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Ford Mustang Mach-E, Tesla Model 3 to join NYPD, NYC agencies for Gov’t use

To demonstrate that a vehicle with an electric powertrain can deliver strong performance and stand up to demanding police duty cycles, the company is submitting an all-electric police pilot vehicle based on the 2021 Mustang Mach-E SUV for testing as part of the Michigan State Police 2022 Model Year Police Evaluation on Sept. 18 and 20. Graphics on vehicle not available for sale. (Credit: Ford)

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Update: The New York City Department of Citywide Administrative Services also confirmed to Teslarati that it will purchase 250 Model 3 units for the New York City fleet. The contract for the Mustang Mach-E has been finalized. The contract for Model 3 sedans is undergoing the approval process, but has not yet been finalized. This is why the Model 3s were not included in the press release.

The New York City Department of Citywide Administrative Services (DCAS) announced today that it will order 184 Ford Mustang Mach-E vehicles and 250 Tesla Model 3s to join the City’s law enforcement and emergency response teams for regular use.

The New York City DCAS only confirmed the purchase of the Mach-E vehicles in its press release. The Model 3 purchase order was confirmed to Teslarati by the NYC DCAS. It was initially reported by DriveTeslaCanada.

“Today, the New York City Department of Citywide Administrative Services announced that it is placing an order for 184 all-electric Ford Mustang Mach-E Sport Crossover Utility Vehicles for law enforcement and emergency response use,” the DCAS wrote in a press release. “The new electric crossovers, purchased as part of the City’s largest electric vehicle (EV) purchase to date, are slated for use by the New York City Police Department (NYPD), the New York City Sheriff’s Office, the Department of Correction, the Department of Parks and Recreation, the Department of Environmental Protection, NYC Emergency Management, DCAS Police, and the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner.”

Credit: @Brian4NY | Twitter

The 184 Mustang Mach-E vehicles will replace current gas-powered cars that are still used in the City’s fleet. The City expects to take delivery of all 184 units by June 30, 2022, it said.

“Smart investments in fleet electrification will help New York City break its dependence on fossil fuels, “Dawn M Pinnick, Acting Commissioner of the NYC DCAS, said. “We are working successfully toward achieving the ambitious goal of an all-electric City vehicle fleet by 2035 by taking steps to fight the climate crisis every day.”

The NYPD utilizes over 6,200 light-duty vehicles for law enforcement, which is the largest group of vehicles in the City fleet, which consists of almost 30,000 cars. It will be the largest order of all-electric plug-in vehicles in law enforcement history and will pave the way for New York City to fully electrify its fleet by 2035.

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Ford Mustang Mach-E captures KBB’s EV Best Buy of 2022

“Law enforcement vehicles are the largest and most visible part of our City’s fleet,” Keith Kerman, Deputy Commissioner for DCAS and NYC Chief Fleet Officer, said. “This order of all-electric Mach-Es will enable our law enforcement agencies to put electric models to the full test and work out maintenance, lights and sirens, charging, and other operational issues. It is a critical step towards our goal of a fully electric fleet.”

The NYC DCAS signed the contract and registered it on December 22nd. The process for finding and commissioning these vehicles was not easy, as the DCAS sought information in June 2017 for the first time regarding the City’s process of bidding for vehicles, equipment, and fuel. The City will spend $11.5 million on initial orders, and its contract with a Minority and/or women-owned business enterprise vendor will remain intact for five years.

The NYC DCAS did not immediately respond to our request for comment.

I’d love to hear from you! If you have any comments, concerns, or questions, please email me at joey@teslarati.com. You can also reach me on Twitter @KlenderJoey, or if you have news tips, you can email us at tips@teslarati.com.

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Joey has been a journalist covering electric mobility at TESLARATI since August 2019. In his spare time, Joey is playing golf, watching MMA, or cheering on any of his favorite sports teams, including the Baltimore Ravens and Orioles, Miami Heat, Washington Capitals, and Penn State Nittany Lions. You can get in touch with joey at joey@teslarati.com. He is also on X @KlenderJoey. If you're looking for great Tesla accessories, check out shop.teslarati.com

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Elon Musk

The Boring Company’s latest Tesla tunnel truck mod “fits like a glove”

The Boring Company has modified a Tesla powered tunnel truck to carry freight containers underground.

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The Boring Company has found a second job for the Tesla hardware it already runs underground. In a post on X, Elon Musk’s tunneling company showed its latest Prufrock Liner Truck modified to carry a standard 20 foot shipping container. “Using TBC tunnels to transport freight,” the company wrote. “The latest Prufrock Liner Truck (using Tesla Model 3 batteries and drive units) has been modified to carry a standard 20′ shipping container. Fits like a glove!”

The photo shows a red container sitting on a long, low white chassis parked outside, with drive hardware visible at one end. The Boring Company did not say where or when freight hauling would start, which customers it has in mind, or how many trucks it is converting.

