Elon Musk's companies approach "traditional" problems from a "tech" standpoint. That is: they bring agile, iterative development with continuous integration, and corresponding organizational structures, to both car and rocket manufacturing.

Both of these industries are traditionally quite slow-moving, heavily laden with bureaucratic processes, management overhead, complicated supply chains with too many hands in the pot (some of which are there for the sole purpose of collecting rent.) Basically, there was plenty of fat to cut by rethinking things from the ground up.

The process wasn't smooth at all in either case, and in Tesla's case it's not even certain at all that it will pan out in the end - but at least in the case of SpaceX, the end result is much leaner than the incumbents and (arguably) more capable too.

Tunnel and transit construction in the US is nothing if not loaded down with bureaucracy and grift. If he can shake up the industry like he did with rockets, even if much of the technology he proposes doesn't pan out, then we all win anyway.

I would imagine that the ORD end will also present challenges. Those two together could soak up a lot of $$ especially with the city having control over both.

Maybe no new tunneling technology, but you are assuming there is nothing new to discover in energy storage technology, that we've reached the pinnacle of knowledge, and that a large scale project will yield nothing new, so ill restate my post..

(btw-good thing those small thinkers weren't involved with the Panama Canal or the Continental railroad.

Could Gary’s airport be getting regularly scheduled commercial service in the next year or two? It’s mentioned as a location for a potential new airline from the man who created JetBlue.

JetBlue’s Founder May Start A New US Airline

^ There is no need for Gary airport. Sounds like a big fail.

Spot on.. Draw a radius around Gary Airport. The closer you get the less affluent, mobile and likely the residents are to fly. Conversely the farther away the more you overlap with areas that are near Midway or Chi Downtown. Look at any demographic map on this board and the development is Downtown or on the Orange and Blue lines, with the exception of Hyde Park, Combined with the lower auto ownership and the abundance of destination and departure choices offered MDW and ORD and the expansion of ORD it just doesn't look good for GRY, and that radius holds true in all directions. Is Gary going to draw consumers from the South Bend market, or Indy. no way. Also Chicago collar county growth is heavily skewed to SW Will county which will default to MDW. And Lake County IL already uses Milw Mitchell as an alternate.
Finally the very discussion we are having on the Ohare express just points out how far GRY has to go to get any kind of transit access... MDW has the orange line and a huge bus transit connection, Ohare has the blue line and the NCS Metra and a bus system and remote parking people mover, and Milw has an Amtrak station that resident of the North Shore and Chicago can access 10 rides a day each way.
Gary airport future is as a cargo airport, they have already acknowledged that. Any pax airline service will be heavily subsidized.

With a 21st century rail link (HSR not just the old SSL), Gary could be a be successful functioning as a relief airport for the metro. Not sure why this isn't obvious to everyone.

Gary airport is very close to South Shore Line, if the airport can get flights it shouldn't be a big deal route it to the airport or run buses. The Region has almost 1,000,000 people, it's not the most affluent but certainly some flights can be run there. It may even be easier for people from South Shore than hiking out to Midway.

Gary will not be a player in passenger traffic. Guaranteed to fail. It has many times already. No reason to think anything has changed.

Obvious it is..30 years down the road! Before that the Chicago-Mitchell rail will have 20+ round trips a day. ChiOrdIng or some other super express will happen at ORD. MDW maybe home to vertical lift off planes. All of this is Possible, same as hsr to GRY.

^I don't get this. If there is enough demand to, at least on paper, build a third airport in the south suburbs than if you removed political motivation, a pure hypothetical would show Gary is the most logical third airport even if it's in Indiana.

^ there is no demand. That's the thing.

But if there are no gates at ORD or MDW, what else can a discount startup do? Using forgotten and even distant airports has proven a successful model for many European and Asian low-cost carriers.

I dont fault them for trying. Delta is expanding in Milw. SWA has a nice offering in Milw as does Frontier. I just think that the current demand (hsr not withstanding) will require annual public subsidy . So go for it. But they are going after a geographic base which has limited potential. About 25% of MKE is from Illinois. I just dont thin that GRY will have the base.

Allegient is making a go of it out of South Bend, of all places - flights to Florida, Phoenix and Vegas. They also fly out of Rockford. Gary just hasn't ever worked for anyone who's tried. And for an example of what happens when the airlines just say "no" you need look no further than Peotone or that one down by St. Louis I can't even remember the name of.

^ seems like Gary and South Bend would just cannibalize each other. I could care less if they try. I'm just predicting it will fail.

regardless of what may or may not ever happen at gary, i'm just glad that no one seems to be seriously talking about peotone anymore.

Gary just needs a better train connection and it can be a good low cost carrier airport. Turn Midway into more of a premium domestic business travel airport, like LGA, given its proximity to the Loop. Having the likes of Southwest fly out of there is a waste.

i doubt that would ever happen.

roughly 95% of all MDW flights are southwest.

for all intents and purposes, MDW is a "southwest airport", like DAL & HOU.

it's one of the most single-carrier-dominated major airports in the entire country.

Isn't Midway SWs largest hub too?