Connect with us

News

Elon Musk’s Boring Co. takes aim at fighting LA traffic

Published

on

The Boring Company’s test tunnel that adjoins SpaceX and Tesla’s Design Center in Hawthorne, CA is really starting to take shape. Serial tech entrepreneur Elon Musk posted an image on Saturday that shows a long run of track, pipes and reinforcement inside a tunnel. In addition to providing a first look at a 500 feet stretch of The Boring Company’s test tunnel, Musk also revealed plans for the company’s first route that’s expected to begin from LAX airport and run parallel to major Los Angeles corridor, Interstate 405, and north to U.S. Route 101.

It doesn’t come as much of a surprise that Musk would choose this section as the company’s first project. After all, his dealing with constant soul-crushing traffic along a path of travel that’s a consistent winner of “America’s worst freeways” was the genesis for The Boring Company.

“First route will go roughly parallel to the 405 from LAX to 101, with on/offramps every mile or so. It will work like a fast freeway, where electric skates carrying vehicles and people on pods on the main artery travel at up to 150mph, and the skates switch to side tunnels to exit and enter.” says Musk.

Vehicles entering and exiting the tunnels would be helped by a car elevator, something Musk first demonstrated in July after posting a video of a Tesla Model S being lowered into the tunnel entrance. The use of side tunnels for exit and entry will allow the main tunnel to keep a consistent, high speed flow of traffic and make travel more efficient. It’s a key differentiator from traditional subway systems that often experience frequent stop-and-go travel. “There is a big difference compared to subways that stop at every stop, whether you’re getting off or not.” said Musk after sharing an image of the test tunnel.

Advertisement
-

In addition to the tunnel project taking place in Los Angeles, The Boring Company has recently been given permission by Maryland officials to dig a 10.1-mile tunnel beneath state-owned land that looks to connect Baltimore with Washington, DC. “Incredibly excited to announce our administration’s support for The Boring Company to bring rapid electric transportation technology to Maryland, connecting Baltimore City and Washington D.C.” said Maryland Governor Larry Hogan on October 19 in a Facebook post.

The Boring Company tunneling machine spotted in front of SpaceX in April 2017

As The Boring Company continues to build its 2-mile test tunnel that’s located a stone’s throw away from LAX, it’s expected that the team will also continue to learn techniques that will allow them to maximize efficiencies with tunnel digging and moving earth. Musk revealed at TED 2017, in a sit-down with head curator Chris Anderson, that The Boring Company plans to cut tunnel diameter by 50% for passenger vehicles and reduce the cross sectional area of tunnels by a factor of four. Building a smaller tunnel that’s just large enough for a vehicle will cut 75% of the time associated with digging and introduce a significant cost reduction.

Unlike traditional tunnel boring machines that dig slowly and incrementally, as it stops so that a team can build tunnel reinforcements, Musk’s GoDot digger looks to install tunnel walls continuously. Being able to build reinforcements into a tunnel while it’s being dug eliminates the need to pause operations, thus speeding up the entire process.

Though Musk’s vision to build a high speed underground transportation system in major cities might face opposition from local regulators at first, visibility of progress being made by The Boring Company in Los Angeles and beyond, and ultimately the cost savings involved with such projects will lead to the eureka moment for government officials worldwide.

Why wait nine years on a $1.5 billion “beach shuttle” when you can do it in less than half the time and at a fraction of the cost? Eureka.

Gene has been obsessed with cars since before he could legally sit in the front seat. Writer, researcher, unofficial CS support, accountant, native suit guy when needed, and overall stick poker. He approaches every story the way he approaches a road trip: with too much enthusiasm, not enough planning, and a surprisingly good outcome. gene@teslarati.com

Advertisement
Comments

Elon Musk

Tesla Cybercabs narrowly miss deadly Amazon cargo plane crash

An Amazon cargo plane crash near Miami’s airport stopped feet from dozens of Tesla Cybercabs.

Published

on

By

Photorealistic depiction of the Amazon Prime plane crash in Miami on Sep 3, 2026 near a fleet of Tesla Cybercab
Photorealistic depiction of the Amazon Prime plane crash in Miami on Sep 3, 2026 near a fleet of Tesla Cybercab

An Amazon Prime Air Boeing 767 cargo jet overran the runway at Miami International Airport on Sunday afternoon, killing five people and injuring five more. The jet, operated by North Carolina based carrier 21 Air as Flight 7598, touched down around 2 p.m. after arriving from San Juan, Puerto Rico, then crossed the airport perimeter, plowed across NW 67th Avenue and struck multiple vehicles before catching fire, according to the Associated Press.

Photos and video from the scene show the aircraft’s nose stopped within meters of a fenced staging lot holding dozens of gold painted Tesla Cybercabs, the steering wheel free robotaxi Tesla began putting on public roads in Austin last week. Miami-Dade Fire Rescue has confirmed the plane struck “multiple vehicles” but has not said whether any Cybercabs were among them, and neither Tesla nor airport officials have addressed the fleet directly.

The Cybercabs had not yet entered commercial service in Miami. Tesla’s existing Robotaxi operation there runs on modified Model Y vehicles and has been unsupervised since Ashok Elluswamy confirmed the detail on X in July.


Elon Musk offered the briefest of reactions. Replying to a Zero Hedge post about the Cybercabs sitting so close to the wreckage, he wrote a single word: “Weird.” He has not commented further, and Tesla has not issued a statement.

