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First, according to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prague_pneumatic_post, the Prague system ended in 2002 when it flooded.

Second, the New York City post offices used to send packages to each other via pneumatic tubes. The system stopped in 1953, though, when it became rather impractical. I see that very much happening here.

And also, do we really _want_ this sort of thing? Are we just too lazy to get out of our houses to get a loaf of bread or whatever?



Yes. Online grocery shopping with dedicated delivery services is huge here (in the UK). Imagine how much bigger it would be when you could order stuff in much smaller batches at more regular intervals? Loaf of bread and a pint of milk to home at 7am, and a sandwich to your office at 1pm?

If you include the postal system and all those little trips people make, we are moving stuff between various hubs and houses several times a day anyway, often with dedicated trips using our hugely inefficient, slow and polluting vehicles. We could really get the eco crowd onside with this one.


and a sandwich to your office at 1pm?

http://twitter.com/deliciouslunch did that for a few weeks, on a local scale. Tweet to them in the morning, have a sandwich delivered same day.

They stopped pretty quickly - but it looks like they might have plans to resume one day.


> do we really _want_ this sort of thing

Replacing labor intensive delivery that involves lots of big brown trucks illegally parking in traffic with an underground, computerized, electrically powered system?

Yeah, that sounds horrible.




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