Dubai Loop Moves Into TBM Assembly as The Boring Company Prepares Its Next Major System

The Boring Company’s next major Loop project is beginning to take physical shape.

Dubai officials said this week that work on the Dubai Loop has advanced to the assembly of its tunnel boring machine and the casting of precast concrete tunnel-lining segments, two of the major steps required before tunneling can begin.

The update came September 29 after Dubai Crown Prince Sheikh Hamdan bin Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum met with The Boring Company President Steve Davis to review the project’s progress. Dubai’s Media Office said several technical and engineering workstreams are now moving forward in parallel following the implementation agreement signed earlier this year.

For Nashville, the development offers an early look at how The Boring Company is beginning to scale the model now being built beneath Music City into another major metropolitan market.

The systems share the same basic Loop concept. The path to getting them underground is considerably different.

Four stations and 4 miles to start

The first phase of Dubai Loop is planned as a 6.4-kilometer, or roughly 4-mile, route with four stations connecting the Dubai International Financial Centre with Dubai Mall.

The first four stations are planned for DIFC 2, ICD Brookfield Place, Dubai Mall Zabeel Parking and the Burj Khalifa area.

That pilot would eventually form part of a much larger system.

Dubai’s Roads and Transport Authority says the full network could extend approximately 22 kilometers, or about 14 miles, with 19 stations connecting major parts of the financial district, Business Bay and the Dubai World Trade Centre area.

The initial phase is projected to serve approximately 13,000 passengers per day, while the full system is projected at approximately 30,000 daily passengers.

That makes Dubai smaller than the current Nashville vision.

The Boring Company says Music City Loop is planned as an almost 25-mile system with more than 40 stations in various stages of design, connecting downtown, Lower Broadway, West End and Nashville International Airport.

But Dubai’s first phase is much more tightly defined: four stations, one corridor and one initial tunnel project.

That resembles the incremental approach TBC has used elsewhere: establish a functioning segment, then expand the network around it.

Before the machine digs, Dubai is building 25,000 pieces of tunnel

One of the biggest differences between Nashville and Dubai is sitting above ground right now.

Dubai Loop’s first phase is expected to require approximately 25,000 precast concrete tunnel segments, each weighing about 4,000 pounds. Those segments are already being manufactured.

Together, they will form the structural lining of the tunnel as the machine advances.

That process is fundamental to The Boring Company’s standard Prufrock system. In softer geology, the machine is designed to excavate while simultaneously installing the precast liner behind it.

Nashville is different.

Music City Loop is TBC’s first major hard-rock project, with Prufrock machines boring through Nashville limestone. The company has described its Main Beam configuration as a Prufrock variant designed for rock strong enough to serve as the tunnel’s natural structural liner.

In other words, the two cities are becoming real-world demonstrations of two versions of the same tunneling platform.

Nashville is testing Prufrock in hard limestone. Dubai will use a segment-lined tunnel configuration designed for different underground conditions.

The vehicles and overall Loop concept may look similar when the systems eventually open. The engineering required to get there is not identical.

Dubai still has a permitting hurdle ahead

There is another similarity Nashville readers may recognize: permits.

Before Dubai tunneling begins, The Boring Company says it expects to seek approximately 48 permits and No Objection Certificates from about 10 different entities. Its public project page says the goal is to begin tunneling in the second half of 2026.

That number is strikingly close to Nashville, where TBC previously said Music City Loop required 45 separate permits and approvals across the project.

Nashville has already moved into active tunneling. Dubai has not reached that point yet.

The September announcement confirms that the machine is being assembled and tunnel lining is being produced. Neither Dubai officials nor TBC have announced that underground excavation has begun.

That distinction matters when tracking the project’s progress.

A different financial structure

The two projects also differ in the way they have been presented financially.

Music City Loop is being developed as a 100 percent privately funded system, with The Boring Company saying no taxpayer funding will be used for construction or operation. TBC estimates the Nashville project will cost a few hundred million dollars.

Dubai has published much more specific cost estimates.

The first 6.4-kilometer phase is estimated at approximately AED 565 million, or about $154 million, while the full network is estimated at approximately AED 2 billion, or about $545 million. Dubai’s RTA describes the project as a strategic partnership with The Boring Company.

The public project materials reviewed by LOOP Nashville do not spell out precisely how those construction costs will be divided between TBC and the RTA.

The Boring Company also announced a $3 billion Series D financing round this year to expand engineering, operations and production and support projects including Las Vegas, Nashville and Dubai. That corporate financing is separate from the already-awarded Dubai Loop project.

The clock now starts on Dubai’s first tunnel

Dubai’s February agreement called for the initial phase to be delivered in approximately one year after design work and required preparations are completed.

The complete 19-station system is projected to take approximately three years.

That does not amount to a firm public opening date.

Design is still being finalized. Permits remain part of the process. And as of the latest official update, the tunnel boring machine is being assembled rather than mining.

But the project has clearly moved beyond the concept stage.

Concrete tunnel components are being manufactured. A tunnel boring machine is being assembled. And the same company already tunneling beneath Nashville is preparing another city-scale Loop project on the other side of the world.

Nashville is becoming part of a larger test

When Music City Loop was announced in July 2025, Nashville represented The Boring Company’s first major expansion beyond its home market in Las Vegas.

Fourteen months later, that picture looks different.

Nashville is now TBC’s first hard-rock Loop project. Dubai is moving toward the company’s first major international Loop system. And the company has raised billions of dollars to expand its tunneling platform into additional markets.

The two projects will not be identical.

Dubai is starting with four stations and a concrete-lined tunnel system. Nashville is building through limestone toward a much larger network with more than 40 stations under consideration.

But both are testing the same underlying idea: whether The Boring Company can take the tunnel-and-vehicle system it developed in Las Vegas and repeatedly deploy it in cities with very different geology, regulations and transportation needs.

In Nashville, that experiment is already underground. Dubai appears to be next.