Entrepreneur Elon Musk said that he plans to bid on Chicago's proposal to build a new transit system connecting downtown Chicago to O'Hare Airport.
Musk tweeted Wednesday night that his business The Boring Company, which constructs underground tunnels for high-speed transit, plans to "compete to fund, build & operate a high-speed Loop" in Chicago.
The Boring Company will compete to fund, build & operate a high-speed Loop connecting Chicago O’Hare Airport to downtown https://t.co/bRqKpzSJjz
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 30, 2017
When asked on Twitter on what exactly a "high-speed loop" is, Musk tweeted that "A Loop is like a Hyperloop, but without drawing a vacuum inside the tube," adding, "Don't need to get rid of air friction for short routes."
Most famous for starting Tesla and SpaceX, Musk founded The Boring Company in 2016 as a result of his frustration with brutal L.A. traffic. The Boring Company is currently digging tunnels outside of SpaceX's headquarters in Hawthorne, CA and in Maryland.
On Wednesday Mayor Rahm Emanuel announced a Request for Qualifications (RFQ) for companies to present their bids to "design, build, finance, operate and maintain" the O'Hare express system. The goal is to get riders from O'Hare to downtown in 20 minutes or less with "fares less than the cost of current taxi and ride-share services," according to a news release.
The system will be funded entirely through project-specific revenues like fares and advertising, and won't be supported by tax dollars, the city said. RFQ responses are due on January 24, 2018.
"More than a century ago, Daniel Burnham encouraged Chicago to ‘make no little plans,’ and today Chicagoans continue to make big and bold plans with an eye towards the future," Emanuel said in the news release.
Musk, not known for little plans, could be a logical partner in the Chicago project.
