Chicago's mayor and Tesla Inc. (TSLA) CEO Elon Musk are in discussions on making the city a bit more boring.
Mayor Rahm Emanuel told the Chicago Tribune on Monday that he is having preliminary discussions with Musk to use a high-tech digger to bore out an underground high-speed rail line connecting the downtown to O'Hare International Airport. Musk is the founder of The Boring Co., which seeks to develop machines and techniques for digging tunnels.
"The other day, because of contact I've had with Elon Musk and his operation for a kind of a tunnel project rather than an existing rail project to be taken over, I sent a team out to look at his tunnel digger as part of this project," Emanuel told the Tribune. "They have shown interest, and now I've asked them to come to the city of Chicago, after I sent my team out to Southern California to explore it and explore their interest. They are very interested, and we're going to have them now out to the city to explore further what we are doing and planning and to see if the tunnel approach is an alternative to the ones we've been discussing."
Musk has said he would like to dig a network of underground roads that could reduce traffic in populous cities. In May, Boring began drilling its first tunnel that Musk said will run from the Los Angeles International Airport to Culver City, Santa Monica, Westwood and Sherman Oaks. He said future tunnels will cover the greater Los Angeles area.
Here are six other next-generation ideas on which Musk's companies are working.
Editors' pick: Originally published June 28.
