hyperloop] could be very easily put together," Hyperloop CEO Dirk Ahlborn told CBS Los Angeles. "It’s more about figuring out how to make it a good business."

The biggest impediment may be financing; it would take about $16 billion, and a decade, to make the project a reality. But if a lack of political will or battles from locals make an L.A. to S.F. route impossible, the group said they're interested in other routes like L.A. to Vegas, or one even outside the country.

Advocate Channel - The Pride StoreOut / Advocate Magazine - Fellow Travelers & Jamie Lee Curtis

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Neal Broverman