Imagine being able to travel between Toronto and Montreal in 30 minutes.
Or from Calgary to Edmonton in under 20 minutes.
It could be a reality sooner than you think.
A team from the University of Torontoâs engineering department is hoping to radically transform long-distance transportation. They want to be the first to create technology that could whisk people at near-supersonic speeds through a tube, from city to city in minutes.
A reality once relegated to futuristic shows and books, such transportation would carry people inside pods to their destination by travelling at nearly the speed of sound.
Approximately 30 people are working on the Toronto team, a collaboration between U of T and a private company called
âWeâre starting in Canada because we want to make this a leading edge Canadian design that we bring to the world,â said Ryan Janzen, TransPodâs chief technology officer.
Much of what theyâre working on is being kept under wraps for the time being.
But a teaser image has been released showing their vision for a so-called Hyperloop tube â and it shows the technology running out of downtown Toronto.
âThe initial speed is about 1,200 kilometres an hour, so itâs quite fast,â Sebastien Gendron, founder and CEO of TransPod, told ŰÎŰ´ŤĂ˝.
At twice the speed of the fastest bullet train, itâs imagined a Hyperloop would see passengers travelling on a magnetic levitation system inside a nearly airless tube.
The idea was popularized by Elon Musk, the creator of the electric car company Tesla and founder of private aerospace company SpaceX.
âItâs a cross between a Concorde (plane), a railgun and an air hockey table,â Musk has said in describing Hyperloop technology.
Musk doesnât have time to build it, so heâs challenging others to make it happen based on his open-source concept. Earlier this year, students from 20 countries gathered in Texas to talk about
Companies are working on their own prototypes. On Wednesday, a Los Angeles-based company tested a motor, demonstrating the technology isnât just pure fantasy.
The Toronto team figures a Hyperloop could carry people from Toronto to Ottawa in 30 minutes.
âI believe that is something quite exciting and can happen,â said University of Toronto professor Kamran Behdinan.
A commercial version could be ready in just five years.
With a report by CTVâs John Vennavally-Rao