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Elon Musk’s Boring Company breaks ground for garage-elevator construction
Last month, Elon Musk’s tunneling startup, The Boring Company, was granted an approval by the city council of Hawthorne, CA to build a prototype garage-elevator concept that would be linked to one of the company’s high-speed tunnels. Recent photos from Teslarati photographers Tom Cross and Pauline Acalin reveal that construction of the prototype elevator concept has already begun.
The Boring Company’s prototype garage-elevator is being built west of SpaceX’s Hawthorne facility. The location of the futuristic garage is no accident, as the startup plans to have cars enter the tunnel from the SpaceX campus, move through the tunnel and on to the garage-elevator, and then travel back to SpaceX as part of the concept’s tests. Adopting such a process allows The Boring Co. to avoid creating additional traffic on the street.
Photos captured by Teslarati photographers reveal that The Boring Company has broken ground on the site of its recently-announced garage-elevator. While the startup has not officially announced that the construction corresponds to the planned elevator concept, the site’s location on 120th St. near Prairie Avenue matches the address of the project that the company confirmed to The Mercury Times last month. Furthermore, the pit’s sheer scale fits well with the company’s plans to dig a hole to extract segments of its tunnel boring machine (TBM).
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- The excavation site of the Boring Company’s garage-elevator prototype. [Credit: Tom Cross/Teslarati]
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- The excavation site of the Boring Company’s garage-elevator prototype. [Credit: Tom Cross/Teslarati]
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- The excavation site of the Boring Company’s garage-elevator prototype. [Credit: Pauline Acalin/Teslarati]
The site of the Boring Company’s excavation for its garage-elevator prototype. [Credit: Tom Cross and Pauline Acalin/Teslarati]
Looking at the images of the construction in progress, it appears that the hole being excavated is around 30 feet or more in diameter. This is quite substantial, considering that graphics provided by the tunneling startup show the garage-elevator transporting cars one at a time. As noted by AutomobileElevator, a company in the business of providing car elevators, lifts that are designed for large vehicles like full-sized SUVs usually have dimensions of 9.3 x 20 x 7 feet – significantly smaller than the pit in the Boring Company’s ongoing excavation. With this in mind, it appears that the tunneling startup’s garage-elevator, once complete, would have enough space to accommodate large mainstream vehicles like full-sized SUVs and trucks.
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- The Boring Company’s proposed prototype garage. [Credit: The Boring Company]
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- The Boring Company’s proposed prototype garage. [Credit: The Boring Company]
The Boring Company’s proposed prototype garage-elevator concept. [Credit: The Boring Company]
In a comment about the garage-elevator, Boring Company representative Jane Labanowski noted that the prototype concept would be an essential part of the tunneling startup’s vision for the future. The garage-elevator, if any, would serve as convenient entry point for the company’s high-speed tunnel system, particularly for those in residential areas.
“It’s an important part of the longer-term vision the company is trying to build,” she said.
The Boring Company might be a newcomer in the transportation industry that is more well-known for its quirky merchandise such as the Boring Company Not-a-Flamethrower, but the tunneling startup is already starting to gain contracts for high-profile projects. Earlier this year, for example, the Boring Company won a contract for the construction of the downtown Chicago-O’Hare high-speed transport line, beating larger, more experienced conglomerates which were also bidding on the project. The Chicago project would feature the Loop system, which features Tesla-made fully-electric pods capable of transporting up to 16 people at a time at speed of up to 150 mph.
Tesla has officially revealed its 2026 Summer Update, which comes with a variety of crazy new features, including Navigation fixes that owners have been wanting for months.
Tesla routinely releases a larger update with the Spring, Summer, Fall, and Winter updates, where it ships a variety of new features, bug fixes, and other additions to customer cars.
The 2026 Spring Update featured things like “Hey Grok” voice assistance, a redesigned self-driving app, Unreal Engine visual upgrades, and more.
🚨 TESLA’S SUMMER UPDATE FOR 2026 IS HERE:
Featuring:
✅ Self-Driving Stats in Mobile App
✅ Caraoke with Scoring
✅ Automatic Navigation
✅ Preferred Routes
✅ Set Arrival Energy from Mobile App
✅ Send Custom Wraps from Mobile App
✅ Rear Display Lock
✅ Other Improvements
🔌… https://t.co/C9IW3egEhH— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) July 21, 2026
Tesla’s Summer Release has about ten new features; we’ll show you each and detail them below:
New Grok Voice Commands
“Grok can now make phone calls, search and play music, adjust climate, open the glovebox, and answer questions about your Tesla.”
Self-Driving Stats in Mobile App
“View and share self-driving stats from the mobile app.”
Caraoke With Scoring
“Caraoke now scores your singing while in Park. High scores are saved to your Tesla profile.”
Automatic Navigation
“Automatic Navigation now adapts to your routine.
In addition to Home, Work, and upcoming calendar events, your vehicle can now suggest and route to places you visit regularly – like a school drop-off on the way to work, or the gym on the way home.”
