The Boring Company, founded by Elon Musk, aims to transform transport in our cities by making roads "3D" with new sled filled tunnels.
The tunnels are intended to first be used in conjunction with high speed sleds on which cars would be parked. The sled with the vehicle and passengers on top of it would be lowered to the tunnel network, and then whisked off at 125mph to their destination, as can be seen in this video below:
According to The Boring Company, current soft soil tunneling machines travel 14 times slower than a snail. Thus, it wants to make a new tunnel boring machine that will be powered by electricity, and will be faster and cheaper by a factor of at least 10, compared to current technology. On a lighter note, Musk mentioned that the machine"s goal is to race Gary the snail, its new mascot.
The company argues that this new tunnel system will reduce traffic congestion by adding lower layers to our traffic networks i.e making them "3D". It also claimed this means of transportation may even be better than flying cars, which may be noisy and vulnerable to weather conditions.
The tunnels will initially be used for sleds and may then be expanded to link up with the Hyperloop system, also proposed by Musk. However, the video provided does raise some questions, such as speculation as to whether there would be enough of them to really make a dent in the traffic situation.
This is yet another bold move by Musk who recently announced plans to connect the whole world to high speed internet through a series of satellites along with sending rockets to Mars in 2020. He is also making serious waves in the auto industry with his ever faster Tesla electric cars.
Sources: International Business Times | Images via Tech Crunch and Market Watch