Building 'Musk Utopia' with More Land Than Jongno-gu, Featuring Factory, Housing, and Leisure Facilities

Massive Land Acquisition Near Austin, Texas

Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla, is purchasing vast amounts of land in the southern United States to build a "corporate city." The area, slightly larger than Jongno-gu in Seoul, is planned to include a Tesla factory, corporate offices, and even residential housing for employees.

The U.S. financial media outlet Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported on the 9th (local time) that several infrastructure construction projects are underway on the outskirts of Austin, the capital city of Texas.

Elon Musk, CEO, giving a speech at Tesla's Texas factory
Photo by Yonhap News

Previously, CEO Musk acquired 3,500 acres (14.16 km²) of land in this area over the past three years. Some local residents estimate that the total purchased land could reach 6,000 acres (24.28 km²), which is slightly larger than the area of Jongno-gu, Seoul (23.9 km²).

CEO Musk plans to build Tesla offices, an R&D center, and employee residences on this land. He also intends to construct launch pads and living facilities for SpaceX, the private space company he leads. In addition, general housing complexes, commercial areas, leisure facilities, and sports fields are being developed. WSJ described this as "a kind of Texas utopia."

Tesla Texas Headquarters [Image source=Yonhap News]

The small city will also host another of Musk's companies, the Boring Company. The Boring Company is planning a project to replace surface highways by drilling large tunnels using its underground tunnel boring machine. Nearby, Tesla’s large-scale factory, Giga Texas, is also set to be established.

WSJ cited statements from Steve Davis, president of the Boring Company and a close associate of Musk, saying that the ultimate goal of this city plan is to create a "fully functioning city with markets and administrative organizations." However, specific construction plans and schedules have not yet been disclosed to the public. It is also reported that Musk required city officials and land-selling residents to sign non-disclosure agreements.

Meanwhile, in October 2021, Musk announced at a Tesla shareholders' meeting that the company’s headquarters would be relocated from California, home to Silicon Valley, to Texas. At that time, he had conflicts with California authorities over industrial regulations, which led to heated exchanges.

However, on the 22nd of last month, he partially reversed his decision by selecting Palo Alto in Silicon Valley as the new engineering headquarters. Musk explained, "We will operate the former HP headquarters building, which has a unique Silicon Valley history, as the global engineering headquarters," adding, "Tesla will operate under a 'dual headquarters' system in California and Texas."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.