Amtrak officials probably wish their West Baltimore tunnel was boring by now. But billionaire Elon Musk may have found a new way to keep it interesting.

Though construction has begun for the multiyear, $6 billion project, which Amtrak has touted as the largest single capital project in its history, major digging is at least a year away.

Now Musk’s The Boring Company, the tunnel builder behind the 1.7-mile Las Vegas Loop underground road, is in consideration for an engineering contract within the larger Frederick Douglass Tunnel Program, according to a report from The New York Times last week.

It’s unclear what the contract might entail and what it might be worth — most of the project’s major construction contracts have been awarded, an Amtrak spokesperson confirmed. But federal officials met with Boring Company employees to discuss ways to build the tunnel more efficiently and at lower cost, according to the Times.

One of three primary construction contracts went to Kiewit/J.F. Shea Joint Venture, a supergroup of two companies, more than a year ago. It includes the most consequential work — boring the two tunnel tubes underneath West Baltimore. Another contract that includes building a new West Baltimore Maryland Area Rail Commuter station and resetting tracks south of the tunnel was awarded to Clark/Stacy Witbeck Joint Venture.

A tunnel boring machine is being built for the project by a German company.

The project has faced community resistance, including allegations of discriminatory bias in selecting the tunnel route that led to a civil rights lawsuit. Now it may have to contend with one of the most controversial figures in the U.S. getting involved.

Musk, who owns much of Tesla, Boring, SpaceX, X and other companies, has drawn fire for right-wing opinions and his role with President Donald Trump’s Department of Government Efficiency, which is slashing the federal government.

An Amtrak spokesperson deferred questions regarding the new contract bid to the U.S. Department of Transportation. Representatives of the DOT and the Federal Railroad Administration did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

A representative of The Boring Company also did not respond to a request for interview and emailed questions.

The company “creates safe, fast-to-dig, and low-cost transportation, utility, and freight tunnels,” according to its website. Its newest boring machine can allegedly churn through a mile of earth in a week — pretty slow (dare I say... boring) to the average eye, but warp speed compared to many other machines.”

The Office of the Inspector General overseeing the federally subsidized passenger rail company found last fall that Amtrak had mismanaged some of the early planning for the tunnel, risking high cost overruns. Estimates for the tunnel’s price tag have since gone up, though the amount is partially driven by factors outside Amtrak’s control, such as inflation on construction materials.

In response to the report, Amtrak said it had beefed up hiring to help manage the program.

This month, Amtrak announced it was cutting about 450 positions as a cost-saving measure across the entire railroad, though a spokesperson said the cuts did not impact the Frederick Douglass Tunnel.

So will Baltimore be the place for the first collaboration between Amtrak and Musk, who this year called the national passenger railroad’s service “kind of embarrassing” and floated the idea of privatizing it?

It certainly wouldn’t be boring.