Engineering, Passenger Rail, Research & Development, Technology and IT

Musk estimates $1bn for Blue Mountains tunnel

Technology entrepreneur Elon Musk says his Boring Company transport loop system could deliver a 50-kilometre underground transit system beneath the Blue Mountains west of Sydney for roughly US$1 billion.

Asked by Independent NSW MP Jeremy Buckingham on Wednesday, the Tesla founder tweeted his back-of-the-envelope costings for a tunnel Buckingham said would “open up the west of our state” and help a city which is “choking with traffic”.

“About $15M/km for a two way high speed transit, so probably around $750M plus maybe $50M/station,” Musk said on Wednesday night.

Buckingham, an Independent since quitting the Greens in December 2018, sits in the NSW Upper House and resides on the state’s Mid North Coast.

“Sounds like a bargain,” Buckingham said of Musk’s figures. “Could be a game changer to go under the Blue Mountains with a modern link between Sydney and the west. I’ll raise it with the Premier @GladysB other colleagues, the community, and get back to you.”

Buckingham subsequently tweeted a potential route for the tunnel, running from Penrith to just south of Lithgow.

 


Graphic: Twitter / Jeremy Buckingham MP

 

The Boring Company, founded by Musk in 2016, recently debuted its 1.8-kilometre Boring Test Tunnel, featuring retractable wheels Musk says turn a car “into a rail-guided train and back again”.

 


Photo: The Boring Company

 

The test tunnel is capable of moving vehicles at roughly 120km/h, according to Musk’s statements to the media, but he has said he wants to see speeds of up to 250km/h, at a rate of 4,000 vehicles per hour.

“A variety of vehicles, like normal roads, from a small car to a densely seated bus,” Musk detailed on December 20. “If all vehicles were densely seated buses, throughput in excess of 100,000 people per hour per lane is possible, but better to offer a range of vehicles and let people decide what makes them happy.”

Musk made headlines in 2017 when he offered to help solve South Australia’s energy woes by building a 100MW energy storage facility within 100 days, or it would be free. Tesla subsequently delivered the battery at a reported cost of $90 million.