# hyperloop hype scale back....as I predicted

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hyperloop-hype-scale-back-as-i-predicted/774019>\
**Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\
**Created:** [December 6, 2016, 2:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hyperloop-hype-scale-back-as-i-predicted/774019 "2016-12-06T14:23:52Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 5\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Sigene](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/df788c/32.png) [@Sigene](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sigene)\
**Post date:** [December 6, 2016, 2:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hyperloop-hype-scale-back-as-i-predicted/774019/1 "2016-12-06T14:23:52Z")

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I’ve been pretty negative about the hyperloop hype, and if I did a search on my posts, I’m sure I predicted that the original specs would be scaled back

Now instead of +700mph its defaulted to 200mph in this piece

> **[Staying in the loop](https://news.wisc.edu/staying-in-the-loop/)**
>
> What’s the future of high-speed transportation? A team of UW–Madison students thinks it’s on the right track — actually, more of a tube — with Badgerloop, a 200-mph pod that levitates its passenger through an above-ground vacuum tube.

Great engineering problems and solutions, excellent learning for these young engineers, though

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**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\
**Post date:** [December 6, 2016, 2:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hyperloop-hype-scale-back-as-i-predicted/774019/2 "2016-12-06T14:36:48Z")

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I’m surprised anyone considers the Hyperloop practical with jetpacks just around the corner.

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**Author:** ![naita](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/naita/32/5862_2.png) [@naita](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/naita)\
**Post date:** [December 6, 2016, 3:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hyperloop-hype-scale-back-as-i-predicted/774019/3 "2016-12-06T15:01:10Z")

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> [@Sigene](#):
>
> I’ve been pretty negative about the hyperloop hype, and if I did a search on my posts, I’m sure I predicted that the original specs would be scaled back
> 
> Now instead of +700mph its defaulted to 200mph in this piece  
> [Staying in the loop](http://news.wisc.edu/staying-in-the-loop/)
> 
> Great engineering problems and solutions, excellent learning for these young engineers, though

You’re seriously referencing the speeds achieved in a student competition project as evidence that a speculative technology with several multi-million dollar projects under way is being “scaled back”?

I’m not saying any of those big players are going to launch 700 mph vehicles right off the bat, but the fact that relatively small players are participating already at 200 mph is clearly not evidence of anyone’s reduction in ambition.

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**Author:** ![Aquadementia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aquadementia/32/555_2.png) [@Aquadementia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aquadementia)\
**Post date:** [December 6, 2016, 9:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hyperloop-hype-scale-back-as-i-predicted/774019/4 "2016-12-06T21:46:37Z")

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Now it only goes from inside the bank to your car.

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**Author:** ![usedtobe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ec9cab/32.png) [@usedtobe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/usedtobe)\
**Post date:** [December 7, 2016, 1:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hyperloop-hype-scale-back-as-i-predicted/774019/5 "2016-12-07T01:26:22Z")

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I am old, so I have info/theories/data points which precede the Web.  
Hard to believe, isn’t it?

Anyway:  
Ca 1830, it was accepted fact that the human body could not go faster than (something on the order of) 19 mph.

This was the limit of this new-fangled “railway”.  
And the thought of building tracks all over Great Brittan was preposterous on the face of it.

An 1830’s era engineer would never have even guessed that trains would go 100+ mph on rails laid through mountains.

Will future people look at the relatively rudimentary attempts at pressurized transport inside tubes as toyed with at “the turn of the last century” as we look at the earliest steam locomotives?

Elon Musk has had some great ideas - PayPal, SpaceX and Tesla Auto. I don’t want to bet against Hyperloop just yet.