Elon Musk

These Vegas Casinos Want Elon Musk's Boring Company to Build Them Tunnels, With Teslas to Transport Guests

Robyn Beck | Pool | Reuters

Elon Musk's The Boring Company might not be done digging underneath Las Vegas: Two Vegas casinos are already hoping to work with Musk to build more tunnels below Sin City to shuttle around guests and gamblers. 

In May, The Boring Company announced it had completed excavation on the second of two tunnels that will run underneath the Las Vegas Convention Center (LVCC). The tunnels will be used to quickly whisk attendees of the convention center's events — which attract millions of tourists every year — across the LVCC's sprawling, 3.2 million-square-foot campus in a matter of minutes, traveling the 0.8-mile route in modified electric Tesla vehicles carrying up to 16 passengers at a time.

While that project is expected to fully open by January 2021 (once additional construction is finished above ground), Wynn Resorts announced in June that it is working with The Boring Company on a proposed tunnel that would connect the Wynn in Vegas, which has over 2,700 rooms and a 111,000-square-foot casino, and the Encore, which has more than 2,000 rooms as well as four restaurants, a nightclub and a beach club, to the LVCC.

In the underground connector tunnel, Tesla vehicles will take visitors to and from the resorts and LVCC in under 2 minutes, Wynn Resorts wrote in a June 9 press release.

And, Wynn (which, with The Boring Company, is awaiting Clark County lawmakers' approval for the project), isn't alone.

Resorts World Las Vegas — a $4.3 billion hotel casino complex that is currently being built by Malaysian company Genting to include over 3,500 hotel rooms, a 117,000-square-foot casino and a 5,000-seat theater — also submitted a proposal to Clark County at the beginning of June for its own tunnel project with Musk's The Boring Company. 

The Resorts World Las Vegas proposal is also for an underground tunnel that would connect the hotel casino to LVCC in order to "swiftly transport passengers" via electric Tesla vehicles in less than two minutes.

Clark County Commissioner Tick Segerblom tweeted an aerial photo showing the proposed tunnel routes between LVCC and the hotel casinos owned by Wynn Resorts and Resorts World.

Tweeted picture of proposed routes

Wynn Resorts is proposing a 0.6-mile tunnel, while Resorts World Las Vegas is proposing a 0.4-mile tunnel between its complex and the LVCC, according to The Verge, which obtained copies of the companies' proposals on Friday. Both proposed projects would feature above-ground passenger platforms, The Verge reported.

A map showing the proposed route for an underground tunnel from The Boring Company and Resorts World Las Vegas.
Source: Resorts World Las Vegas
A map showing the proposed route for an underground tunnel from The Boring Company and Resorts World Las Vegas.

LVCC is in the midst of a $935 million expansion project that will add a new 600,000-square-foot exhibit hall to further expand the convention center's presence near the Las Vegas Strip. It hosts numerous high-profile annual conventions that bring waves of additional tourists into the city, including the annual Consumer Electronics Show (CES).

Wynn Resorts and Resorts World Las Vegas are both negotiating the terms of their agreements with The Boring Company with regard to how much each of the resort operations would pay Musk's company to finance the construction of the proposed tunnels, according to The Verge. None of the companies have provided estimates for how much the projects could cost. The Boring Company's current LVCC tunnel project, known as the Convention Center Loop, will ultimately cost the city's convention and tourism authority over $50 million.

Resorts World Las Vegas and The Boring Company produced a mock-up presentation of a passenger platform for their proposed underground tunnel project in Las Vegas.
Source: Resorts World Las Vegas
Resorts World Las Vegas and The Boring Company produced a mock-up presentation of a passenger platform for their proposed underground tunnel project in Las Vegas.

While the Convention Center Loop, which is publicly funded, will offer free rides to passengers, the proposed tunnel routes by Wynn Resorts and Resorts World Las Vegas would reportedly cost money. Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority CEO Steve Hill told CNN that they would likely cost between $3 to $5 per trip.

"It's too early to confirm additional details but the service will be open to the public and fares will be affordable," a Resorts World Las Vegas spokeswoman told CNBC Make It in an email.

A spokeswoman for Wynn Resorts added in a separate email that the company is not yet disclosing details such as the overall cost of the proposed project or passenger fare prices.

CNBC Make It also reached out to The Boring Company for comment and additional information, but the company did not immediately respond.

In May, The Boring Company tweeted a video of its machinery breaking through the a concrete wall to connect the two completed tunnels of the Convention Center Loop:

Twitter Loop video

Meanwhile, Musk and The Boring Company have proposed expanding the Convention Center Loop in the past, including building out the tunnels to make more than two dozen passenger stops throughout downtown Las Vegas, even reaching the city's airport and adding an extension to Los Angeles. However, city officials have so far not signed off on that plan, according to CNN.

The Convention Center Loop represented a major milestone for The Boring Company, as the tunnel company's first paying contract. The company has also completed a test tunnel near its headquarters in Hawthorne, California and has other projects in the works, including the Chicago Express Loop and the East Coast Loop from Washington D.C. to Baltimore. 

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