Las Vegas is willing to take a gamble on the Boring Company’s high-speed tunnels.
The Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority voted Tuesday to continue talks with Elon Musk’s tunnel-digging startup, with a plan to secure a contract by June. The city is looking for a transportation solution for it’s sprawling convention center, which will stretch two miles when current construction projects are finished by 2021.
Las Vegas could become the first city to build a commercial transportation service with the Boring Company. The price estimate for the system is reportedly $30 million to $55 million, which will be paid with money from the convention authority’s general fund, which is funded mostly by hotel room taxes in Las Vegas.
Elon Musk tweeted about the prospective tunnel following the vote.
“Looking forward to building a Boring Company tunnel in Vegas. Assuming to be operational by end of year!”
Looking forward to building a Boring Company tunnel in Vegas. Assuming to be operational by end of year! https://t.co/cSSO4SJ140
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 12, 2019
Musk’s grand plan is to build a network of connected tunnels for high-speed transportation to “solve the problem of soul-destroying traffic.”
The Boring Company is currently digging a tunnel connecting downtown L.A. to Los Angeles International Airport in eight minutes. Another tunnel under the Baltimore-Washington Parkway is expected to be the first leg of an East Coast route connecting Washington and New York. However, another proposal to tunnel in Chicago seems threatened as a new administration is set to take office.
The Los Angeles tunnel seems to have the most progress. A test tunnel being used for the research and development of the Boring Company’s tunneling and public transportation systems was unveiled in December. The company also released footage of a Tesla Model X being lowered into the tunnel on an elevator, fixed on rails to speed through the neon-lit tunnel, then being lifted by an elevator on the other side.
Musk said at the tunnel opening that the company has traveled as fast as 110 mph, but admitted it’s still “a little scary.”