California needs to give up on high speed rail
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- Опубликовано: 19 мар 2024
- "They have not even figured out the engineering of getting over the mountains in southern California and northern California to connect to the Bay area and L.A., which means that everything that they're doing now is never going to work, because they have not addressed the actual hard part of the project," argues Nick Gillespie.
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The Onion also had a news story about California deciding to replace high-speed rail with a high-speed bus system. They showed buses with a Shinkansen nose cone duct taped to the front, and a CG concept animation showing freeway ramp traffic tentatively crossing the bus lane as 250mph buses flashed by. Absolutely genius.
But the national money hole provides lots of employment.
House of Cards also discussed California's high-speed grift
California high speed rail would be awesome, if their government could actually do it correctly and efficently (and they haven't proved that at all)
I used to live in London. Caught the Eurostar to Paris a bunch of times. And I can tell you HSR will never work in California. And it's not just about the Govt. In fact Govt is the least of the problem.
Government is the problem. Private is the way to go...just like SpaceX.
SA and LA are about as far as Tokyo and Osaka. It can work if you americans stop bitching and whining for once
designate the middle of the highway from LA. to Frisco as the location and hand it to the private sector
it would be up and running in two years
@@adtastic1533 tell us more
Brightline, going from Orlando to Miami, cost a fraction of what California is spending.
Are you comparing Gov DeSantis to a juggling monkey?
Brightline is not High-Speed Rail. It uses an old goods rail path with at grade level crossings. Minor sections were upgraded. It's like comparing a national highway to your suburban main street.
@@paulmeilak9946 brightline saved money running on existing tracks. Brightline Florida Also kills 99 people a year. Although I will admit the Darwin law applies to those running the crossing when a train is coming.
@@fredfrond6148Fact Check: 101 deaths since 2018, not in just a single year.
@@paulmeilak9946 Yes that is the whole idea of passenger rail , use and upgrade rail facilities that are already there . Building all new is an environmental disaster and damages habitat .
10 billion dollars and I understand that they aren't even through with the environmental studies.
@@HarryF-tz5foI hear they need another 100 billion. I'll probably never see the train in my lifetime
@@vietle8157 not if you lives a thousand years.
@@HarryF-tz5fo designate the middle of the highway from LA. to Frisco as the location and hand it to the private sector
it would be up and running in two years
Only about 70 miles haven't passed review out of 500. Should be completed this year.
They couldn’t make a bicycle path that follows the entire rail path.
Now add in a train.
Incompetence cannot explain this, it is far past that, this can only be attributed to outright corruption.
Incompetence cannot explain it. But stupidity might. 🥴
The goal was never to build high speed rail. The goal was to create a budget (developing countries with 1/2 the resources of California build this infrastructure all the time). Rail just caught the public's attention and got support. Once you've got a budget, you can reward your friends. This happens all over the place. They spend over $40k/yr per homeless person. Still can't get them housed. Lots of people making $100k+ "fixing" the problem though. The Democrat party is just a political machine. Legalized scams. Grift. Say it however you want. Bet they vote for them again though.
They’re also pouring in $40B each year to deal with homeless problem. Once you accept additional funding, it becomes a full time job for these people
@@yn5568 yup the homeless industrial complex.
its called airline companies. they did the same BS in texas.
Whats the actual problem? Because it seems like high speed rail would be a tremendous benefit.
Lawsuits and inflation over 20+ years
@@Squibtorious inflation inflates the cost but also the value of everything
@@benjamindover4337 correct. You asked what the actual problem was. The project was mired in endless lawsuits from wide range of interests, plus they had to buy most of the land to build on--that's never easy. All the costs went up with inflation over the 20+ years; land costs, survey costs, labor costs, material costs, and cost of train sets also went up.
The project will be great once it's done. Just the initial segment, the Merced Corridor will make a huge positive impact on the economy
Too many environmental regulations(State and Fed), competing corrupt politicians, lack of experience, and delays.