Preferred Routes
“For a more personalized experience, navigation now prioritizes routes that you’ve taken before”
Set Arrival Energy from Mobile App
“Set your desired Arrival Energy from your phone.”
Send Custom Wraps from Mobile App
“Skip the USB drive and upload a custom wrap of your car from the mobile app. Instructions for creating a custom wrap here: https://github.com/teslamotors/custom-wraps.”
Rear Display Lock
“Kids can watch content on the rear screen, but only the front row can control it through the rear screen app.”
Other Improvements
- Find Superchargers by name when searching for a destination
- Add Apple Music songs to queue from search and artist page
- Set your preferred zoom level for the Self-Driving visualization
- Intro animations for new Model 3 and Y
Tesla’s reason for Starlink integration on Cybercab might surprise you, as the company’s Head of AI, Ashok Elluswamy, finally shed some light on the reason they are putting a satellite internet terminal on its ride-hailing-geared vehicle.
On Monday, Tesla officially confirmed that it would integrate Starlink V5 terminals into Cybercab vehicles, something many Tesla fans had figured the company would do, as the vehicle is primarily geared toward giving rides without any passenger intervention.
Starlink V5 directly integrated in Cybercab pic.twitter.com/FxzTtzjB6I
— Tesla (@Tesla) July 20, 2026
The ability to access the internet would allow riders to work or play in the car with their devices. It seemed like a more-than-reasonable feature to add to the Cybercab, which made its way off the production lines for the first time earlier this year.
Tesla reveals first vehicle model to receive Starlink integration
However, the move is not for the rider, as Elluswamy confirmed on Monday night. Instead, it’s actually for Tesla to be able to have a constant connection to the cars in the Robotaxi fleet so it can troubleshoot issues, contact riders, or resolve other issues.
Elluswamy said:
“It is still not required for safe operation of the vehicle. Connectivity is primarily meant for navigation, customer service and, in general, fleet management.”
It is still not required for safe operation of the vehicle. Connectivity is primarily meant for navigation, customer service and, in general, fleet management.
— Ashok Elluswamy (@aelluswamy) July 20, 2026
Many initially assumed the option of constant connectivity would be enabled on the Cybercab for passenger entertainment or work. With the Cybercab, passengers won’t be doing anything but enjoying the ride, so it seemed more than logical that they would be hanging out with Starlink internet access as an amenity.
However, Tesla’s primary concern with Robotaxi is safety, and nailing these first unsupervised rides is a crucial step to setting a good narrative on how effective driverless transportation can be.
Being able to get in touch with passengers or a vehicle if something is wrong is a crucial part of the overall experience, and preventative measures are being taken by Tesla to ensure a smooth process, even in the worst-case.
Tesla has expanded its Robotaxi program in Florida to include two new cities: Tampa and Orlando.
This marks the second and third cities to be added to the company’s available locations for autonomous ride-hailing in the Sunshine State, joining Miami, which was the first Florida city to offer Robotaxi rides.
Tesla announced the addition of Orlando and Tampa to the Robotaxi program on Tuesday morning. The cities now join Austin, Dallas, Houston, Miami, and the San Francisco Bay Area as locations where Tesla can operate its Robotaxi platform:
Robotaxi now in Tampa & Orlando! pic.twitter.com/fYtmXgJq3O
— Tesla Robotaxi (@robotaxi) July 21, 2026
These rides are unsupervised, as AI Head Ashok Elluswamy confirmed the suite in Florida is operating without safety drivers or anyone within the cabin to assist with operation.
Orlando Tesla Robotaxi Operation
The geofence in Orlando covers a prominent irregular shaded zone on the map, roughly 4-6 miles across in key dimensions, so it likely measures somewhere between 25 and 45 square miles, which is comparable to other early Tesla launches in other cities.
It encompasses central and southern areas bounded by major highways including SR-417 and SR-528, including parts of the Orlando metro core, tourism-adjacent zones, and residential/commercial districts. This represents an initial targeted rollout in a tourist-heavy region, positioned for quick expansion via Tesla’s software updates.
Tampa Tesla Robotaxi Operation
In Tampa, the shape of the geofence is a shaded polygon covering key neighborhoods, explicitly including West Tampa, Tampa Heights, Hyde Park, and downtown Tampa proper, with boundaries along major roads and the Hillsborough River area.
This focuses on high-demand central zones and will offer tourists and citygoers rides without drivers.
Robotaxi Progress
Tesla has been operating Robotaxi since last June, when it launched in Austin. The geofences in most regions have already expanded several times since their launch last year, but the bigger complaint is vehicle availability. Tesla has been working to add more Robotaxi-enabled vehicles to its fleet.
The company still plans to utilize its Cybercab, a new vehicle that is being produced at Gigafactory Texas, for the Robotaxi suite alongside the Model Y, which has been the vehicle of choice for Tesla with early operations.
Tesla reveals 2026 Summer Update with crazy fixes to Nav and more
Tesla’s reason for Starlink integration on Cybercab might surprise you
