🚘 Exclusive: Tesla Tunnel Investigation

🚄 High-Speed Rail From Vegas to San Francisco?

Pie-in-the-sky transportation projects are the theme of the day — and we can always dream, right? At least California’s making progress on its high-speed rail line between Los Angeles and San Francisco, breaking ground on the railhead (or freight yard) in ceremonial fashion. Laying real track? That comes later. [Courthouse News Service]

• Here’s the fun part: a connection route between Palmdale and Victorville would bring the Brightline West route to Vegas into play. Look for it to all be sorted out by 2050. [California Governor’s Office]

💰How Nevada Spends Federal Money

Hey, remember the $2.7 billion Nevada got from President Biden’s 2021 stimulus bill? Housing, health care, and state administration projects got more than half the money. Education, broadband, and water initiatives got in on the action too. The funds were allotted by the end of 2024 and need to be spent by 2026. [Nevada Independent]

🖥️ Another Reason to Resent AI

Matthew Livelsberger used ChatGPT to plan his suicide and Cybertruck explosion outside the Trump International Hotel. Police also say the Green Beret considered some sort of attack at the Grand Canyon’s Skywalk before switching to Vegas instead. [KLAS]

🏈 Raiders Coach Out

Antonio Pierce was officially fired. Now, it’s on to the next coach and another rebuilding year for the Raiders. [KSNV]

The Boring Company has completed more than five miles of a 68-mile Vegas Loop system of underground Tesla vehicles, with plans to expand to more than 100 stations throughout the Las Vegas metropolitan area. Despite the proposal’s massive scale, it was approved with little public input and less regulation, oversight, and accountability than traditional public transportation projects.

ProPublica and City Cast Las Vegas teamed up for an exhaustive, months-long investigation into the Boring Company and its relationship with the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority (LVCVA).

Based on public records and exclusive interviews, the investigative news piece found that Elon Musk’s Boring Company skirted environmental, building, and labor regulations.

The story, written by Daniel Rothberg and City Cast’s Dayvid Figler, reveals details on:

• Fines related to the improper storage and transportation of construction waste near Commercial Center and on Interstate 15.
• Findings by state regulators that untreated water was discharged into storm drains that flow to Lake Mead.
• A documented Public Works notice for construction in public rights-of-way without first obtaining permits.
• How expansion plans were listed on county agendas under the obscure names of limited liability companies, making their progress difficult to track.

"Las Vegas is effectively a test case for the rest of the country to see if this form of underground transportation can work," Figler said. "Musk himself admits to preferring a build-first approach over the lengthy environmental approval process. And because the Vegas Loop is privately operated and funded, it's exempt from a lot of critical vetting and oversight."

The investigative piece also discusses how similar Boring Company proposals failed in other cities, and why former mayor Carolyn Goodman was "opposed to it from the beginning," but ultimately voted to approve the project.

• City Cast Las Vegas co-host Sarah Lohman welcomed Rothberg and Figler for an in-depth conversation to discuss how the project came together, and why the issues involving the Vegas Loop matter not only to Strip tourists, but everyone in Las Vegas. [City Cast Las Vegas 🎧]