Environmental clearance studies are a big time waster adding to the costs, politicians want all their towns connected to it, adding to the length of the route and adding delays, and we simply don't build rail in this country so many people working on this are new to the field, causing an increase in costs from mistakes made and delays.
@@Crusader677 yup! Reason could make a whole playlist of the "Sounds Like A Great Idea, With the Best of Intentions" shorts just about this project.
That being said, the project will be a success, and the network effects of the rail system will create a boom in the Central Valley
The problem with your parable of the juggling monkey is high speed rail exists in lots of countries.
But but but if America can't do it, it musts not be worth doing!
Just because other countries have done it doesn't mean we should just jump off the bridge and do it too. The whole point they're trying to make is high speed rail (outside of a few special cases such as the northeast corridor) is wasteful, inefficient, and unprofitable. If a private company hasn't already jumped on putting high speed rail somewhere, then chances are putting high speed rail there is a stupid idea. Profitability doesn't just matter to CEOs and shareholders, it matters to the economy as a whole. If something is not profitable, it is a drag on the entire economy. It is a sign that people don't actually want it. It is wasteful economic activity, money that could have gone somewhere and made more money that is just doing nothing. It's not worth building high speed rail out in the middle of nowhere just to serve some "underserved communities" who are probably not going to use the stupid thing anyways. Those communities would be much better off with that money in own their wallets.
@@thepuncakian2024 roads and highways are not profitable either. They're wasteful
@SergeyNeiss Agreed, privatize them. Privatize all modes of transportation for that matter. With no preferential treatment from government the market could decide which form of transit it actually wants.
@@thepuncakian2024 Turns out the market doesn't do well in all situations. Stuff like infrastructure are ONLY done efficiently by the government.
I think that CAHSR being a waste of money is kind of the point. Like obviously it's going to be more efficient and take cars off the road/planes out of the air, but there's more money to make in solving those problems than in those problems having been solved. It's the same reason FSD has always been just around the corner and why we've always been 5-10 years away from a man on mars, just applied to the government rather than private industry.
You nailed it... spot on.
private companies built all the railroads in the united states.
And it’s private companies colluding with government stopping some HSR projects that would be funded fully private.
And they still own the vast majority of the ROWs even though they abandoned passenger rail service in the 70s. Leaving the USA stuck resulting in the worst passenger rail service of any first world country.
I feel as though this railway is crucially important and must be finished, cost be damned!
Because I am thoroughly entertained and not paying for it!
Great Clip. Thank you.
How funny will it be when Brightline connects LA to Vegas before CAHSR actually finishes?
Not so much funny but expected. If someone tells me a private company can do something faster and cheaper than the government I'm not surprised at all.
"Personally, I liked the university. They gave us money and facilities, we didn't have to produce anything! You've never been out of college! You don't know what it's like out there! I've WORKED in the private sector. They expect *results*." - Dr. Ray Stantz, just before he mortgaged his house to go into business with Venckman and Egon.
It'll be a great thing, public-private partnership. Brightline is using existing infrastructure to build their corridor. We all benefit. Awesome!
Expect the CAHSR rail network to open to private enterprise later on as well. Public-private partnership.
You mean the thing that's been "shovel ready" for a year and hasn't even started yet? Sure, that things going to be finished first.
@@Strideo1with $5.5 billion in federal government help. Without that help, it wouldn't be happening.
the monkey with chainsaw is a bad metaphor, rail is not impossible, mountains and rail is hard, but not impossible, just ask Switzerland, :D 4 track is overkill
And many other countries.
When they finally give up, it will make a cool elevated sidewalk in the middle of nowhere....
It can be another expensive hipster walking path like the High line and 606.
This is the best infrastructure Project in usa since at least 30s
@@MilwaukeeF40Cdont forget that there are highways that are WAY MORE OVER BUDGET and would be way better if canceled and turned into rails
If they would have just done the project the way it was SOLD to the voters and it would be done by now. The original maps had the route following most of highway 101 and it would not have had to FIND and BUILD any new tunnels/bridges. San Francisco to L.A. and done. Then the extension into the central valley would come later if the ridership was enough. What the project really turned into was a political slush fund for the labor unions. Now it is just Jerry's little tank engine to nowhere.
