Work on $680m Dubai Loop to begin immediately

• Stage 1 to be executed within 2 years
• Dedicated tunnels for EVs
• Boring costs AED70m per km

The first stage of the Dubai Loop transport project will be implemented “within two years”, according to Mattar Al Tayer, director general and chairman of the board of executive directors at the emirate’s Roads and Transport Authority.

The Dubai Loop is a proposed underground mass-transit system designed to move large numbers of passengers quickly across the city using electric vehicles travelling through dedicated tunnels.

Work is set to begin on the opening leg of the underground development “today”, Al Tayer said at the World Government Summit in Dubai on Tuesday. The first 6km will cost AED600 million ($163 million) and be built around the financial district – “The key commercial area of Dubai,” Al Tayer said.

The entire project will cover 24km and cost around AED2.5 billion, transporting around 13,000 passengers daily.

An agreement has been signed with Elon Musk’s The Boring Company, which will use specialised, high-speed machines to carve out low-cost, narrow tunnels designed for autonomous electric vehicles – primarily Musk’s Teslas.

Al Tayer said each kilometre of tunnel costs AED70 million to bore, while tunnels for the metro system cost AED125 million: “There’s a big difference in the costs.”

The only operational Loop is in Las Vegas, where Tesla cars with human drivers transport passengers between stations.

Al Tayer did not say which area would be next on the Dubai Loop roll-out.

“The project will add much to the infrastructure of Dubai. The first stage will be executed within two years. The second stage we’ll try even earlier, but let’s begin first,” he said.

The Boring Company says the Dubai Loop has potential speeds of up to 100 miles per hour (160km per hour), and could cut travel time between key points in the city to minutes as well as helping to alleviate increasing congestion. 

Residents in the emirate spend an average of 35 hours a year delayed in traffic, according to the Breaking the Middle East’s Billion-Dollar Traffic Challenge report, which draws on 2024 data from traffic analytics platforms INRIX and TomTom.

The report’s authors do not give regional breakdowns but say congestion costs the global economy more than $500 billion a year.

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As well as the Dubai Loop, the UAE is exploring multiple approaches — from self-driving buses to flying taxis — to tackle its mobility and congestion problems.

Al Tayer said there would be 100 autonomous taxis operating in Dubai in the first quarter of this year, with plans to ramp that up to 1,000, without giving a specific timeline.

California-based Glydways, meanwhile, is working with Dubai and Abu Dhabi to explore the deployment of its mass-transit system. 

Its autonomous electric vehicles run on wheels and dedicated lanes. These can be added to the side of existing roads, above or underground and Glydways says it is faster and cheaper to build and operate than trains.