Elon Musk’s Boring Company has won permit approval and a franchise agreement to build the Vegas Loop under the Las Vegas Strip.

The 29-mile underground transportation system would connect with the Las Vegas Convention Center Loop that opened in June. That .8-mile link transports convention center goers through tunnels in electric Teslas and is Musk’s first fully commercial operational tunnel.  

The Vegas Loop would have 51 stations throughout the Strip and into Clark County and would have a capacity of 57,000 passengers per hour. The Clark County Commission approved a special-use permit October 20 for The Boring Company to apply for and receive building permits to build the tunnels, according to the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority.

The commission also approved a franchise agreement with Boring that allows it to operate the Loop. Boring would pay to build the Loop and then collect fares from passengers. The commissions says no tax dollars would go toward funding the project. The franchise agreement also faces a vote by the Las Vegas City Council.

Along with the Strip, the Vegas Loop would connect to downtown, McCarran International Airport and Allegiant Stadium. The Boring Company says the goal is to eventually link Las Vegas and Los Angeles.

A map of the proposed route of the Vegas Loop to be built by Elon Musk’s Boring Company.The Boring CompanyBoring and Las Vegas convention center representatives hailed the Vegas Loop as a relief to the city’s traffic congestion and an easier way to get visitors to their destinations. An example provided by Boring says a trip from the convention center to Mandalay Bay, which can take up to 30 minutes, would be shaved to 3 minutes with the Loop.

“The Vegas Loop will be a game-changer for our visitors in moving them around our exciting destination quickly, conveniently and in an entertaining ‘Only Vegas’ way,” says Steve Hill, LVCVA president and CEO.

The electric Teslas would travel through the tunnel directly to a passenger’s destination station with no stops along the way, unlike a subway system. The Boring Company provided the following sample trips and fares:

Sample fares for the future Vegas Loop, which would be self-supporting.The Boring Company

Musk envisions the Teslas reaching speeds of up to 150 mph and being autonomously driven. High-occupancy automated electric Teslas are also planned that would hold up to 16 passengers with sitting and standing room.

The convention center Loop, which opened in June, consists of a mix of 62 Tesla Models 3 and X that have drivers and reach top speed of 40 mph, because of the tunnels’ short length. They can hold up to five passengers.

The convention center tunnels are 40 feet underground. Riders can travel across the convention center campus in 2 minutes versus a 25-minute walk. The Loop debuted at World of Concrete this year. It cost $52.5 million to build. It has a capacity of 4,400 passengers per hour and three stations.

Check out this video of the convention center Loop:

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Erik Christenbury often gets calls from people wanting to display antique Caterpillar construction equipment. But one that stands out in his mind came about seven years ago from a coordinator on a major motion picture.

The coordinator was calling from Wilmington, North Carolina, on behalf of the director, and he needed a 1950s era dozer.

As founder and president of Chapter 12 of the Antique Caterpillar Machinery Owners Club, Christenbury was happy to assist. Assuming the movie was being shot in his home state, he sent a photo of his 1956 Cat D6 9U dozer. He had bought the machine about a year earlier – a rare find as it had less than 900 operating hours on it and all original parts.

It was about as brand new as a 1956 dozer could be. He said the director was welcome to use it.

He soon learned the movie was being shot in New Orleans – more than 800 miles away from his home in Liberty, North Carolina. Christenbury looked around for antique dozers closer to the movie location, but the director had his heart set on his D6. He wanted it in New Orleans by 5 a.m. on a Monday.

Along with the long distance, the dozer’s blade made it a wide load, so it couldn’t be hauled on a Sunday when wide loads are prohibited, unless the blade was removed. Christenbury let the coordinator know it wasn’t going to be cheap. He immediately got the OK after sending in his quote.

He and his friend removed the blade, loaded up the dozer and hit the road to New Orleans.

“We pulled up on the movie set about 9 o’clock Sunday night, and they had a security guard there,” Christenbury recalls.

It was just a little house by the side of the road. It didn’t look like a movie set.