An interesting side note: On the Hawaiian island of Oahu they are doing the same thing with a rail system (phase 1) that goes from out in the pineapple fields to nowhere that people need to go. They say that MAYBE phase 2 (at a price of billions of dollars more) will finally go somewhere.
It seems to me that the plans all lie about the true cost and intentionally build a useless section then come back with the line "we can't stop now".
That has been an important part of Brightline's success, using existing infrastructure and freeway right of way wherever possible. As you mentioned, following the 101 could have had a completed project from SF to LA by now and possible extensions to the Central Valley in the planning phase.
That's absolutely false. Using the 5 or 101 was NEVER the final route. They were considered and dismissed. Going through the Central Valley was the only official route.
@@jaymieceleste-romero2265And it's why Brightline's projects are dumbed down resulting in mediocre conventional train routes. The Florida line has an average speed of 70 mph. That's a direct result of using existing ROWs and single tracking most of the route which is not grade separated resulting in many collisions and deaths, too. You get what you pay for.
They are doing the same thing in Vegas. The average speed will be 100 mph. That's pathetic if the train is capable of 200mph. Again, they are single tracking most of the line among other shortcuts.
This project combines the two things government is most effective at: Doing nothing and spending lots of money
This is the best infrastructure Project in usa since at least 30s
But propose a freeway widening project it’s done a In a year
EXACTLY, this is one of the main problems with the US.
This is still going on?
Don't talk bad about the Money hole!!!!
Wait, we are STILL paying for this?
No they need to give up on state rail, a market can do a much better job making transportation the customer wants. It could be rail, or maybe a bus only road I don’t mean a lane a whole road so that the bus doesn’t get stuck in traffic & it’s an actual viable alternative. Or it might be a pedestrian biker only road. Ect
Oh my God I love The Brink that show was fantastic
Jack Black and Tim Robbins,,, it was FUN
I was so waiting for season 2 and it never happened dammit...
All I know about Tim Robbins is he was a puppet in Team America.
They look at this project and decide what they need to do is build high speed rail from LA to Vegas. Of course.
High-speed rail rails is a godsent for cronies in the loop.
A train just from LA to Bakersfield would be nice to connect with the San Joaquins. It doesn't have to be HSR.
Yes, it will connect on the Northern end to conventional rail service. However, on the LA side, it will be by bus unfortunately.
As far as figuring out the hard part of getting the monkey to juggle chainsaws they could've just hired an experienced Japanese engineering firm that has worked on high speed rail to come up with routes and feasibility plans and figured all this out by now. 🤦
They have hired and consulted with HSR specialists from Japan and German or French.
When the high speed rail fails, what happens to the ruins of infrastructure?
What is it with authoritarian governments and trains?
Lincoln did it first!
(Bankrupted Illinois with a rail project, then started a federally corrupt one because National Greatness)
Last time I checked, Switzerland is not authoritarian. Neither is Japan. What is it with Americans and driving?
@@crowmob-yo6ry
You can thank Americans for Japan and Switzerland not being authoritarian. _You're welcome!_
@@infinitytoinfinitysquaredb7836You missed my point. I mentioned two countries that have good passenger rail that are not authoritarian. Not only authoritarian countries have good passenger rail.
Just imagine if all this wasted money went towards reparations. They need their cash and this project is sucking the air out of everything in its path. Can't have both without huge tax increases which ain't happening.
its more efficient than driving. the voters voted for trains let them build
did not hear much reason, hmmnn interesting.
Environmentalists who force more people to drive and the construction of more roads, not to mention making them fly more too. What a lot of idiocrits.🤦
let the Germans or Swiss build it ...
(or probably not Germans considering BER and Stuttgart1)
Jerry Brown was shaking his fist at geography. There are mountains between the Bay Area and the Central Valley, and mountains between the Valley and the LA Basin. Following the freeways would be impossible for high speed rail. Running trains up the Grapevine would be a horror.
