[mojomark]

Nobody here is trying to crush dreams. The author, and many others, are simply trying to point out that there are much better uses of time and money.

The factors (i.e. physics) underpinning the economics of freight shipping in all forms are well understood. Can a hyperloop be built? Sure. Is it better than existing intermodal cargo shipment infrastructure? Yes and no. It certainly offers speed, but doomedly at the expense of economies of scale: https://www.usmma.edu/sites/usmma.edu/files/docs/CMA%20Paper...

Here's a thoughtful assessment by Olaf Merk posted last month that draws the same conclusion as the author: http://shippingtoday.eu/musk_maritime/

Bottom line, if you can find enough high value bulk cargo that benefits significantly from high speed transit to only two or three "ports", then hyperloop is your answer. However, that's a very (perhaps nonexistent) niche in the industry.

What we (transport engineering community) need to be expending resources on is: a.) eliminating greenhouse gas emissions, b.) designing a system of transport that scales with global trade demand (vice building 20K+ TEU megaships that can only be served by a few ports and promote trucking congestion in ports). Autonomous shipping, AI implementations in both freight forwarding (the logistics side) and transport control systems themselves, and applications of H2 fuel cells are technologies with great promise.