Latest By
Category:
Armor
Artificial
Intelligence
Biology
Clothing
Communication
Computers
Culture
Data Storage
Displays
Engineering
Entertainment
Food
Input Devices
Lifestyle
Living Space
Manufacturing
Material
Media
Medical
Miscellaneous
Robotics
Security
Space Tech
Spacecraft
Surveillance
Transportation
Travel
Vehicle
Virtual
Person
Warfare
Weapon
Work
"...science fiction is sort of like a sociological genome. It's a huge range of possible futures, most of them useless; some vital. You never really know in advance."
- Peter Watts
 |
| Submarine Tube | ||
| A means of transport between Europe and North America via underwater tubes. |
| He stated that more than 3,000 miles of iron tubes, weighing over 13,000,000 tons, were required, with the number of ships necessary, for the transport of this material--200 ships of 2,000 tons, each making thirty-three voyages. He described this Armada of science bearing the steel to two special vessels, on board of which the ends of the tubes were joined to each other, and incased in a triple netting of iron, the whole covered with a resinous preparation to preserve it from the action of the seawater.
Coming at once to the question of working, he filled the tubes--transformed into a sort of pea-shooter of interminable length--with a series of carriages, to be carried with their travellers by powerful currents of air, in the same way that despatches are conveyed pneumatically round Paris... By the light of an electric lamp in the roof I carefully examined the carriage I was in. Nothing could be more simple: a long cylinder, comfortably upholstered, along which some fifty arm-chairs, in pairs, were ranged in twenty-five parallel ranks. At either end a valve regulated the atmospheric pressure, that at the farther end allowing breathable air to enter the carriage, that in front allowing for the discharge of any excess beyond a normal pressure. |
| From An Express of the Future,
by Jules Verne. Published by Not Known in 1895 Additional resources -
|
Compare to the single vehicle tunnel from Foundation (1951) by Isaac Asimov, the pneumatic tube station from Exiles of the Moon (1931) by Schachner and Zagat, the sub-Atlantic tube from Ralph 124c 41 + (1911) by Hugo Gernsback, the vacutubes from Double Star (1956) by Robert Heinlein and the public tubes from The Houses of Iszm (1954) by Jack Vance.
Comment/Join this discussion ( 0 ) | RSS/XML | Blog This |
Additional
resources:
More Ideas
and Technology from An Express of the Future
More Ideas
and Technology by Jules Verne
Tech news articles related to An Express of the Future
Tech news articles related to works by Jules Verne
| First Boring Passenger Station In Las Vegas |
| Tesla's 20,000 Superchargers |
| Gyroscopic Median-Straddling Mass Transit Vehicles |
| AutoX Sets Up Asia's Largest Robotaxi Center |
Want to Contribute an
Item?
It's easy:
Get the name of the item, a
quote, the book's name and the author's name, and Add
it here.
| <Previous | Next> |
|
|
|
Technovelgy (that's tech-novel-gee!) is devoted to the creative science inventions and ideas of sf authors. Look for the Invention Category that interests you, the Glossary, the Invention Timeline, or see what's New.
|
Okay, sf fans. If you could have some art created from a science fiction sentence, what sentence would you pick?
'There were the cleaners, with large padded feet, who were apparently polishing their way the whole length...'
It's fascinating to me how the Apollo program forced people to think outside their usual boxes.
'Some will combine in place to form more complicated structures, like excavators or centipedes.'
'the hair-fine wire going deep into Owen's brain, down into the pleasure center.'
'There was a dim whirring, and the spheres tipped and began to rotate...'
'The houses are prefabricated units... and they sell at the flat rate of five hundred dollars a room — set up.'
