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Tesla urged by local residents to build bike path near proposed Portland Store

Residents of South Waterfront in Portland, OR urge Tesla to complete a bike path adjoining its proposed Showroom and Service Center

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Tesla Showroom and Service Center Portland

Tesla has reportedly volunteeredΒ to buildΒ a bike trail at the urge of local residents near the proposed site for its Showroom and Service Center in Portland, Oregon.

A riverfront area known as South Waterfront justΒ 2 miles south of Downtown Portland has been the site for the city’sΒ urban redevelopment project over the last decade. Nestled among luxuryΒ high-rise condominiums, sophisticated industrial-chic stores, and urban dining joints, is a relatively undeveloped area that was once the site for the now vacantΒ 35,000 sqft. Benz Spring Company warehouse, a pre-WWII manufacturer of automotive leaf springs and coil springs.

According to NextPortland a site that keeps track of building developments in the city, Tesla has applied for a Design and Land Use review on its proposed Showroom and Service Center located at 4330 SW Macadam, the same location that houses the abandoned Benz Spring Co. warehouse.

Flyer advertising the commercial lease of 4330 SW Macadam, future site of Tesla's Showroom / Service Center [Source: Canterbury Commercial LLC]

Flyer advertising the commercial lease of 4330 SW Macadam, future site of Tesla’s Showroom / Service Center [Source: Canterbury Commercial LLC]

Photos fromΒ a flyer forΒ a Canterbury CommercialΒ real estate leasing company show the rectangular shaped building bisecting a popular riverfront walking and biking trail. Local residents of South Waterfront have urged Tesla to assist with building a bike path known as the Willamette Greenway Trail that would connect the existing path that ends directly south of the building with the area north of it. The request comes afterΒ budgetary constraints halted completion of the proposed project by the city’s Parks and Recreation division.

We’ve included a Google Street View image showing theΒ current bike path coming to an endΒ as it reaches the southern point of the proposed Tesla Showroom.

While Tesla’s Store seems generally welcomed based on positive comments from residents out of the South Waterfront Facebook Group, many locals have urged the company to consider completing “the gap” in the Willamette Greenway Trail or more commonly known as “the pathway to nowhere” by locals.

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However, city zoning codesΒ in South WaterfrontΒ exempt projects having to connect the Greenway Trail gap on their property unless they’re adding at least 50,000 square feet of new floor space.Β In essence Tesla was not required to build the bike path since their proposal for the store (see official filing here)Β wasΒ for a remodelΒ of the existing warehouse which registers under 50,000 square feet.

According to BikePortland.org, South Waterfront local resident Bob Cronk took to the community’s Facebook groupΒ askingΒ residents to write the city’s Land Use Services division and urge Tesla to “complete their share of the Willamette Greenway Trail!”

Bob writes on May 5 via Facebook’s South Waterfront – Portland Oregon group:

“Tesla is remodeling a warehouse in South Waterfront. Their plans do not include completing their portion of the river path also known as the Willamette Greenway Trail. If you would like to see this trail completed, email Jeff Mitchem at Land Use Services at jeffrey.mitchem@portlandoregon.gov (case file number LU 16-116605 DZ) by May 20th and let him know you want this gap in the trail completed! Each new project in the neighborhood needs to fill in their portion so we will someday have a continuous trail along the river.”

Well, Tesla obliged and volunteered to complete the long overdue bridgingΒ of the Greenway Trail gap.Β Last week, Bob took to Facebook again to announce that Tesla had agreed to complete the segment of the Greenway Trail adjoining their upcoming store.

“Good news, Tesla has agreed to pave the path on their property!”

In a city that’s stereotypically knownΒ for being greenΒ and flat-out hip, walking, biking, and soon driving a Tesla will hopefully be a common place item. We leave you with a closing comment from a happy reader of BikePortland.org. “Grandpa” writes:

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β€œWe don’t yet know why Tesla decided to build the trail …
Perhaps they did it because it is the right thing to do, and they are a company who’s business model is to do the right thing. Their product line would support that supposition. FWIW I emailed Tesla that I had a case of beer riding on their putting the trail section in. That may have been the deciding factor.”

And that’s why Portland is one of the hippest cities on earth.

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

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Elon Musk

Tesla primes Cybercabs for 4K streaming and high bandwidth gaming with Starlink integration

Tesla is now shipping Cybercabs from Giga Texas with Starlink hardware built in as standard.

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tesla cybercab with no manual controls showing a movie with two employees inside

Tesla’s Cybercabs are now leaving Gigafactory Texas with Starlink hardware on the rear hatch in significant numbers, according to drone footage captured Tuesday by longtime Austin drone observer Joe Tegtmeyer. Production at the factory ramped back up after the Labor Day weekend, and his flyover of the outbound lot showed rows of gold Cybercabs alongside Model Y Long Wheelbase units, many carrying the satellite module for the first time as standard equipment rather than a one off retrofit.

