Time is money too. The drive from SF to LA is about 5.5 hours (per Google Maps). 5.5 hours of stress and frustration, compared to 30-40 minutes of hyperloop...

Just as an anecdote.. We had some friends from Orange County come visit us in SF this past weekend.

* OC -> SF -- Left at 3pm, took 9.5hrs to drive * SF -> OC -- Left at 9pm, took 7 hours to drive

There is random night construction as well as detours and traffic to worry about on I-5. Half an hour would be a no-brainer, even if it only went so far as downtown LA.

> The drive from SF to LA is about 5.5 hours (per Google Maps).

If I tried to do it in 5.5 hours in the real world, with traffic, I'm pretty sure I'd get arrested at some point.

Up to 8 hours when there's construction on I-5, jams into your destination city, or when you're taking kids who need bathroom breaks.

good point. Also my estimate is the marginal cost for a car vs the ammortized total cost for the hyperloop.

It's kind of cool that Elon Musk is competing with himself here -- Hyperloop vs. a 3rd generation Tesla (which should be even cheaper than $45 one-way per car, including depreciation and electricity.)

The real problem, even once you add self-driving cars, is I-5's limited capacity.

Isn't the real problem that it sucks to drive 7 hours?

Self driving cars seem plausible, especially for interstates, in 10 years. Technically, in 3-5.