“I was like, ‘Is this the right location for the movie?’”

The guard said it was.

“Where can we unload?”

Grandfather’s 1940 D2

Christenbury began his antique Caterpillar equipment collection in the 1990s, starting with the D2 tractor his grandfather bought new in 1940. A dealer had talked his grandfather into trading in his gasoline-powered Cat Fifteen for the new diesel-powered tractor, which was quickly becoming popular with farmers. He paid $1,800 for it.

His grandfather used the D2 as a drawbar tractor on his cotton farm for terracing, plowing, and dragging logs out of the woods.

“He always said that was his favorite tractor,” Christenbury recalls.

Christenbury bought the worn old tractor from his grandfather. He cleaned it, got it running and slowly restored it over a period of years. He calls it the pride and joy of his collection, and it was just the beginning.

“That was what started our Caterpillar collecting,” he says. “And unfortunately, Caterpillar made a lot of different models. So as a collector, you decide, ‘Hey, I’d like to have one of each model.’ And then it just grows from there.”

Erik Christenbury, right, restored this Caterpillar D2 dozer that Erik’s grandfather bought new for $1,800 in 1940. Christenbury owns ChrisCo Machinery in Liberty, North Carolina, where he buys, sells, rebuilds and manufactures industrial woodworking machinery.Erik Christenbury

Finding a “like new” 1956 D6

Today Christenbury has about 150 pieces of antique Cat equipment he has acquired from all over the country. One of those is the 1956 D6 9U he lucked upon one day.

While driving down a highway, he saw it covered with a blue tarp in a front yard.

“I turned around and knocked on the front door,” he recalls. “An older man came to the door and gladly talked about his tractor.”

Charles Moretz had operated the D6 since his employer bought it in 1956. When his boss no longer needed it on the farm and decided to sell it, Moretz bought it and had kept it all those years. It had less than 900 hours on it, and all parts were original. Christenbury let him know that if he ever decided to sell, he’d be interested.

“Halfway home my phone rang,” he says. “It was the owner of the D6 I just looked at, offering it to me for purchase.

“Needless to say, we struck a deal on the phone, and I picked it up the very next day.”

Charles Moretz was the original operator of the 1956 Cat D6 dozer. Erik Christenbury purchased the dozer from him. It had less than 900 hours and all original parts.Erik Christenbury

He needs a hat

Christenbury and his friend were soon met by the director after they arrived at the movie’s staging area at 5 a.m.

Christenbury didn’t know the name of the movie, what it was about or how they intended to use the D6. He was surprised when the director asked him if he could operate it for them. He said he’d be glad to teach someone, that it wouldn’t take long to learn.

“We’d rather have you do it,” the director said.

Christenbury agreed and soon his hair was getting cut, his goatee shaved, makeup applied and his 1950s-style wardrobe donned. But there was one thing missing.

“Every good dozer operator wore a hat to keep the sun out of his eyes,” Christenbury told them. “You’ve got to give me a hat.”

So they did.

“They gave me this hat that looked like Indiana Jones.”

Erik Christenbury with his 1956 Cat D6 on the movie set, dressed in 1950s wardrobe – and Indiana Jones-style hat.Erik Christenbury

Dozer operator/movie actor

After a long wait, Christenbury was told where to put the dozer and where the cameras would go. He still didn’t know the movie’s name or story line.

“I was like, ‘Well, what are we going to do with it? Are we burying dead people? Are we building something? Making a road?’”

The director said, “We’re making a pond.”

“I can make you a pond,” Christenbury replied.

And so for about 5 minutes, he moved dirt while they filmed. Later, they had him lean up against a pickup truck and pretend to talk to one of the characters while the main actors were behind him.

He was about to leave early the next morning when the coordinator who had hired him said they needed him for one more day. The director wanted another shot with the dozer.

“So I’m pushing dirt again, and they’re throwing dust in the air,” he says. “And they’re zooming up on the tracks as it’s moving and dirt spilling over the blade and that kind of stuff.”

The script described it: “A ROARING BULLDOZER’s iron snout dredges up earth.”

