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SpaceX gets L.A. City Council approval to build Mars spaceship at Port of L.A.

Shipping containers are stacked at the Port of Los Angeles, the nation's busiest container port, on Nov. 7, 2019. (Mario Tama/Getty Images)

SpaceX’s road map to Mars now includes the Port of Los Angeles.

The Los Angeles City Council approved a permit Tuesday that allows the Elon Musk-led company to use a site on Terminal Island at the port to build aerospace parts.

With the vote, SpaceX is now cleared to start work at the site; last week, the L.A. Board of Harbor Commissioners green-lighted the permit.

SpaceX representatives told L.A. City Councilman Joe Buscaino’s office that the company was interested in the port site because it needed additional manufacturing capacity for its Starship spaceship and rocket booster. A SpaceX representative at last week’s harbor commissioners meeting did not mention Starship by name during his presentation of the project, but he said the company would use the port site to further its goal of creating an interplanetary society that includes Mars.

Read the full story on LATimes.com.