Elon Musk’s Boring Company receives green light to extend 2-mile long tunnel under LA

Earlier this month, Elon Musk’s Boring Company presented the second phase of its tunnel at a special meeting of the Hawthorne city council.

We now learn that they have approved the plan and the startup can start extending its tunnel.

Hawthorn’s Daily Breeze reported:

“The City Council approved the two-mile underground track Tuesday night in a 4-1 vote, with only Councilman Nilo Michelin dissenting.”

As we previously reported, the second phase would link the tunnel entrance and 160-ft first phase of the tunnel under SpaceX’s parking lot to a new 2- mile (3.2 km) long tunnel under 120th street all the way to Hawthorne Boulevard.

Here’s a visual representation of where the Boring Company wants to dig based on the plans submitted to the city:

They will dig the tunnel at a depth of 44 feet and said not to expect to see any construction or disturbance at the ground level.

The company will use its first boring machine (Godot), which they want to improve on during the making of this tunnel.

Brett Horton, Senior Director of Facilities and Construction for both SpaceX and Boring Company, said during the presentation to the council:

“It is a research and development tunnel meant for us to learn about our tunneling machine (Godot), understand the technology and where we can improve it, and also test and prove out the transportation system.”

He explained that Boring Company will use Tesla’s technology for its transportation system in the tunnel – a sort of electric skate platform to transport cars autonomously in the tunnel.

https://youtu.be/u5V_VzRrSBI

While it’s still only in development, the ultimate goal of the project is to create an entire network of tunnels under LA to alleviate the traffic.

They plan for drivers to pull up on those platforms and be transported at higher speeds than on surface roads.

Musk hopes that after the test tunnel, they will connect with LAX to dig up to Culver City, Santa Monica, Westwood and Sherman Oaks. He is reportedly working with the Mayor of Los Angeles on the project.

In other projects for longer distances, the Boring Company is actually thinking about creating a vacuum in the tunnels to turn them into a hyperloop system. Musk says that the company is already working on one between New York and Washington DC.

SpaceX is going to be holding its second hyperloop pod competition this weekend at their test track near their headquarters.