Over the past few years, Elon Musk has expanded his footprint in Texas, moving his companies from California and building offices, warehouses and manufacturing plants across a growing number of Texas counties.

Now Mr. Musk is trying to do something that few, if any, titans of industry have done in a century: create his own company town.

Mr. Musk has long talked about his desire to make a new town — which he hopes to call Starbase — in coastal South Texas, where his rocket launch company, SpaceX, is based.

Map locates Boca Chica, Texas, and also shows the locations of Austin, Bastrop and Brownsville.

50 miles

Bastrop

Boring Company,

SpaceX and, soon, X

Austin

Musk’s compound and Tesla

Houston

San Antonio

TEXAS

Gulf of

Mexico

Brownsville

Boca Chica

Mexico

Proposed location for the new town of Starbase

By The New York Times

For years, the plan did not appear to be moving forward in any official way, in part because creating a new municipality in Texas requires a certain number of residents and support from a majority of voters.

But in that time, SpaceX employees have packed into newly refurbished midcentury homes and temporary housing — some of it in the form of silver Airstream trailers — in the shadow of the company’s rockets.

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