Ketchikan is not getting a free, mile-long, 12-foot-diameter tunnel to link the community with its airport across the water.

The Ketchikan Gateway Borough had been one of 16 finalists for a national company’s offer to pay for building a tunnel but did not measure up in the final decision. The Boring Co. will be moving forward with projects in New Orleans, Baltimore and Dallas, selecting three winners rather than the original plan for a single winner of the Tunnel Vision Challenge.

The company, which was founded by Elon Musk, announced the contest winners in a late-night March 23 post on its X social media account.

Ketchikan’s 45-page entry, one of 487 submitted to the company, had proposed four options for tunnel access between Revillagigedo and Gravina islands, linking the town to the airport.

The company’s post on X said the next step for the three winners will be for The Boring Co. “and the project stakeholders (to) enter into a rigorous diligence process.” That will include meetings with “elected officials, regulators, community leaders and business leaders,” in addition to geotechnical borings and utility and subsurface infra investigation.

The company said it would pay 100% of the cost of the due-diligence effort, adding that it would build all three “if all three are feasible.” But, if only one of the tunnels is feasible, it would build just the one.

Ketchikan’s effort started in January, when Assembly Members Rodney Dial and Sharli Arntzen talked of addressing long-standing issues surrounding the aging ferry system between Revillagigedo and Gravina islands.

Dial discovered The Boring Co. contest that promised to finance and construct one mile of 12-foot diameter tunnel infrastructure for the winning project.

The interest in a hard link such as a bridge or tunnel across Tongass Narrows goes back decades. It increased with construction of the state-owned and borough-operated Ketchikan International Airport on Gravina Island in 1973.

Currently, borough-operated shuttle ferries serve the airport.