That's what tunnels are for.
@@davidjackson7281 Those would be honking long tunnels-look at a map. And that does not consider faults.
@@tomhalla426Though no engineering expert here, in all due respect, l wonder how much you think you know about faults and tunnels. Funny how people support multiple 13+ mile tunnels through the Pacheco Pass and San Gabriel Mountains yet they fear a series of tunnels through the Grapevine with each no longer than 5-6 miles totalling up to 20-22 miles. The Tejon Pass and the Tehachapi routes have the same elevation of 4000 feet. Brightline West will execute the proof of concept by successfully traversing 4.5% grades.
The issue with tunnels is not earthquakes. Damage occurs on the surface not underground which would be like a submarine in an ocean. The issue is running into high pressure gas and water when digging. That's what pilot bores are about.
My understanding is the route was not chosen for engineering reasons and logic. lt was chosen because of political support vs. nimby opposition. Lancaster and Palmdale and the High Desert wanted it while Tejon Mountain Village and Santa Clarita short-sightedly did not. Big Unfortunate Mistake.
@@davidjackson7281EXCELLENT RESPONSE, David. Your comment is the first intelligent one that I've read so far in all of the comments herein. Most of the comments are rooted in right wing ideology and politics, and demonstrate no knowledge of transportation... especially rail transportation. KEEP COMMENTING on high speed rail. And keep advocating for the Grapevine.
CAHSR has already stated that there will be 15 miles of tunnels.
Elon Musk starts with the monkey. He focused his engineers on rocket motor efficiency so that the rockets had enough fuel to land, could have enough thrust so that they didn’t need to carry a lot of fuel for the landing. On the cybertruck, he tackled the high voltage system to reduced the weight and improve the efficiency of the electrical system. All without industry support.
I hate their densification mantra.
Do you live in a rural area?
@@Squibtorious NYC all my life
Before there used to be different areas of the city that had different densities like overcrowded areas, medium density, and low density but they're making so the whole city is just overcrowded. It sucks.
still better than car-centric sprawl
@@crowmob-yo6ry Well, it depnds on preference. There should be a place for you and a place for me but it seems like that's not how this country works anymore. Also, a passenger community that uses shared taxi vans could replace regular taxis in NYC but that wouldn't see the light of day because it's about command and conquer. Most of the people pushing and spearheading these ideas are from Red States and escaped to NYC, etc.
"If something is hard, it's not worth doing." -- ReasonTV.
Flanged steel wheels rolling on parallel rails. What will they think of next? One day we’ll be able to travel from one wind blown parking lot in the LA basin to another wind blown parking lot in the Bay Area, in only slightly more time, and at only twice the cost, than these old fashioned airliners we’ve been flying around. It will bankrupt the state, but Jerry Brown gets to reminisce about using his Eurorail Pass.
Jerry's push'ng 90.
It's all a grift.
It's funny how so much of what was regurgitated in this circle jerk was so wrong. How can anyone take them seriously?
First of all, it was the California voter who passed this. It wasn't a project passed in the state house. The people decided.
Second, Jerry Brown had nothing to do with starting this project. The measure passed in 2008 when Arnold Schwarzenegger was in office. Jerry Brown didnt come in until 3 years later in 2011. However, what Jerry did say is that he would support the will of the people in getting HSR built in California.
The monkey and pedestal metaphor doesn't make sense. What's or who's the Monkey in the CAHSR project? Besides, many other countries have built HSR so the monkey, chainsaw, pedestal example is moot. It's not seemingly impossible. Granted, CAHSR has had its share of growing pains, but when you're the first to do it in the USA, there's going to be a unique learning curve. That's true for other infrastructure projects built to last 100+ years and take decades to build.
CAHSR has over engineered many viaducts and bridges that are already completed on purpose partly because California is earthquake country. It's not just about environmental/pollution issues.
And when it comes to environmental laws in California, I'm very glad they have been there for decades. It's partly the reason why any person has access to beaches over the entire coast of California. It cannot be privately owned, and blocking extensive development has kept the coast more like a state park for all of us to enjoy. Or else our coast would have looked like Miami, Honolulu, or Cancun by now.
