When Elon Musk says he wants to “build the future,” he doesn’t just mean rockets and Teslas. He literally means building a city from scratch—and that’s exactly what’s happening in the far southern corner of Texas. Forget small tech campuses or industrial complexes. Musk has launched something far bigger, far stranger, and far more controversial: Starbase, Texas, a city created almost entirely for SpaceX and the people who serve his vision of colonizing Mars.
This is not a drill. A city designed by Musk is taking shape, and if the details sound like something from a dystopian novel, that’s because it kind of is.
The Birth of Starbase: From Village to Tech Fortress
The sleepy seaside settlement of Boca Chica Village was once little more than a handful of beach houses and dirt roads. Today, it’s being transformed into Starbase, a Musk-controlled municipality where SpaceX calls the shots. With incorporation rights, SpaceX has effectively given itself control over zoning, infrastructure, and even legal authority in the area.
Why does this matter? Because it means Musk can build rocket factories, test facilities, and launch pads with fewer restrictions. Roads, utilities, and land use are no longer bottlenecked by outside bureaucracy. The city is streamlined for one thing: rockets, rockets, and more rockets.
But Musk isn’t just building a launch pad—he’s creating a community. Housing, education, and even dining complexes are being planned for employees. The Rio West development, reportedly including shops and restaurants, signals that Musk wants more than workers—he wants settlers.
The Controversy: Public vs. Musk
Here’s where things get messy. Locals are not thrilled. Critics argue that Starbase is restricting public access to nearby beaches, raising environmental alarms about wildlife, and essentially privatizing land that should belong to Texans, not Musk’s empire.
Officials have questioned whether the creation of this city serves the public good at all—or whether it’s just another power play for one of the world’s richest men. Environmentalists, in particular, warn that transforming sensitive coastal land into a rocket city is a disaster waiting to happen.
Yet Musk’s supporters say this is the price of progress. They argue that the U.S. needs Starbase if it wants to compete in space, and Musk’s vision has always required bold risks.
A Billion-Dollar Investment in the Future
SpaceX isn’t skimping on the details. A $100 million rocket factory is already in the works, with plans for expanded employee housing and state-of-the-art facilities. The idea is simple: if Musk wants his people to build rockets 24/7, they need to live nearby, shop nearby, and raise their families nearby.
And here’s the kicker: Musk isn’t stopping with Starbase. He has teased plans for another community called Snailbrook, complete with schools and residential areas, cementing his dream of creating experimental towns where innovation meets everyday life.
This is not just about rockets—it’s about building new models for living.
Meanwhile at Tesla: Unbox Production and Robo-Taxis
While SpaceX is constructing cities, Tesla is rewriting the rules of manufacturing. The company has revealed a radical unbox production strategy, a process designed to reduce material waste, cut costs, and allow for rapid scaling. Musk claims this approach could allow Tesla to produce two million robo-taxis annually starting in 2026.
These so-called Cyber Cabs are optimized for ride-hailing, stripped down for weight efficiency and space, and positioned as the future of urban transport. If Starbase is the colony for Mars, Tesla’s robo-taxis are the colony for Earth’s cities.
And that’s not all. Tesla’s Nevada plant is ramping up production of its long-awaited Semi trucks, aiming for 50,000 trucks per year. At the ACT Expo, Tesla showed off advances in battery tech and production lines that will make its clean transportation fleet cheaper, faster, and more scalable.
Tesla’s Semi Gets an Upgrade
The Tesla Semi itself is being upgraded with a new high-performance battery boasting a 7% boost in efficiency and reduced weight. This may sound minor, but for heavy-duty trucking, it’s massive. Lower weight means more cargo. Better batteries mean lower costs.
Perhaps the boldest feature is a 25 kW electric power takeoff port—yes, the truck can power refrigerated trailers directly, removing the need for separate diesel generators. Imagine a truck hauling produce across the country without burning a single drop of diesel for cooling. That’s the kind of innovation that sends shivers down traditional trucking’s spine.
To support this fleet, Tesla plans a network of mega charger sites across the U.S., with 46 locations expected by 2027.
Reinventing Gas Stations
Even the gas station, the icon of 20th-century America, is being reinvented. Across the country, vintage fuel pumps are being repurposed into sleek EV chargers, blending nostalgia with functionality. DIY builders are retrofitting old pumps into powerful chargers, while businesses are selling replicas to homeowners who want a retro vibe for their electric cars.
The shift is symbolic: what once pumped gasoline now fuels the electric revolution.
What Does It All Mean?
When you zoom out, a picture emerges. Elon Musk is no longer just a CEO. He’s positioning himself as a nation-builder, a man who creates cities, infrastructure, factories, and entire lifestyles around his companies.
Starbase is the clearest example yet. It’s not just a workplace; it’s an ecosystem where Musk controls everything from the roads you drive on to the rockets you see in the sky. The Tesla Semi and Cyber Cabs show how deeply intertwined his companies are—transport, energy, and space exploration feeding into one another.
Supporters call it visionary. Critics call it terrifying. But one thing’s certain: the world has never seen a billionaire try to reshape reality on this scale.
Conclusion
Starbase, Texas, may one day be remembered as the launch point not only for SpaceX rockets but for Musk’s entire new model of civilization. Whether it thrives as a pioneering tech utopia or collapses under its own ambition remains to be seen.
For now, the future looks like this: a billionaire with a billion-dollar city, fleets of electric trucks, and the audacity to rewrite the rules of life itself.
