June 26, 2026, 2:33 p.m. CT
U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy took a trip to Nashville on June 25 to tour progress on The Boring Company’s Music City Loop tunnel system currently under construction beneath city streets.
The controversial project will offer passengers quick underground transport between Nashville International Airport and downtown Nashville. By the time it’s set to open in the first quarter of 2027, CEO Steve Davis said he hopes there are at least 20 stops across town, including Music City Center, Giarratana Development’s downtown apartments, and maybe even Nissan Stadium.
“For too long, we’ve let our bloated bureaucracy gum up critical infrastructure projects that could meaningfully improve the lives of the traveling public,” Duffy said in a statement. “This project is further proof that those days are over, and America is building again.”
The Boring Co., one of tech billionaire Elon Musk’s companies, announced less than one year ago on July 28, 2025, that it planned to construct the private tunnel system and run a taxi-like Tesla car service through it. While Davis said in the initial announcement that the project could open to passengers as early as spring 2026, the company quickly pushed its timeline back to spring 2027.
Still, the project steadily progressed with relatively minimal oversight. The Boring Co. received a free lease from the state to use a parking lot on Rosa Parks Boulevard for construction staging following the July announcement, and on Feb. 25, state and federal agencies officially cleared workers to begin tunnelling.
The Tennessee Department of Transportation and the Federal Highway Administration permitted The Boring Co. to use state-owned property across Nashville for its tunnels. In a joint statement, the two agencies declared Music City Loop “one of the largest infrastructure projects in the United States.”
“USDOT is proud to partner with the state of Tennessee and The Boring Company to help deliver this tremendous project at Trump Speed. By empowering innovators like The Boring Company, we are creating good-paying jobs that will deliver big, beautiful infrastructure for American families and businesses nationwide,” Duffy said.
In a June 26 statement from USDOT, the agency said the Federal Highway Administration expedited Music City Loop’s approval timeline by 83%.
“Tennessee continues to lead the nation in finding innovative solutions to infrastructure challenges, and we’re grateful to Secretary Duffy for his commitment to advancing projects that strengthen our economy and improve connectivity,” Gov. Bill Lee said. “The Music City Loop demonstrates what’s possible when government leverages private-sector partnerships to pursue opportunities we couldn’t achieve on our own, and we look forward to continuing to work in partnership with the Trump Administration to keep Tennessee at the forefront of transportation innovation.”
While Lee and other officials connected with the project tout is as having “zero cost to taxpayers,” state lawmakers voted in April to establish the Governor’s Infrastructure Coordination Council and the Subterranean Transportation Infrastructure Coordination Authority to oversee the project. Both entities will be taxpayer funded.
Hadley Hitson covers business news for The Tennessean. She can be reached at hhitson@gannett.com. To support her work, subscribe to The Tennessean.
