Elon Musk’s starbase becomes an official city in Texas: you all need to know
Alon Musk’s long -standing vision of creating a future city dedicated to space exploration is now an official reality. On Saturday, a landslide vote among the residents of unirrigated Boka Chika village in South Texas, mostly SpaceX employees approved its inclusion. starTexas. According to Cameron County’s election results, the final count was in favor of 212 votes and was only against six.
Musk celebrated the result with a brief message on X: “Now a real city!” Cements, where the company has spent launching the prototype of rocket building, testing technology, and starships in the last decade, the growing appearance of SpaceX at the southern end of Texas, the hopes of the vessel musk will one day take humans to Mars.
While the election has passed, the implications are still beginning. With the new position of the Starbase as a municipality, SpaceX will now have a significant impact on the local regime.
What is Starbase and what is Musk’s plan?
The Starbase, which was earlier Boca Chika Village, had a 1.5-class mile patch of coastal land near the US-Maxico border, which was criscross with trailers, hangers and high-tech devices. It has served as a major launch feature of SpaceX for Starships, a rocket designed for deep space missions under contracts with NASA and Defense Department.
NBC News reported that the company already manages major services in the region, including roads, utilities, schooling and medical care for its workers. In 2024, SpaceX General Manager Catherine Ludors wrote to local authorities that they formally requested a vote to establish the city, which “needs to develop starbase as a community.”
SpaceX aims to increase its rocket launch from five to 25 per year with dramatically infrastructure upgrade. With Cityhood, the company is now ready to control zoning, public access and even emergency protocols. Critics are concerned that this may resulting in repeated beach closure, public inspection may be reduced, and may have increased powers for musk and their duties.
Driving with the remote highway 4 of South Texas, the indications of the expansion footprint of Elon Musk are infallible. Politico reported that the huge rockets and murals of Musk’s face now mark the region, once known only for their mescite thick and civil war. Once the non -irrigated Boka Chika village was turned into a starbase, a escape company was almost completely inhabited by SpaceX employees. As Politico describes, Musk’s ambitions now spread beyond the discovery of space with the starbase, building a city by scratching, getting almost total control over land, infrastructure and local regime, which inspires both astonishing and alarms from nearby brownville residents.
Who will run the starbase?
Robert “Bobby” Peden, a 36 -year -old SpaceX veteran who serves as the vice -president of the Texas Test and launch company, will serve as the mayor. The commissioners include a former operating engineering manager in the Starbase and a self-known philanthropist, and Jordan Bus, the current senior director of environmental health and safety in SpaceX.
In the low-profile campaign, no public program, no website and no yard indications were seen. Each candidate agreed not to accept more than $ 1,110 in political contribution. The vote to include the new city was supported by about 300 eligible residents, most of whom are SpaceX employees.
All three elected officers either live in the present or Boka Chika belongs to the village, now known as a starbase. The construction of the city is seen as a major step in the long -term vision of Elon Musk for the expansion of SpaceX operations in South Texas.
Musk’s history with Texas
The presence of Musk in Texas has increased continuously in the last decade. In 2014, after scouting various sites, SpaceX chose Cameron County for its launchpad, partly due to its proximity with the equator, minimum population and favorable tax deals. As Politico said, local authorities lent SpaceX a 10 -year property tax break, which expects to encourage economic growth in one of the poorest areas of the state.
Since then, the relationship has developed. While SpaceX has brought jobs and investment, it has also promoted stress. Residents at the nearby brownsville complained of increasing fare and banned beach access during rocket tests. Activists, including South Texas Environment Justice Network, have ralled against what has been seen as corporate overache and environmental risks.
In South Texas, Starbase now resembles a modern-day “company town”, completion with SpaceX employees in major local government roles.
