I don't know! It would be pretty cool if this got going at even a local level any time soon!
This part of the future makes me feel very claustrophobic. I honestly don't know if I could ever step foot into one of those capsules, and I don't have a diagnosed phobia* or anything. It's just... jeepers. That said, when I think of the dangers given the parameters set out on the page (e.g. NY <=> LA in 45 mins), one would be travelers suffering acute medical emergencies, such as a heart attack, en route. And then I compare same to air travel, which takes far longer than 45 minutes - even to make an emergency landing - and can't find any reason for this NOT to happen, given proper safety measures, etc. Do you anticipate we'll see this even at a small scale before, say, 2050? * and are phobias diagnosed? Never thought of it that way before. NHS suggests phobias can indeed be formally diagnosed.
I anticipate we could see a small scale much sooner than 2050. Intrastate it seems like it could happen before 2030. Granted, I think that getting support for it (because of how scary it is as an idea) will be the hardest part of getting it "off the ground" so to speak. There are definitely some things I wonder about. For instance, it works because it's air tight, but for the distances involved, that would be difficult to monitor and maintain, and unless I'm wrong, allowing air into the tubes would a) strand some people in them and b) lead to very, very high speed crashes. Fun though that might be, it would be no fun. Then again, it has had some great PR already!
