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The pneumatic tube's strange 150-year journey

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Tubes have carried cats, mail, and people for a really long time. Vox's Phil Edwards leads the tour...

More than a century and a half before Elon Musk thought up the Hyperloop, his mash-up of pneumatic and maglev ideas (and a bunch of other moving parts), people were using pneumatic tubes to move people. Though we're familiar with pneumatic tubes from banks, they've been around much longer and used for a lot more.

Documentary is production of Vox Media.
The photo at the page is a screenshot of the video at YouTube.

Pneumatic.TubePneumatic Tube, Rohrpost, Buizenpost

The pneumatic tube's strange 150-year journey

  Last updated: 01-08-2018


The pneumatic tube's strange 150-year journey


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  Pneumatic Tube Calendar

20 August 1868 (156 years ago)
Successful Pneumatic Despatch experiments at Battersea, London United Kingdom

1 August 1898 (127 years ago)
Pneumatic Tube Mail connects the New York City and Brooklyn post offices, carrying mail below ground in tubes

24 August 1904 (120 years ago)
Commissioning Pneumatic Tube Mail Chicago, USA

1 August 1926 (99 years ago)
Pneumatic Tube Mail Boston USA re-established, after being 8 years out of business

6 August 1926 (99 years ago)
The dedication of the Boston Postal Pneumatic Tube System

13 August 2002 (23 years ago)
Prague (Czech) is flooded, damaging the Pneumatic Tube Mail system beyond repair

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