It lasted about 5 or 10 minutes, and the scene was done. Christenbury and his friend could head back home to North Carolina.

“Children of the Corn” reunion

While on the set, Christenbury eventually learned that the name of the movie was “Trumbo,” starring Bryan Cranston, Diane Lane and John Goodman.

“We saw Diane Lane and Bryan Cranston,” Christenbury says. “John Goodman wasn’t there yet, but I saw a lot of actors.”

The movie is based on the life of Dalton Trumbo, a screenwriter who was blacklisted during the McCarthy era. Christenbury’s scene was to show that Trumbo had come into some money and wanted to build a lake by his home. 

Christenbury, of course, was the dozer operator. His friend was the surveyor.

Playing the general contractor in the scene was Sean Bridgers, an actor Christenbury had met before.

At age 16, Christenbury had played a role in the horror flick “Children of the Corn Part II – The Final Sacrifice,” which was shot near his home in North Carolina.

Bridgers was also in the movie, which came out in 1992.

Christenbury, who was big for his age, was a stunt assistant and also played one of the children of the corn. “I was one of the terrors that went around killing people,” he says. One of his “victims” was a doctor he “stabbed.”

So when he saw Bridgers on the “Trumbo” set, he ran after him.

“Hey, buddy, were you in ‘Children of the Corn Part II?’” he asked.

Bridgers said he was, turned back around and kept walking.

Later, Christenbury got a second chance to get reacquainted. He was on the set later in the day when Bridgers walked around the corner.

“You don’t remember me,” Christenbury said, “but I was in the ‘Corn’ movie with you way back when.”

Bridgers started to remember.

“We talked and he was real nice guy,” Christenbury says.

“It’s funny,” Christenbury recalls telling Bridgers. “The only two movies I’ve ever been in in my whole life, you were in both of them.”

Actor Sean Bridgers poses with Erik Christenbury on the “Trumbo” movie set. Bridgers played the general contractor for the pond’s construction, while Christenbury operated his 1956 Cat D6 dozer.Erik Christenbury

Watching “Trumbo”

When “Trumbo” came out in 2015 several months after Christenbury had hauled the D6 to New Orleans, he took his father and his friend to see the movie at the local theater.

In the opening scene, Trumbo is looking out over a lake.

In the theater, Christenbury punched his buddy in the arm.

“We didn’t make the cutting room floor,” he tells his friend. “They cut us out.”

“What do you mean?” his friend says.

“There’s that lake we were supposed to have built.”

Christenbury laughs while recounting the moment.

“So sure enough, they cut that out of the movie,” he says.

Despite all the work and being cut from the film, Christenbury enjoyed the experience. It was fun seeing the movie stars. It also helped that he was paid well.

He adds that he was in good company, noting that Bridgers met the same fate.

“His part got cut out of the movie, too,” Christenbury says. “So I didn’t feel too bad.”

As for the D6, it’s fame for now is relegated to antique equipment events.

“We proudly take it to shows and demonstrate the machine, giving lots of new operators a chance at the controls,” he says.

“It’s not everyday you get to operate a ‘like new’ 1956 machine.”

A glimpse of the movie script for “Trumbo” for the lake-building scene that Erik Christenbury operated his 1956 Cat D6 in.Erik Christenbury 

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The ruggedized phone has seen a resurgence of product releases this year, and this time a seemingly retro product – yesterday’s flip phone – is getting a new look. We’ll first look at the newest offering in this category and then review the other ruggedized phones that have made headlines this year.

Cat…with a flip

Cat S22 Flip phoneBullitt GroupThe siren call of smart phones has frustrated many construction supervisors observing crew members on their phones instead of working. One possible answer: ban smart phones and require a flip phone.

There are a couple of options out there, including the just-released $234 Cat S22 Flip, an Android 11 Go phone that runs on T- Mobil’s 4G LTE network.

“It really simplifies what a phone should be,” says Adrianne O’Hare, senior manager, brand marketing for Bullitt Group, the Cat phone licensee. “It has all the same rugged features and credentials that you would expect from any Cat phone.”