Tesla first showed Starlink built into an actual Cybercab on August 10, when the Robotaxi account posted images of a single gold unit with the antenna integrated into the roofline above the taillights and called it the first Cybercab with Starlink integration. That followed a July reveal where Tesla and Starlink jointly posted a cutaway diagram of the antenna placement without a working vehicle to back it up. Ashok Elluswamy, Tesla’s VP of AI software, said at the time that the connection isn’t required for the car to drive itself. It exists mainly for navigation, customer service and keeping tabs on the fleet.

Musk has made a different case in public. During Tesla’s Q2 earnings call, he said the company can’t afford robotaxis stranded in what he called “Bermuda Triangles of lack of cellular connectivity,” and he separately claimed on X that Starlink will eventually reach every Tesla built, calling it the only way to deliver high bandwidth to billions of vehicles. He has also pitched the antenna as an entertainment upgrade, telling riders they would be able to stream 4K video or play games during a trip.

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The rollout has moved fast since. Robotaxi service opened to the public in Austin on September 3, and Cybercabs had already been spotted with Starlink hardware in Houston and near Miami International Airport in the weeks before Tuesday’s factory footage showed the module shipping at volume rather than on scattered test units. Whether the satellite link earns its keep is still an open question. Tesla’s unsupervised service currently runs in dense metro geofences in Texas and Florida, markets where cellular coverage is already strong, which is not where the rural dead zones Musk describes tend to show up.

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Tesla Cybertruck targets job site crews with new Tailgate Utility Track and Bed Gear Box accessory

Tesla launched a $350 tailgate track and a $985 lockable Bed Gear Box for Cybertruck.

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Tesla Cybertruck construction site

Tesla’s Cybertruck team added two more items to the Tesla Shop, targeting job site crews and owners who use the truck bed for actual work rather than just showing it off. The official Cybertruck X account posted the Tailgate Utility Track and the Bed Gear Box within minutes of each other, part of a five item batch that also included a reflective jacket, a spray paint hat and an updated reflective tee.

The Tailgate Utility Track runs $350 and turns the folded down tailgate into another mounting surface. It’s a single aluminum track with a T-slot for sliding accessories and two L-track attachment points, plus two load stops included in the box. The pitch is straightforward: strap down oversized cargo, like lumber or a cooler, that hangs off the back of the bed without it sliding out mid-drive. It bolts onto the existing tailgate and works on every Cybertruck trim.

The Bed Gear Box costs $985 and is a different kind of accessory. It’s a lockable aluminum storage box, 55.78 inches long, 19.8 inches wide and 7.79 inches tall, that mounts to the bed’s L-track rails and comes with two internal bins for smaller items. According to Tesla, at just over 57 pounds empty, it’s meant to stay in place rather than come in and out with each trip, giving owners a factory-fit alternative to loose totes for tools, recovery gear or emergency supplies. Tesla’s listing notes that Long Range and Dual Motor AWD Cybertrucks need the L-Tracks accessory installed separately before the Gear Box will mount, since L-tracks come standard only on certain configurations.

Tesla Cybertruck bed gear box accessory

Tesla Cybertruck bed gear box accessory

Both accessories lean on the idea Tesla has been building toward since Elon Musk first described the Cybertruck’s third-party attachment strategy at the 2023 shareholder meeting, when he said the truck would ship with mounting points so outside companies, and Tesla itself, could keep adding gear without redesigning the bed. That’s the same L-track backbone underneath the tailgate shield and jumpseats Tesla launched last year, and the off-road armor package that arrived through the same X account in 2025.

Owners looking to round out the rest of the L-track ecosystem, cargo dividers, MOLLE panels, bed racks and similar gear, can find a wider range of options through our Cybertruck accessories collection.

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Elon Musk says he knows how to save Earth for a billion years

Elon Musk says sentient AI satellites launched from the Moon could keep Earth livable forever.

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Elon Musk spent part of his weekend describing a plan to keep the planet livable for roughly a billion years, and it starts with satellites that can think for themselves.

In a post on X, Musk argued that swapping fossil fuels for solar and wind power will not be enough to protect humanity from what he called extremely severe extinction events, the kind that occur roughly every 100 million years. His fix is what he called sentient satellites, or solar-powered satellites, controlled by AI, that would sit in a fixed spot between Earth and the Sun after being launched off the Moon using a giant electromagnetic catapult instead of rockets.

The satellites’ onboard AI would make continuous, small adjustments rather than waiting on human instructions. The mass driver is Musk’s proposed way of getting the raw material there cheaply by using an electromagnetic launch track built on the Moon, where lower gravity and no atmosphere make it far easier to fling cargo into space than it is from Earth.

Musk shared a Grok generated estimate suggesting roughly 5 percent of Florida’s land, or about 1.68 million acres, could face regular flooding by 2070 under a high sea level rise scenario, and said humanity has about 50 years to act before coastal living looks very different than it does today.

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This is not the first time Musk has floated the idea. He raised a similar concept in November, describing a solar powered AI satellite constellation that could make tiny adjustments to incoming sunlight to fine tune Earth’s temperature. Musk has also tied planetary risk to his broader vision at SpaceX, where his compensation package is explicitly linked to establishing a self-sustaining Mars colony, one he has described as an insurance policy against the kind of extinction event he referenced this weekend, and where he has said humans could set foot within five to seven years.

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