The Boring Company's very first demonstration tunnel is apparently nearing completion, with CEO Elon Musk declaring on Twitter that it will open its doors on December 10, with free rides for the public to kick off the following day.
Musk first shared his tunneling plans in December 2016, lamenting the traffic woes that plague the city of Los Angeles and resolving to overcome them by digging underneath them. He has tried to set his tunneling startup apart from existing tunneling approaches through a particular set of technological aspirations.
This includes shrinking the diameter of tunnels so they can be burrowed faster, which would also reduce the costs by three or four times. The Boring Company also aims to triple the power output, enable its machines to tunnel continuously, and modify them so they can dig and build the tunnel simultaneously, rather than stopping and starting as it goes.
The Boring Company put its tunneling machine to work at its headquarters in LA in October last year, beginning what it hopes will become its first demonstration tunnel. Musk has previously said that this could stretch as far as 13 mi (21 km) beneath the city, all the way to from LAX to Highway 101. He has now revealed that the length will be around 6,000 ft (1,800 m) long, and an opening event will be held on December 10.
The company's first operational, high-speed tunnel is planned for Chicago, which will take the form of an Express Loop that ferries passengers out to the airport in 12 minutes. Pedestrians and cars would be shuttled through these tunnels on electric skates at 155 mph (249 km/h).
Elon Musk is not short of ideas, but adhering to publicly disclosed timelines around those ideas certainly isn't a strong point. He actually first declared the LA demo tunnel to be nearing completion back in May, and said free rides will be offered to the public within a few months.
"Dec 10 in real time or Elon time?" asked one Twitter user today, to which Musk responded, "I think real."