Musk says verbal government approval received for Washington - New York Hyperloop

Tesla chief, Elon Musk yesterday announced that his tunnel-boring company had received a verbal government green light to build a super-high-speed pod-and-tube Hyperloop transportation system for travel between Washington and New York.

''Just received verbal govt approval for The Boring Company to build an underground NY-Phil-Balt-DC Hyperloop. NY-DC in 29 mins,'' he wrote on Twitter.

It was however, not clear who had given the approval.

Responding to a question about Musk's claim, a White House spokesman said, ''We have had promising conversations to date, are committed to transformative infrastructure projects, and believe our greatest solutions have often come from the ingenuity and drive of the private sector.''

The system would run from ''City center to city center in each case, with up to a dozen or more entry / exit elevators in each city,'' Musk said in a later tweet.

The system would be built by Musk's firm, underground, using an excavation machine. The futuristic concept envisioned transporting passenger capsules in a low-pressure tube at hundreds of miles an hour.

But Musk had to do a little moderating as the day wore on.

''Still a lot of work needed to receive formal approval, but am optimistic that will occur rapidly,'' he wrote in a later tweet.

Meanwhile, according to officials in Washington and New York, no approval had been granted to any project, and under federal rules Musk would need extensive environmental and building permits to undertake such an ambitious project.

Musk recently started, The Boring Company to build transport tunnels for the system, which he said would be far faster than current high-speed trains and use electromagnetic propulsion.

Musk also further tweeted that the first set of tunnels would be to "alleviate greater LA (Los Angeles) urban congestion," adding that the company would also "probably" do a loop from Los Angeles to San Francisco, and another in Texas.

"City center to city center in each case, with up to a dozen or more entry/exit elevators in each city," he wrote.