Its very impressive to read this type of post I love your idea and I want to share some icon hotels suggestion that will help you in this task.

Hey. I totally get where you are coming from.

https://hackaday.io/page/2707-dysgenesis-of-the-corpus-callosum

https://hackaday.io/project/163332-the-house-of-fun

https://hackaday.io/project/164181-starcrete

You can also DC me if you want a chat dude. ;-)

actually i get that ideas years ago, it was inspired by elon musk's boring company. and when i consider that tunnel purpose, suddently i thought it could be use as home too. i think there should be two tube for one person, one for bedrom and privacy purpose, the other for all the rest , and for diary farm issue, i dont think this project should consider that, homeless people has many ideas on life style, you cant just keep them in one way. just provide them some help on sleep, if you want, you could grow potato and carrots nearby and feed them , but its an extra help

Just thinking more about the management... In my town, there's a soup kitchen operates out of a temporary prefab building on a patch of rough ground, every day at 6pm. They could perhaps manage padlocks and small issues. The second option might be, to have a homeless shelter use them as extra beds for emergencies. Place them in the yard behind the shelter building. A shelter I know of is staffed 24 hours, although night staff have their own bedroom to sleep in, they aren't awake through the night. An emergency intercom from these sleeper tubes could wake them though, and cameras with speakers out in the yard could let them make an assessment before leaving the building.

Homeless shelters, that I know of, also work on an "out-patient" basis. Rough sleepers can come in for a cup of tea, and most helpfully to have a shower and wash some clothes. As well as a bit of human contact. They could cover the people who would sleep in these mini-bedrooms, possibly the same people who otherwise would be sleeping rough. Although a few homeless people like to camp out away from town simply because they don't get on with humanity (can you blame them!?).

Also thinking, rather than supplying the tubes themselves, offer a service or a kit, to convert concrete tubes on-site. Saves a lot on warehousing and shipping! Since concrete pipe delivery is an already established infrastructure, and perhaps a kind construction company could drop off a few extra or unneeded pipes from a nearby building site. And get some nice publicity for doing so. And maybe a tax break.
Getting the conversion process down to a simple set of repeatable steps would be the thing. With minimal drilling into the pipe, just an internal mounting perhaps for the controls (Intercom / buzzer, lights, TV / security camera screen). Run the wires out through the wall at the top end of the pipe. Have the electronics be protected by something waterproof that slides into place if you need to hose it out. Capacitive touch switches would be good for tough no-maintenance controls, or the toughened switches used in some building intercoms. Although a vandal can't throw much of a punch or a kick inside a pipe!

Finally a thought on lights. Embedded LED lights, fixed in the wall, with one pointing the right way for a reading light. Maybe have that in a swivel mount. I realise it's not The Ritz but a few inexpensive touches can make life a lot nicer.

While most people would be glad of a facility like this, there will always be people who like to smash stuff, as well as people, up. Makes things more complicated and expensive, but unfortunately something that must be taken into account. Some people will try to steal a TV, just on the chance of getting 2 bucks for it. Perhaps you could miss out the TV, and even the security camera screen. Shame tho cos it would make a difference I think.

Also... lockers available, strong ones, for people's property. Either with combination locks or padlocks, combination being better cos no lost keys.

To be fair, you might wanna give up the pretense that a 6 year old is putting the work, ideas, and blogging into all of this. I was a pretty smart 6-year-old myself, and organised my class into building a dairy farm of our own. In Lego. 

It might have been an idea of Little Reilly's, it might not have been. But it's disingenuous to the point of annoying to pretend he's organising or building this thing. He's simply not capable of it, and there's nothing wrong in that, because he's 6.

As I said, it was his idea, I helped refine it a bit, but this came from him. I am in no way being disingenuous at all. I realise that a 6 year old (now 7) can't actually do the heavy lifting on a project like this, but this is something that he is very passionate about. He is also an autistic savant by the way, so he does a lot of big people thinking as a small person. I only helped create this project with him as an outlet to those ideas. Please, please, don't ruin this for him, he is very proud that people are looking at his idea and commenting.

