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I'm assuming this can't be used for flying over land due to sonic boom?

Depends which land and — most likely — depends who builds it.

It's not like the US forbid overland supersonic flight for their military planes (and overland commercial supersonic flight was only banned as the US's sole SST program was cancelled)

The US military is typically only allowed to go supersonic over land in the US in certain special areas.

During 54 years of living in 5 different metropolitan areas of the U.S., I've never heard a sonic boom. (I know what one sounds like because they were frequent during a vacation I took in West Germany a long time ago.)

The Blue Angels, for example, are not authorized to exceed the speed of sound: http://www.blueangels.navy.mil/show/faq.aspx

I lived near colorado springs in the early 80s, as a child, and I can remember on two occasions being (figuratively) knocked out of bed by a sonic boom.

Presumably from the Air Force Academy. Only happened those two times the entire time we lived there - presumably someone got in trouble for it...

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