Boca Chica Village, Texas
Boca Chica Village | |
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Bridges | Veterans Bridge, B&M Bridge |
Boca Chica Village or Kopernik Shores, formerly Kennedy Shores, is a small
In 2014, the village was chosen as the location for the construction of a control facility for the
In March 2021, Elon Musk announced plans to incorporate a new city to be called
History
Early history
The town was founded as Kennedy Shores in 1967 by John Caputa, a Chicagoan property developer, and was initially aimed at
In 1975, local resident Stanley Piotrowicz was voted in as town
SpaceX launch site
In 2012, private space exploration company
The site has been criticized as a "sacrifice zone." It was seen as empty space by both SpaceX and the state which is exemplified by Elon Musk saying ‘we’ve got a load of land with nobody around, so if it blows up, its cool’ in 2018.[16] At the time of its construction, many of the villagers’ homes were bought out with the threat of eminent domain. The launch site is an area where ‘negative externalities’ are located making it a sacrifice zone.[17][18]
In September 2019, SpaceX extended an offer to buy each of the houses in Boca Chica Village for three times the fair market value along with an offer of VIP invitations to future launch events. The amount of the offer was said to be "non-negotiable". Homeowners were initially given two weeks for that particular offer to remain valid.[19][20] Some Boca Chica property owners were happy with the offer and made plans to accept but other owners were not, noting that they had made substantial improvements to their properties and that the base valuation used by the September process used county tax assessment valuations and did not look at the specifics of each house so could not be a full
A small number of house owners in Boca Chica Village did not accept the 2019 offer from SpaceX and remained in the village in October 2020, one year after the initial purchase offers from SpaceX were made to residents.[24]
"David Finlay, SpaceX’s Senior Director of Finance, told Boca Chica Village residents that this would be SpaceX’s final and best offer, and threatened the company would need to pursue alternate means to obtain the homes if the people of Boca Chica Village turned down the money. ... 'the scale and frequency of spaceflight activities at the site continue to accelerate, your property will frequently fall within established hazard zones in which no civilians will be permitted to remain, in order to comply with all federal and other public safety regulations. This email therefore represents SpaceX’s best and final purchase offer.'"[24]
Proposed incorporation into "Starbase", Texas
In March 2021, Elon Musk stated that he intends to incorporate Boca Chica Village into
Starbase is planned to include the land in Boca Chica Village proper—where both the legacy house community and the SpaceX build site are located—as well as the land where the SpaceX test site and launch site is located, and more since Starbase is to be a municipality "much larger than Boca Chica."[5]
See also
- Boca Chica area summary
- Palmito Ranch Battlefield
- Del Valle, Texas
- Leesville, Texas
- Interstate 69 in Texas
References
- ^ "Kopernik Shores Populated Place Profile / Cameron County, Texas Data". TX HomeTownLocator. July 1, 2018. Archived from the original on July 15, 2019. Retrieved July 15, 2019.
- ^ "Kopernik Shores". Geographic Names Information System. December 31, 2003. Retrieved February 26, 2024.
- ^ Perez-Treviño, Emma (February 19, 2014). "SpaceX continues local land purchases". Valley Morning Star. Retrieved February 19, 2014.[permanent dead link]
- ^ Wasson, Erik (February 9, 2019). "Trump border wall could split SpaceX's Texas launchpad in two". Bloomberg. Archived from the original on March 31, 2019. Retrieved March 31, 2019 – via Los Angeles Times.
- ^ a b "Elon Musk Wants To Set Up A City Named Starbase Around His Texas Rocket Launch Site". Forbes. March 3, 2021. Archived from the original on March 3, 2021. Retrieved March 3, 2021.
- ^ a b Bendix, Morgan McFall-Johnsen, Aria. "Elon Musk is trying to create a new city called 'Starbase' at SpaceX's Texas launch site". Business Insider. Archived from the original on March 3, 2021. Retrieved March 3, 2021.
