With the future of his Chicago tunnel very much in doubt, Elon Musk is heading back west, with Las Vegas now the frontrunner to get the first-of-its-kind high-speed transit route.
The Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority voted to move forward on talks with Musk’s Boring Co. on a possible underground transit route around the city’s convention center. The parties have set a goal of ratifying a contract by June, and Musk tweeted the project could be operational by the end of 2019, according to Bloomberg.
Boring Co. has said the tunnel could cost $30 to $55 million and would be funded by hotel taxes. Rides would be free to convention-goers. After an expansion in 2021, the sprawling Las Vegas Convention Center will span two miles, Bloomberg reports.
The Las Vegas project is a scaled-down version of initiatives proposed in Chicago, Los Angeles and the East Coast.
In Chicago, Musk envisioned an underground commuter line linking Downtown and O’Hare Airport. The project lost its biggest supporter when Mayoral Rahm Emanuel didn’t seek a third term, and the remaining mayoral candidates have been ambivalent about the project.
A Los Angeles tunnel project was scuttled after opposition from neighbors, and a project linking Washington, D.C. to Baltimore is stuck in the environmental-review phase, according to Bloomberg.
Las Vegas’ tunnel project is moving forward more easily because it would run under land owned by the convention center’s governing body, and would not run through population centers or multiple municipalities that make the approval process more complicated. [Bloomberg] — Joe Ward