Chinese Propose Asia America Rail Link

How about passenger ICBMs, taking about 20 minutes each way?

ICBMs aren't good at landing, once launched they're never expected to be within a mile of the surface again in one piece.

Although, with the multiple-'warhead' submunitions in the nose, it would also simplify delivery of passengers/cargo, each submunition could be brogrammed with its target address, thus saving on shipment costs for the 'last mile.'

Ah. So survival of the occupants is actually a design criterion, then? Good-oh!

Oh, wait, you wanted the passengers to SURVIVE the 'delivery'?

I may need to adjust my calculations. how many pieces is the occupant allowed to break into on impact arrival?

ICBM delivery may not be as feasible as first estimated.

With the ever increasing cost of petrol I can see where this would elevate some of the cost of shipping. Which has hurt China's economy.

But has spurred the regrowth of manufacturing in some countries. Being cheaper to make it at home then pay the freight from China.

It's a long way from <...discussing...> to "cutting the first sod".

The Longshoremen union in CA is definitely against this.......

I like the idea that this is being discussed but by the time this could become real I suspect the world market dynamics will drastically change. Will China still want to sell to North America?

Then there's that little problem of running a tunnel parallel to the Pacific fault line for 78 miles under frozen earth and or water with only the Aleutian chain acting as a very distant barrier islands. The English Channel is a little more stable in a seismic sense.

How about a high speed elevator straight down.

I wouldn't want to be in the middle of that 2 day tunnel when an earthquake happened! I think a monorail above the ocean would would be more practical, but expensive.

125km @ 350kmph?

The whole trip is two days, the tunnel looks to be about half an hour.

The ventilation system for the tunnel must be interesting. A 350 kmh train pushing 125 km of air out of the way.

How about a fan pushing air into the tunnel behind the train, and a fan exhausting air from the tunnel ahead of the train? If the first has larger capacity, its surplus air ventilates the train.

A pneumatic train?

Isn't that what Elon Musk proposed for SF to LA.

I think so, but I don't know if his speeds are practical. (I haven't even done any thumbnail calcs yet.)

Or a larger scale of this..... Getting a Lift from Vacuum

Don't need the fan, the train will push the air on its own.

if the air is just pushed ahead/pulled behind the train, the tunnel mouths will roar like a flock of dragons in mating season.

that would mean 'wind speeds' at the tunnel entrances of 350kph, roughly 160mph. (very rough, I'm not crunching numbers here) That's Hurricane-level winds, major devastation hurricane at that.

Everything accelerates gradually. "Hurricane" effects are irrelevant.

If the tunnel is large enough, the air would just displace around the train. There would be local turbulence, but not requiring 125km of "bicycle" pump action, which would be very inefficient.

This is a such a long tunnel that may not be resting on or below the sea floor that free space around the train will have to be an integral part of the design. This is precisely my point.

How about a fleet of nuclear powered airplanes for just crossing the oceans....

http://www.wired.com/2008/10/bring-back-the/

"The project will be constructed and built by China".

OMG, they're going to cash-in all their overseas investments .

Perhaps they willl sell off US treasury bonds - I think the own about 20% of the national debt(?)

Kinda my point - they may end up making you lot fund it whilst they collapse your economy further into the ditch. Not just America, Chinese investments overseas are huge.

Not to worry. As PW mentioned, it's a helluva long way before any sod is cut.

The debate would be if they sold off the treasury bonds, would it hurt the US or China more?

Mexican standoff.