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Hyperloop One Floats 11 Potential Routes Throughout US

Three routes will eventually be selected to "explore project development and financing" with Hyperloop One officials.

A California company that hopes to develop a Hyperloop system last week detailed 11 proposed routes for the ultra-high-speed system in the U.S.

Hyperloop One said that the 11 proposals were culled from more than 2,600 participants in the company's "Global Challenge." Three routes will eventually be selected from the 11 domestic and 24 international plans to "explore project development and financing" with Hyperloop One officials.

"We are on the brink of the first great breakthrough in transportation technology of the 21st century, eliminating the barriers of time and distance and unlocking vast economic opportunities," Shervin Pishevar, the company's executive chairman, said in a statement.

The U.S. routes range in length from 64 miles β€” linking Boston to Providence β€” to a 1,152-mile route from Cheyenne, Wyo., to Houston.

Two other proposals would also include the "Front Range" β€” the Rocky Mountain foothills spanning from Cheyenne to central Colorado β€” while the second-longest route would connect the "Texas Triangle" cities of Houston, Dallas and San Antonio.

Other plans would link Chicago and Pittsburgh, Kansas City and St. Louis, Los Angeles and San Diego, Miami and Orland, Reno and Las Vegas, and Seattle and Portland.

A Hyperloop, first proposed by Tesla and SpaceX founder Elon Musk in 2013, would transport passenger pods through vacuum-sealed tubes at nearly the speed of sound using a system of magnets and fans.

Hyperloop One is among several companies vying to bring the concept to life. The company, which saw a high-profile court battle between top executives last year, conducted the first test of its system β€” which uses electric propulsion β€” in the Nevada desert last spring.

Officials last week also announced the installation of the world's first full-system test track, called the DevLoop, near Las Vegas. The company said that it will employ 500 "engineers, fabricators, scientists and other employees dedicated to bringing the technology to life" by the end of the year.

β€œThis disruptive technology β€” conceived, developed and built in the U.S. β€” will move passengers and cargo faster, cleaner and more efficiently," said CEO Rob Lloyd. "It will transform transportation as we know it and create a more connected world.”

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