PIPE DREAMS

The hyperloop joins a long list of radical transportation projects. Here are some glimpses of the future (and one from the past).

skytran

Inspired by the 40-year-old personal rapid transit system in Morgantown, W. Va., skytran is a high-speed (150 mph) network of two-person pods that whisk people on suspended maglev tracks. A test system is slated this year in Tel Aviv, with a bigger city network projected for completion by the end of 2016. Skytran says tickets will sell for less than a bus fare. We doubt that. Cost: $80 million.

Terrafugia Flying Car

It’s 2015 and we still don’t have flying cars? Terrafugia aims to change that with its Transition street-legal airplane, enabling you to commute like the future Marty Mcfly. There have been successful test flights, and deliveries are anticipated for 2016. Still, flying cars have been promised for so long we’ll believe it when we take one to work. Cost: $279,000.

Project Harp

Jules Verne imagined a day when astronauts would be fired from a gigantic gun to the moon. In the 1960s the U.S. and Canada tried to build guns that could shoot satellites into orbit. Despite perpetual funding woes and political obstacles, the project was able to fire test payloads up to 112 miles high before it was shut down in 1967.

Shweeb

Google invested $1 million in Shweeb, which is developing a system of monorails with individual pods that you pedal with your feet. The company built a 220-yard prototype at an amusement park in New Zealand. Cool for cities, but what rhymes with Shweeb?

ET3

Two weeks before announcing Hyperloop, Elon Musk met with the founder of ET3, who is talking up a network of vacuum tunnels through which car-size capsules fly using magnetic levitation. The company claims that its system could be built for a quarter of the cost of a freeway and support more trafc. It is seeking sites for a 3-mile prototype that can travel more than 370mph.