Transportation

Transportation is the method by which players move around the world. This includes walking, sprinting, swimming, flying, and using minecarts and boats and even TNT cannons.

Speed
The speed of travel varies depending on method and conditions. The fastest methods seem to be either a minecart or boat down a slope (unless you count the sprinting bug), both of which travel at approximately 7 meters per second (m/s). However, there are some sprinting bugs that can make the player travel faster, detailed below. The speed of any form of travel can be approximated simply by measuring the time taken to travel some known distance. In the below experiment, the speeds of various methods and conditions were calculated based upon the time taken to travel 100 meters along the ramp shown below.


 * Average is given by the arithmetic mean, sum(x1, x2, ..., xn)/n
 * Speed is given by the definition of speed, &Delta;distance/&Delta;time


 * From this data, we can infer that the time taken by a boat to reach maximum speed is 9.4 seconds -- the the difference in time between a running start and not, is half that, or 4.7 seconds.
 * One noteworthy point is that a boat does not seem to be significantly faster when going down rapids rather than traveling at top speed on flat water.
 * The swimming speeds assume still water, and are not affected by Swiftness potions.

Vertical Speeds
Some vertical times are also known:
 * Using any method of elevating yourself that relies purely on jumping, including climbing a slope without stairs and nerdpoling, you cannot rise faster than about 2.0 m/s.
 * Walking up stairs, you will ascend by about 3.2 m/s. Walking down is slightly faster at 3.6 m/s
 * On ladders, you go up at about 2.3 m/s and down at 3.0 m/s. (From experiment)
 * In creative mode, flying vertically is slower than horizontal flight: 7.5 m/s (from experiment)
 * Falling down a waterfall, you drop at 2.0 m/s. Swimming up is only slightly slower, 1.9 m/s.
 * Going up or down a lavafall (in the Overworld, and assuming you can survive) moves at 0.8 m/s. (from experiment)
 * Falling speed is more complex: Every tick (1/20 second), non-flying players and mobs have their vertical speed decremented (less upward motion, more downward motion) by 0.08 blocks per tick (1.6 m/s), then multiplied by 0.98.  This would produce a terminal velocity of 3.92 blocks per tick, or 78.4 m/s.  However, the sky isn't quite high enough for that:  Falling from layer 256 to bedrock takes about 5.5 seconds, with impact at 3.5 blocks per tick (70 m/s).

Other modes of transportation
Players are also able to use pistons for transport.

Besides boats and minecarts, players can also ride pigs which have been saddled. However, the player has no control over the pig's wandering, and so this is not a practical form of long-distance transportation.

Players can pillar to reach high locations; this type of movement is commonly attributed to new players.

Players are able to fly in Creative mode.

In addition, there are two bugs when a player is Sprinting that can be exploited to create very high speeds:


 * Sprinting and jumping while in a 2 block high tunnel or house will cause a speed almost twice as high as regular sprinting speed. This is rather inefficient however, as this can easily drain food at a rate of about 1 unit per second.
 * Doing the same as above, except above Ice allows the player to move at an astonishing 16 blocks per second. That is twice as fast as a full speed minecart on powered rails.

It is possible to mount minecarts and boats as long as they are within 32 blocks (inclusive) from the player. Placing minecarts in a straight line allows for extremely fast transport, with speeds upwards of 100 blocks per second.

Throwing Ender Pearls will teleport the player to the spot where the Pearl lands, at the cost of two and a half hearts in fall damage.

History
In the Seecret Friday Update 1, Minecarts were added. Boats were added later in the Seecret Friday Update 5. Before the Seecret Friday Update 1, walking was the only way of transportation.

Sprinting and flying were added in the Beta 1.8 Adventure Update.

On October 11, 2011 Jeb tweeted that Dragon Riding is a possibility. That would add a way of transportation by air. It has yet to be confirmed.