Elon Musk may take on Los Angeles traffic by tunnelling under the city

'Traffic is driving me nuts. Am going to build a tunnel boring machine and just start digging'

Tech genius Elon Musk dreamed up the plan while stuck in a traffic jam (Reuters)

Elon Musk has said he will build an underground tunnel to alleviate the notoriously terrible Los Angeles traffic.

The Chief Executive of SpaceX and Tesla Motors tweeted yesterday that he plans “to start digging in a month or so.”

He announced the project last month, tweeting: “Traffic is driving me nuts. Am going to build a tunnel boring machine and just start digging…”

Naming the endeavour The Boring Company, he told The Verge: “I really do think tunnels are the key to solving urban gridlock. Being stuck in traffic is soul-destroying.”

Musk has certainly succeeded with numerous large-scale projects, such as building self-driving cars and launching rockets into space.

And, as USA Today reports, the tunnelling industry is expected to “[increase in] revenue at an annualized rate of 7.3% from 2016 through 2021.” The project also aligns with President Trump’s plans to increase spending on infrastructure.

Still, there are a number of details to be hashed out before the project can go ahead. Twitter users have wondered if he’s just joking, suggesting his account has been taken over by the parody account Bored Elon Musk.

Despite Musk’s assurance that he is “actually going to do this”, critics have asked where exactly the tunnel is ending, how and when Musk plans to secure permits, and whether a new highway would even decrease traffic, rather than increasing the amount of drivers on the road.