The timing puts Tesla’s newest vehicle near an unrelated but highly visible tragedy just days after its Austin debut, a launch that had already drawn scrutiny from federal regulators. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration opened an audit how Tesla certified the Cybercab as compliant with federal vehicle safety standards, a process Teslarati covered after the vehicle’s September 3 launch event. That inquiry concerns the car’s lack of a steering wheel and pedals, not the Miami crash.

Advertisement
-

Investigators from the FAA and NTSB are focused on the plane, not the parking lot beside it. Flight data reviewed by outlets including Simple Flying show the 767 touched down around 170 knots, well above the 135 to 140 knot range typical for the aircraft, though investigators have not determined a cause. Amazon said it is working with authorities and that its priority is the safety of everyone affected.

Whether any Cybercabs were damaged, and what Tesla plans for the fleet parked near one of the country’s busiest airports, remain open questions.

Continue Reading

News

Tesla crosses major Unsupervised Self-Driving milestone

Published

on

Credit: Tesla

Tesla has reached a notable benchmark in its autonomous driving program after its Robotaxi fleet surpassed one million miles of unsupervised operation. The company made the announcement during its Cybercab event in Austin on September 3.

Tesla Vice President of AI Ashok Elluswamy told attendees he was happy to report the fleet had achieved one million miles of unsupervised Robotaxi operation as a testament to safety.

The new total marked a sharp increase from the 380,000 unsupervised miles Tesla disclosed during its second-quarter 2026 earnings update in late July.

In roughly six weeks, the company added about 620,000 miles. That acceleration followed Tesla’s decision to remove in-vehicle safety monitors from most of its operations outside the San Francisco Bay Area.

Credit: Tesla

Tesla first launched Robotaxi service in Austin in June 2025 with safety drivers present. It later began fully unsupervised rides and expanded into Dallas, Houston, Miami, Orlando, and Tampa. The San Francisco Bay Area remains the exception, where a safety monitor still rides in the vehicle under California permitting rules.

The company has not released a city-by-city breakdown of the one million unsupervised miles.

The milestone arrived as Tesla began offering public Cybercab rides in Austin. The purpose-built vehicle has no steering wheel or pedals and is designed only for autonomous ride-hailing. Production versions joined the existing fleet of modified Tesla vehicles already operating in the service.

Advertisement
-

Tesla’s unsupervised mileage is growing at a double-digit weekly rate according to earlier company comments, yet its fleet size remains modest compared with established competitors. Waymo has accumulated more than 200 million fully autonomous rider-only miles. Tesla has described its own unsupervised operations as having recorded zero notable incidents in the period leading up to the July update.

The one-million-mile figure reflects Tesla’s shift from supervised testing to broader driverless service in multiple states. It also highlights the company’s strategy of using both existing Model Y vehicles and the new Cybercab to scale its network.

Credit: Tesla

Whether the rapid recent growth continues will depend on further city expansions, regulatory approvals, and the performance of the purpose-built Cybercab in everyday paid rides. Tesla has not specified how many of the latest miles involved the new vehicle versus the rest of the fleet.

The announcement underscores Tesla’s progress toward a larger robotaxi network while illustrating the remaining gap in total autonomous experience relative to longer-operating rivals.

Continue Reading

News

Tesla Robotaxi will be a 24/7 service: here’s when

Published

on

Credit: @AdanGuajardo/X

Tesla AI lead Ashok Elluswamy said this week that 24-hour Robotaxi service is close. Replying on X to a rider who wanted Cybercab trips all night, he wrote that the capability would arrive “next month or so” once “the next tech to merge on the v15 plan” is ready.

The comment landed on September 4, one day after Tesla opened public Cybercab rides in Austin. It is the clearest near-term timeline yet for overnight unsupervised operation. Tesla’s paid Robotaxi network currently runs from 6 a.m. to 10 p.m. seven days a week across Austin, Dallas, Houston, Miami, Orlando, and Tampa.

That 16-hour window is shorter than the 6 a.m. to 2 a.m. schedule the company used for much of the prior year.

Elluswamy did not name the specific feature or say whether the change would apply first to purpose-built Cybercabs, the existing Model Y fleet, or both. He also offered no city-by-city rollout list. The link to Full Self-Driving v15 is nevertheless significant.

Advertisement
-

Tesla has described v15 as a step-change architecture with seven parallel improvement tracks and roughly ten times more parameters than earlier builds. Early versions of that software already operate on the Robotaxi fleet and contain about 40 percent of the planned gains.

By July 2026, the unsupervised fleet had logged more than 380,000 miles across six cities in two states with what the company called an impeccable safety record and no notable incidents caused by the vehicles themselves. Tesla has repeatedly argued that camera-based end-to-end neural networks, rather than extra sensors, are the core of the solution.

Overnight service would test that claim in lower-light conditions and would also raise vehicle utilization, a key variable for Robotaxi unit economics. The company has already begun using public Superchargers at night and is building dedicated Robotaxi charging sites.

Riders have asked why software must change if the cars already drive in the dark. The practical answer appears to be reliability and scale: Tesla has held back mass expansion until more of the v15 stack is merged, citing the need for higher confidence before putting thousands of unoccupied vehicles on streets around the clock.

If the next module arrives on the timetable Elluswamy sketched, 24-hour service could begin in October 2026 in at least some markets.

That would mark a shift from a daytime-bounded pilot to a service that can run whenever demand exists, including the late-night hours that have so far remained out of reach.

Advertisement
-
Continue Reading