The S22 is simplicity and functionality wrapped up in an exterior designed to take on construction. Drop proof, dust proof and waterproof, the S22 offers voice and text, fast internet browsing and access to essential apps. Users have access to email, camera, social media, maps, search, talk-to-text and Google Assistant.

“There are a lot more businesses that are looking to go into a low-cost device that’s easy to use and offers fewer distractions,” O’Hare says. “Android Go is like a hybrid version between what’s available on a traditional flip phone and a smart phone.”

The essentials of the familiar flip design are still there: no calls when closed, so no need to worry about accidental dials. When closed, the front window gives you at-a-glance date, time and battery life. The S22 also has a large glove-friendly keypad, a dedicated programmable side button for push-to-talk capabilities and amped up volume that gives you the ability to hear in noisy environments. The 2,000-mAh removable battery lasts and “an entire day and beyond,” Bullitt says.

The phone meets toughness standards, including IP68 ingress protection and MIL SPEC 810H certification. Waterproof to 5 feet for 35 minutes, it has also survived repeated drop testing from 6 feet onto steel on every side and corner,  and the hinge has been tested 150,000 times, Bullitt says. The 2.8-inch internal touch screen is protected by Corning Gorilla Glass 5 and optimized for use with wet-finger or glove-on working technology.

“The large keys were important since those in the field are always wearing gloves,” O’Hare says. “You don’t have to worry about taking off your gloves or if you’re in a wet environment.” The S22 can also be used in potentially hazardous work environments and is certified to be non-incendive, Class 1, Division 2, Group A-D, 4T.

Although the Cat S22 is available only on T-Mobile at present, Bullitt says it is in discussions with other partners.

RUGGED PHONES ALSO INTRODUCED THIS YEAR

Sonim XP3plus

Another rugged flip phone offering is Sonim Technologies’ XPSplus, built on the company’s predecessor XP3 model. Advantages over the previous model includes a larger display, additional programmable buttons and an intuitive user interface with dynamic soft keys.

The unit also has a larger battery that offers 15 hours of talk and 440 hours of standby.

The XPSplus is compatible with a range of industrial-grade accessories, including headsets, remote speaker microphones and vehicle mounts. It has an 8-megapixel front camera; non-camera models are available.

Drop proof and waterproof, the XP3plus withstands falls onto concrete from about 5 feet and can be submerged for 30 minutes in 4.9 feet of water. It operates in temperatures ranging from -4 degrees to 131 degrees Fahrenheit.

Cat S62 Pro, Cat S62

Cat S62 ProBullitt GroupCat licensee Bullitt Group also introduced two smart phones this year, the full-on spec-heavy Cat S62 Pro, introduced in April, and the sleeker Cat S62, introduced in June.

The Cat S62 Pro came with a nice surprise: priced at $649 it was significantly lower than its $899 predecessor S61, introduced in 2018. It features a high-definition FLIR Lepton 3.5 thermal imaging camera, helping users locate and diagnose damp areas, leaks, hot spots, electrical shorts, blockages or elevated temperatures.

This thermal imagery can also be blended with images from the phones 12MP dual pixel Sony camera or used with FLIR’s variable intensity multi-spectral dynamic imaging technology, which overlays linear detail from a scene onto the thermal image.

Cat S62Bullitt GroupThe military-grade Cat S62 doesn’t have the FLIR camera but does offer both heft and sleekness. Bullitt says the phone doesn’t have the rubber overmolding or raised edges of the S62 Pro but “it’s got the same rocket engine.”

Its 4,000-mAh battery can last for up to two days before needing a charge. The phone, priced at $498, includes a fingerprint sensor for security, login and remote payments. 

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The construction lineage is deep in the Pruss family. Matt’s grandfather, Jim Sr., started Pruss Excavation in 1968. His father, also named Jim, joined him four years later, and Matt came on board in 2001.

But Matt’s start in construction goes much further back than 2001.

