This Los Angeles company says its version of Elon Musk’s Hyperloop will be running by the end of the decade

At the planet Government Summit locked in Dubai, breathtaking technology were on everyone’s lips: life extension, 3 D printed body parts, humanoid robots, the UAE’s 2020 pursuit to Mars, “gecko” grips that allow you to climb up the side of buildings, and even sensors inside your brain that enable you to contact others just with your thoughts.

But probably the most stunning revelation was the news that within the sluggish field of ground transportation, a near-supersonic technology that first surfaced this year should be ready for full-scale, full-speed testing prior to the end of the year.

Hyperloop is real. Hyperloop is happening.

That technologies are the Hyperloop, a pod-in-a-tube that will use friction-free near-vacuum conditions and linear-induction motors to whisk people and cargo between cities at speeds of up to 1,100 km per hour – and possibly more.

When the concept first emerged, it seemed yet another one of those sci-fi jetpack/domed-cities concepts that never appear to work out. However with the fertile mind of Elon Musk (PayPal, Tesla, SpaceX) laying out the scientific case inside a white paper, and bequeathing the idea to anyone who wants to follow up (because he’s too busy), many groups are working on real-world applications. And no yet another aggressively than Los-Angeles-based Hyperloop Technologies.

“Hyperloop is real. Hyperloop is going on,” said Brogan BamBrogan, HT’s co-founder and chief technology officer, to a rapt audience of presidency and business leaders at the World Government summit. He explained his company has already solved a number of “hardcore” problems, such as how you can levitate a passenger vehicle, and just how perfect your vacuum should be. He says the company’s “Kitty Hawk moment” – a full-scale test of the technologies – should happen in a testing facility north of Las Vegas by year-end.

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Although it’s no official relationship with Elon Musk, HT has got the next most convenient thing: executives who’ve worked with Musk. BamBrogan, for example, would be a senior staff engineer at SpaceX, which built a spaceship in under Ten years that’s able to dock with the International Space Station and return safely to earth.

First proposed to run between San Francisco and Los Angeles, hyperloop is really a totally new type of transportation. It’s less than urban transit – HT is proposing lightweight pods that will carry about 12 people. That’s because hyperloop is probably to run on elevated tubes (tunneling can be done, but a lot more expensive). The lighter the vehicles, the more affordable the system will be.



Still, Brogan admits no one knows exactly what the probably applications will be. Will hyperloop perform best over short, medium or long distances? Could it be more suited to passengers or freight? HT is keeping its options open, he says: “We’re asking governments around the world, how would you make use of this system to best help your people?”

BamBrogan framed the flexibility of hyperloop in ways certain to intrigue the Summit audience, the majority of whom were from Dubai or any other Emirate communities: “Imagine travelling between Dubai and Abu Dhabi (160 km apart) in Fifteen minutes. And you’ll have the ability to leave without notice. You don’t need to bother about missing your train, because there’s always another pod leaving in a few minutes.”

The cost? “We are able to deploy and operate hyperloop for under the price of high-speed rail,” says BamBrogan. But then he added, “Once we innovate deeply, we believe we can cut those costs by 50 per cent.” Given those savings, he says, “rides could nearly be free.”

The audience in Dubai had the same questions you may have: How safe could it be? Let’s say there’s a malfunction? What would take place in an earthquake? BamBrogan reassured his listeners that HT is putting safety first by citing a range of sensors, fail-safes and impact-dampeners.

Toronto city officials, now planning a number of high-profile transit projects, can rest secure that high-volume, short-distance LRT and subway with a lot of stops will probably ‘t be displaced by hyperloop in the near future. In retrospect, however, hyperloop may have made more sense than the $456-million Union-Pearson Express airport train, which has been largely running empty since its launch last year. It’s also been suggested that hyperloop may be the the easy way connect Toronto with the growing high-tech hub of Waterloo. As well as in his presentation BamBrogan mused about connecting Calgary and Edmonton having a hyperloop that will whisk people between those cities faster than the current air shuttles.

In an interview with the Financial Post the day after his presentation, BamBrogan declined to discuss specific projects that HT is working on. But he did say that interest rates are high, and that some prospects are willing to write cheques as soon as the technology is proven. BamBrogan said he was particularly pleased that a senior Dubai business leader had just appropriated certainly one of HT’s slides for any presentation around the region’s economic future.

BamBrogan says HT expects to have its first commercial system up and running after the decade. To meet its ambitious goals, the organization appointed a brand new CEO last fall -former Cisco Systems president Rob Lloyd – which is now working to close a US$80-million financing round.

Once the very first systems are in operation, BamBrogan foresees underground hyperloops, undersea tubes, as well as hybrid services that transport people throughout the day and cargo at night. “There isn’t just one hyperloop,” he says. “You will see a lot of methods for you to deploy it.” Like every good technologist he is sure many new and significant applications will emerge that no one today can yet imagine.

But one thing’s without a doubt. “We don’t desire to be a theme-park ride,” says BamBrogan. “We don’t want to be a 12-mile airport connector. You want to constitute real value.”