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Until now, the liner trucks have hauled concrete. Teslarati reported in August on Liner Truck 3, which uses Model 3 battery packs and drive units to move more than 22,000 pounds of precast tunnel segments to the boring machine. It has 28 miles of range, tops out at 12 mph, and is piloted remotely from the company’s operations center in Texas. The freight version appears to be the same platform with a different bed, and The Boring Company has not said whether it will also be remotely piloted.

Freight has been on the company’s menu for years. When TBC updated its product lineup in 2021, its freight tunnel was described as sized to fit a standard shipping container, “barely.” The company later used the idea at Tesla’s own factory, where Prufrock 3 dug a tunnel to Giga Texas that now moves finished Cybertrucks away from the production line.

The Boring Company closed a $3 billion Series D in September at a $23 billion valuation, and Teslarati has covered how that money is tied to a UAE tunneling push and a faster Nashville build. In Nashville, Prufrock MB1 and MB2 are mining at the same time, and a third machine is expected to launch in late October. Each machine needs a steady supply of liner trucks, so any design that works for segments and containers alike gives the company more use out of the same Tesla parts.

The Vegas Loop remains the only Boring Company system open to the public, and it moves passengers in Tesla vehicles. A freight service would be a separate product, and the post gave no indication that one is close to launch. For now, it is a truck, a container and a short caption saying they fit together.

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Elon Musk

Elon Musk will give ‘every kid in America’ a SpaceX share in 2027

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Credit: Grok Imagine

Elon Musk said he is planning to give “every one of his SpaceX shares to every kid in America” in 2027, stating that “this will be the first of many.”

SpaceX went public earlier this year, and its stock price has been relatively stable since leveling off shortly after its IPO. Based on its current price, it’s a gift of just over $10 billion to children across the United States.

It appears to be closely related to President Donald Trump’s bank accounts for children, which were set up earlier this year as Trump Accounts.

Just hours earlier, Anthropic had announced the establishment of its Anthropic Public Benefit Fund, “a new wholly-owned entity dedicated entirely to public benefit.” Musk responded by stating he recommended “giving the shares directly to the public,” and that he would be doing it that way.

Just a little bit later, Musk said children across the U.S. would be getting a share from him:

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There are roughly 70 million children, meaning someone under the age of 18, in the United States, according to the Federal Interagency Forum on Child and Family Statistics. Musk’s ownership of SpaceX stock shows he has around 849 million Class A shares of SpaceX stock, according to filings with the SEC.

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Elon Musk

Elon Musk reveals why Boring Co’s biggest East Coast project never happened

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(Credit: The Boring Company)

Elon Musk revealed in a post on X that “Permits were impossible to get,” explaining the fate of The Boring Company’s most ambitious East Coast proposal.

The comment responded to a query about what became of his July 20, 2017 announcement that he had “just received verbal govt approval” for an underground Hyperloop connecting New York City, Philadelphia, Baltimore, and Washington, D.C., capable of carrying passengers from the Big Apple to the Nation’s Capital in just 29 minutes.

The Boring Company receives verbal ‘approval’ to build NY to DC Hyperloop tunnel

The 2017 post, which envisioned city-center stations and multiple elevators in each city, sparked immediate scrutiny. Local and state officials in New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, and D.C. said they had no knowledge of any approval. A White House spokesperson confirmed only “promising conversations” about the transformative infrastructure.

Musk clarified shortly after that there was “still a lot of work” to do for formal approvals.

Limited progress followed, as Maryland Governor Larry Hogan’s administration issued a conditional utility permit and supported work near Fort Meade. In 2018, Washington, D.C., granted a preliminary permit for site preparation and excavation on a vacant lot at 53 New York Ave. NE in the NoMa neighborhood, which The Boring Company said could become a station.

A draft environmental assessment for a D.C.-Baltimore segment was released in 2019. Yet, by April 2021, the company had removed the project from its website, and the Federal Highway Administration reported receiving no indication of further interest. Communication with Maryland officials had ceased.

The full corridor would have required coordination among the District of Columbia, Maryland, Pennsylvania, New York, the Federal Highway Administration, the Army Corps of Engineers, the National Park Service, and other agencies.

Environmental reviews under the National Environmental Policy Act, utility clearances, and approvals for novel infrastructure added to the overall complexity of the project and its approval.

Speculation on the permitting barriers centers around a few factors, but a multi-state, multi-level route involving unproven high-speed vacuum-tube technology inherently triggers exhaustive safety, environmental, and engineering reviews that can stretch for years, even for conventional projects.

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There are also other elements, of course, like officials who may face political exposure if a privately funded, untested system encountered anything such as cost overruns, delays, or safety issues. On the outset of this project, there were limited things such as engineering plans or demonstrated technology maturity, which also added to the potential skepticism.

The East Coast vision for Boring Co., once framed as a privately funded revolution that could reshape Northeast travel, quietly ended without construction of the promised network. Musk’s recent statement frames the outcome as a regulatory impasse, unfortunate but not unexpected.

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