And then there is the issue of the air quality in places like the LA basin. In the 60s and 70s you had regular smog alerts. It would mean kids couldn't even play outside during recess or lunch or play outside. Your lungs would actually sting to breath outside after a couple of hours.
BTW, there was never an official cost amount listed on the ballot measure. There was a travel time of 2:40 added at the last hour, but no actual overall cost for the project. So that $33 billion number was not from the proponents of the measure.
Oh, and you know why the very specific travel time was added? So that future politicians couldn't dumb down the project years later resulting in a higher speed train that's not true HSR like the one you have in Florida by Brightline. That's built on the cheap with pedestrian travel times.
Lastly, if it wasn't for the federal government you wouldn't have this little thing called the INTERNET!
I guess none of you are actual reporters, but do some research before you pontificate on something you, obviously, know very little about. Thanks for the laughs.
Money pit.
If libertarians had their way, the highway system would never have been built, "too expensive ", "uneccessary" etc.
The democrats will do all they can to keep this rail boondoggle going. Why?
$$$$$$$ in their pockets.
Hire a Chinese contractor to get it done.
Chinese contractor's first day on the job:
"What do you mean we can't pay the labor cents on the dollar? No slaves? We can't just treat this like a meat grinder? What's OSHA?"
Democrat$$$...Republican$$$$......both have a history
❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤ high speed rail that never gets built ……. seems like a great way to spend money
Just make an autobahn from Bakersfield to Redding
I live here in Cali. There was a popular radio show called John and Ken. They would do a bit on the High Speed Rail and would play Ozzy Osborne’s “Crazy Train” for the bumper music. They lied about the ridership, lied about the progress, etc. It was always stupid and we’ll get concrete monuments in the middle of nowhere. I had a buddy who was a civil engineer that worked on highways. His firm worked on a big interchange. Over a decade and hundreds of millions of dollars…………..for the engineering and environmental impact. They designed in pipes under highway to allow endangered species to crawl under the highway. Hilarious. I didn’t know that endangered species could read signs.
Interesting considering construction started in 2015. Not even 10 years ago. I call BS
@@mrxman581 Call BS on what? That HS rail will happen in Cali? It wont.
Only high speed rail is the one that runs from your wallet to Sacramento.
Give up? Did they even start?
Yea America isn't capable of building anything anymore, not possible. Leave innovation to other countries like Laos, they have high-speed mountain rail. Or hire the Chinese, they built America's first and only rail system, and I am sure they could easily build another.
Laos' first train is great but the top speed is 100 mph. Far from high speed. Brightline with diesel power at 125 mph is faster.
Agreed -
And a high speed rail is an extremely high cost item for very little actual benefit.
It could not possibly serve a high number of people, and it would hardly be as inexpensive as a bus ticket.
true but it would save you a bunch of time sitting on that bus in traffic... and the higher cost would keep the folks you share space with of a more tolerable quality
@@jd-py5nm - "More tolerable quality." Such as ... ? Do you even know what you're talking about? By the way, a long distance bus would not exactly spend lots of time sitting in traffic. It would be a freeway bus, and I doubt the departure times would be scheduled with rush hour.
I know a guy who has done engineering work on this. It's a total joke as they cannot get the train up over the Grapevine.
In 5 years they will discover that they can connect SF and LA if they tunnels through the mountains, which will take 10 years and only cost $200B more.
The average grade on the Grapevine is around 4% which should be doable. However, the Cajon Pass going to Vegas is a 6% grade. No HSR train has ever traverse that grade. 4% is around the max.
The average grade on the Grapevine is around 4% which should be doable. However, the Cajon Pass going to Vegas is a 6% grade. No HSR train has ever traverse that grade. 4% is around the max.
@@michaelcavalier8750There will be a total of 15 miles of tunnels. That's already in the plans.
I believe there are airports that are near San Francisco and Los Angeles. They can get you to the same relative area in roughly the same amount of time, and roughly at the same price, with no additional tax dollars.