Fellow puzzle-piece type here ;) polite note, not that it's /offensive/, particularly given that you're a parent yourself to One Of Us, but the phrase "autistic savant" in particular refers to more the "Rain Man" side of autism - a person who is extremely low-functioning in all areas of life except for this one odd niche place where s/he's practically superhero-level capable. Your son, FWIW, sounds from here more like he has Asperger's Syndrome, a very, very distinct and specific form of autism that tends to provide an unusually-high level of cognition (i.e. a ton of "book smarts") with consequential tradeoffs in communication and in interpersonal relations.

Someone with Asperger's seems "very smart" to the layperson, but is ultimately still significantly challenged to "get anywhere in life" due to the other complications of the disorder -they generally won't have many friends at any given time, and will find both expressing and discussing emotions to be a bewildering maze to navigate.

I myself have Asperger's... if you're interested in a window into my life, PM me, I'm happy to chat :)

Oh -- and please do keep encouraging this sort of thing in your son, if you can -- and anyone else you can touch with it. We *desperately* need more people in this world who are aware of modern society's less-friendly side and who feel compelled to do something about it.

Wow, what a idea... You like to live there by yourself in a waste water tube ?? 

if it's warmer in the winter time and cooler in the summer time than on the outside and I got nowhere to go and could call this "my place", I would. Don't mock a six year old kid ;) You don't really need much to live and those japanese pods look quite nice - looks like camping and there are a lot of full-year campers.

It's not much smaller than my home, and the bed isn't a triangle :)

Actually "my place" might be practical, given secure enough construction, a lock on the inside, and a padlock for each tenant. If that's the way you wanted to do it. That way, abusive tenants could be kept out. Might need thick plastic windows rather than glass.

This would benefit from a managed policy for tenants, rather than just ad-hoc first-come first-served. A homelessness charity might take the responsibility on.

For more security, a phone link to emergency services might be good, as might a small screen connected to security cameras. And maybe TV! You can get smallish LCD screens with video input for very little money now. Though it would complicate things somewhat, and need a power supply. Solar would be too fragile and expensive. Really a mains linkup would be vital, if it's going to have power. There could be no mains sockets inside, but a couple of USB sockets for charging phones.

It would also need nearby toilet facilities, or else end up stinking after a few days. Perhaps built near existing public toilets. Although the public would probably not want it too near anything they use regularly.

very good points IMHO! @greenaum 

I think the major problems with this would be security, and maintenance. Homeless people, unfortunately, are not often homeless simply through lack of a home. They're often people with severe mental health issues, ignored and abandoned since they can't afford to pay for treatment, and the government just won't put the money in to look after them. And since many public mental institutions are like underfunded rundown horrendous prisons, I can understand why someone wouldn't want to live in one, even if they had the chance. 

Society is to blame. We've really let down our weak and helpless, and criticising and blaming them for their own situation seems to be the best our consciences can come up with.

Places for homeless people, at least in the UK where I am, tend to have a lot of staff devoted to admin, and rehabilitating their clients, helping them with their problems. It needs a lot of staff, work, and money.

Still, it is better than sleeping out on the street, the alternative if you've nowhere else to go. I worry about fights, bullying, robbers, drinking and drugs and the mess they leave in a place. It might be safest to site these little homes in small groups of 2 or 3, wide apart from one another, to stop interpersonal problems from developing, and giving people a chance to just move to another one if their neighbours are abusing them.

I'd also give thought to maintenance and cleaning, they need to be able to be hosed out if needed, quickly and easily. Perhaps bedding and blankets could be supplied separately through some local charity office. Actually sleeping bags would be good.

Still, as a simple cheap place to stay, I think it's a good idea. Might also be adapted for things like refugee camps, and natural disasters, though something more portable than concrete would be needed. There might be valuable lessons to learn on infrastructure coming from this.

Ahhh, the refreshing sound of someone who really does understand... :) thank you for being a voice.