{{cite web}}
: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link) - ^ a b Garza, Alicia A. (June 15, 2010). "KOPERNIK SHORES, TX | The Handbook of Texas Online | Texas State Historical Association". TSHA. Archived from the original on October 1, 2021. Retrieved February 6, 2014.
- ^ Martinez, Domingo (August 2016). "Countdown to Liftoff". Texas Monthly. Archived from the original on August 22, 2016. Retrieved August 19, 2016.
- ^ "Boca Chica Village, formerly Kopernik Shores, Texas". TexasEscapes.com. February 9, 2008. Archived from the original on October 19, 2012. Retrieved February 6, 2014.
- from the original on May 7, 2021. Retrieved May 7, 2021.
- ^ Leinfelder, Andrea (January 11, 2018). "Aerospace talent in Texas Lauded". Houston Chronicle. Archived from the original on July 15, 2019. Retrieved July 15, 2019.
- ^ Nield, George C. (May 2014). Draft Environmental Impact Statement: SpaceX Texas Launch Site (PDF) (Report). Vol. 1. Federal Aviation Administration, Office of Commercial Space Transportation. pp. 3–32–3–34. Archived (PDF) from the original on September 28, 2020. Retrieved August 13, 2020.
sources explicitly quoted from the FAA document include reference to Garza 2012b; Garza and Long 2012b; Hildebrand 1950; Garcia 2003
- arstechnica.com. Archivedfrom the original on May 5, 2021. Retrieved July 5, 2021.
- ^ Foust, Jeff (August 27, 2019). "SpaceX's Starhopper completes test flight". SpaceNews. Archived from the original on November 26, 2021. Retrieved August 28, 2019.
SpaceX's South Texas site is unusual in that people live within a few kilometers of what the company eventually plans to be an orbital spaceport, in a subdivision called Boca Chica Village that predates the site by decades. Residents of the subdivision reported on social media that they were informed by local law enforcement to stand outside of their homes during the test, in the event an explosion created a shock wave that could break windows.
- ^ Martinez, Laura B (August 24, 2019). "Residents receive alert on SpaceX testing". The Brownsville Herald. Archived from the original on August 26, 2019. Retrieved August 26, 2019.
- ^ Keates, N.; Maremont, M. (May 7, 2021). "Elon Musk's SpaceX is Buying Up a Texas Village". Wall Street Journal. Archived from the original on May 7, 2021. Retrieved March 16, 2022.
- S2CID 150443847.
- from the original on March 8, 2023. Retrieved March 20, 2022.
- ^ Masunaga, Samantha (October 1, 2019). "To reach Mars, SpaceX is trying to buy up a tiny Texas community". Los Angeles Times. Archived from the original on October 6, 2019. Retrieved October 7, 2019.
- ^ "SpaceX launch pad transforms tiny Texas neighborhood: "Where the hell do I go now?"". CBS News. September 18, 2019. Archived from the original on September 20, 2019. Retrieved September 19, 2019.
- ^ a b c Leinfelder, Andrea (October 9, 2019). "The question in Boca Chica: Do you take Elon Musk's money and run?". Houston Chronicle. Archived from the original on October 9, 2019. Retrieved October 14, 2019.
- ^ Chang, Kenneth (September 29, 2019). "SpaceX Unveils Silvery Vision to Mars: 'It's Basically an I.C.B.M. That Lands'". The New York Times. Archived from the original on March 9, 2020. Retrieved March 15, 2020.
- ^ "Boca Chica residents take Elon Musk's money, make way for SpaceX launches from Texas". Houston Chronicle. March 18, 2020. Archived from the original on March 20, 2020. Retrieved March 20, 2020.
- ^ a b Gault, Matthew (October 2, 2020). "SpaceX Is Trying to Force Residents Out of a Small Texas Village". Vice. Archived from the original on November 1, 2020. Retrieved October 9, 2020.
- ^ Musk, Elon [@elonmusk] (March 2, 2021). "Creating the city of Starbase, Texas" (Tweet) – via Twitter.
External links
- "Boca Chica Village aerial overview video: Nov 18 2015". YouTube. January 7, 2016. Retrieved February 10, 2016.