“I got on an excavator when I was 10 years old. When my dad told me to dig, I just kept on digging,” he says with a laugh. “Mom freaked out, but I enjoyed it.” And as he was growing up, both he and brother Scott, who now serves as superintendent with Pruss Excavation, pitched in when his father found himself shorthanded.

Matt went on to get a construction management degree, something he didn’t know was available until Freshman Day at the University of Nebraska. He had planned to go into business, but after the dean of the university’s construction management college learned his dad was a contractor, he convinced Matt to switch majors.

“We had some amazing professors who gave us real-world scenarios,” Matt says.

One example: it’s bid day and the students are estimating a project. The professor would go through the students with a handful of papers with vendor and sub quotes. “He would literally just throw them your way,” Matt recalls. “Some quotes didn’t have bonding and some didn’t include taxes, and you had figure out the good ones to develop the bid.”

Matt thought the exercise was exaggerated until he got back into the family business right after college. “It was not,” he says.

“A lot of contractors would just chase the flood work,” he adds, “but Matt stuck around, and he kept the job moving. It was a big deal. Matt knows he can’t just be an owner and pick up a paycheck. He’s very involved and he drives the ship on their modeling.”

This flood remediation experience came into play when the company bid on an emergency $1.05 million contract with a 144-hour turnaround.  The job required over 33,500 tons of materials to be imported to close a breach that was 350 feet long and over 25 fee deep with flood water still flowing through it.  “We had a pre-bid meeting at 1 p.m., they wanted bids at 4 p.m. and would sign the contract at 4:05 p.m.,” Matt says. “We were low by $11,800 and got it done early.” The project required a dozen operators and 30 trucks. 

“A week later we were low bid on another fast-track levee repair,” Matt says. “We were low by $55,000 on a $2.8 million contract with a 168- hour completion.  We successfully completed that repair on-time as well.”

Matching fleet to job demand

The company’s fleet of pull-behind scrapers — now at 32 — has helped them tackle wet conditions.

“We have had more machines than people throughout the years, and we’re still that way,” Matt says. This also allows Pruss Excavation to stage an upcoming jobsite while finishing another and thus lessen time spent on mobilization.

Its fleet of pull-behind scrapers now numbers 32. “Pull-types are awesome in the wet and the sand,” Matt says, noting that the company also uses Cat 627 self-propelled scrapers in drier conditions.

Although the bulk of his fleet is in the large machine category – including dozers, excavators, articulated trucks, scrapers and scraper tractors – Matt also uses skid steers as support machines. “We’re also heavy into Topcon GPS,” he says, “and in addition to dozers, scrapers, and motor graders, we also put the excavators on grade control. We’ve found it very user friendly.”

While operators are responsible for daily greasing, Pruss uses NMC to handle PM tasks. “They’ll service my entire fleet, no matter the brand,” he says. Engine, transmission and other major repairs go to dealers.

Today’s machine telematics also help with service, he says. “When we get a warning, dealers can diagnose and know where the machine is and what they need to fix it.” 

But he’s also learned these convenient diagnostics can eat up tech time if an easy fix is not readily apparent. “I always press my dealers for warranties that cover diagnostics,” Matt says. “I don’t want to be billed for the time it takes them to figure out a problem.”

Legacy

Father Jim Pruss (left) and brother Scott Pruss (right) flank Matt Pruss at the Contractor of the Year event.

Being named the 2021 Contractor of the Year has special resonance for Matt: His father, Jim Pruss Jr., was named a Contractor of the Year finalist in 2004. Both his father and brother attended the Contractor of the Year event last month and witnessed his win.

Neither is surprised he came away with the award. Matt’s clients and vendors also notice his attention to detail in how he approaches his jobs.

“He’s a heck of a businessman,” says his dealer representative Kevin Peterson with NMC. “And you can see it in the way he’s grown.”

“They know the type of leadership it takes to run a great small business,” says Ridder. “They just get it done.”

“We let our work to speak for us,” Matt says. “We want to under-promise and over perform instead of the other way around.”

Watch Matt Pruss receive the Contractor of the Year award below:

 

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