[knodi123]

In addition to what the other guy said, think about vulnerability to terrorism.

Blow up a support for a segment of tube in the right spot at the right time, and you turn the train into a kinetic kill weapon. (it's traveling 50% faster than a 747!) I'd hate to see that done when it was going through a city.

Blow up a support at any point at the right time, and you've murdered a tube of passengers, plus completely shut down an entire segment of transportation infrastructure for a significant amount of time. Do you know how much it cost the US to shut down all air traffic on 9/11?

Basically, hyperloop is a lot more feasible in a world without homicidal nutjobs - but, alas...

[bronson]

All your points apply to rail as well, yet rail works fine.

(what rail lacks in speed it makes up in tonnage)

Yes, the Madrid 2004 bombing happened, but events like that have been very rare. Do you think they'd be more frequent against a hyperloop?

[asadjb]

I have a different POV on this given I currently live in Dubai, UAE. They have a 74KM automated rail system (Dubai Metro) and most of it is built on raised towers. This proposed system from what I understand is going to cross mostly empty dessert area.

Secondly, UAE is a pretty safe country in terms of terrorism. At least thats the perception you get if you live here. I haven't heard of one terrorism related activity here. That may be because the media is tightly controlled, but word still gets out if something that major were to happen here. This might just be because they have very tightly controlled borders, and are surrounded by friendly states that also have a relatively good security record (Saudi, Oman).

Just my take on these issues. I don't have any hard data, this is just my perception from having spent 3 years in this country.