Once again Elon Musk has been coming up with ideas that many people would say are a little far fetched or crazy. But, does this stop him? Does this slow down his intentions? No! It simply drives him to keep going. And now, one of his latest schemes involves building a tunnel underneath the streets of Los Angeles in order to ease congestion.
At first, this may seem like quite a good idea; an expensive one, but a good one nonetheless. But, after careful consideration, will this actually help in trying to ease traffic and make it easier for people to get around? Musk certainly seems to thinks so and just a few days ago announced on Twitter, “I really do think tunnels are the key to solving urban gridlock.”
Exciting progress on the tunnel front. Plan to start digging in a month or so.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) January 25, 2017
But, there are many people that would disagree wholeheartedly based on the law of induced demand. This basically says that the more roads you build, the more people will use them, and that is a fact. However, Musk counters that argument by saying that the law of induced demand drops off quickly in a recent Twitter message.
Elon’s plans for these tunnels are much more elaborate than a simple road underground. He also wrote in a message, “If you think of tunnels 10, 20, 30 layers deep (or more), it is obvious that gong down 3D will encompass the needs of any city’s transport of arbitrary size. The key is to think of tunnels many layers deep, not as a 2D array, like surface roads.”
So, quite how this complex underground tunnel system will look when its complete is anyone’s guess. I’m not even sure Musk knows at this point. But, one thing that is for certain is that construction is already underway, and it won’t be too long before real progress is made, so watch this space to find out more.
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