This is a classic example of failing to realize there is already a solution to the problem. That or a deliberate boondoggle project that put money into certain people's pockets.
But they can't put you at all of the places in between.
Airports take longer. They also aren’t connecting the growing parts of California to LA and the Bay Area. This is going to be a backbone rail system for half the state/most of the population that will be around for generations. Regions of the state are going to connect to this thing. It’s just the beginning.
❤❤❤sunk cost. Stop this stupidity. Let me know what to do. 😅😅😅
It's not about high speed rail. It's about hiring g high paid consultants who then contribute to politicians' campaign funds
This project no longer even closely resembles what voters approved back in 2008. It MUST be put to a vote again as a “new” project. Knowing there is no firm completion date, no reliable final cost estimate or a funding source, put it to a vote again. If it’s approved, build it.
Idiots will just approve it again anyway.
We already did that. It's the lack of federal funding that's the problem. We need more of it sooner and it will be built sooner.
@@mrxman581 When was the second vote?
Browns and Newsomes donors all needed favors repaid.
Actually, it was Arnold Schwarzenegger who was in office when the HSR measure passed in 2008. Jerry Brown wasn't in office until 3 years later.
As much as a libertarian I am, I will never be against rail. It's insane how far ahead other countries are with their transportation, we're behind even many developing countries.
No matter how corrupt and wasteful the spending on it is?
@@ryan1127 fix the process don't stop the project. Obviously they fucked it up. Unfuck it. New management. Bring in the Japanese, someone knows how to do it
@@ryan1127 Yes. Raise the taxes if needed - I am SICK of the United States being so abysmally behind the entire rest of the developed (and now developing) world with respect to our transportation infrastructure.
That said, there is a free-market solution which will get a TON of high-speed intercity rail, electrified regional rail, and urban / suburban metro systems built, but said solution would screw over the military-industrial complex and some of the largest corporations in the world so it will *never* happen...
It's not being against rail it's being against the wasteful spending and pipe dream that is cross country rail
@@cgmason7568 long distance rail does already exist and is heavily subsidized, probably because so few people use it. What rail advocates want is not that, planes will always be more competitive. It's the in-between short to medium distances that rail excels at.
I remind everyone here that similar accusations were made of the Shinkansen system when it was being built (it had massive cost overruns at a minimum, don’t know if it was as delayed as California HSR), but after it opened, all of those concerns were buried by how good the system was and still is, not to mention how profitable. I know there are gonna be a lotta people sipping for the auto and airline industries here but before you flame me in replies consider this: absent the massive subsidies the auto and airline industries receive in the form of government-owned infrastructure, neither of your pet industries would be at all profitable let alone economically viable. Rail by contrast is actually profitable even in the absence of government subsidization, not to mention there’s a sweet spot in travel distances where it’s too short to fly but too long to drive where HSR actually makes sense. I love Reason’s reporting but I fear sometimes you guys fall into the trap of simping for established interests (in this case cars and planes) and failing to adequately consider the real benefits of alternatives to those industries in favor of hiding mostly if not entirely behind the pure numbers as advertised to the public and failing to imagine an alternative world in some respects.
It’s going to be a vital piece of infrastructure once it’s done. The feds should just grant them the extra 100 billion to do it. It’s chump change for their yearly budget. The defense budget alone is around $900B a year. How about they put some of that money into national infrastructure.
@@mendodsoregonbackroads6632 $100 billion is never chump change. I'm a big supporter of CAHSR but it's hard to believe the price tag man...
Just seems to me Shinkansen is not prifitable at all
Needs to be subsidized to survive
@@dafyduck79 It's the same with our airline system and roads. Both of those need to be subsidized, especially our road system. Should we stop funding those? If you think we shouldn't stop funding those why not?
@@mendodsoregonbackroads6632 to subsidize means, that you keep activites alive which destroy value; value of input is higher as value on output - we are simply destroying the wealth
Roads and airlines definitly can live without public money, there are many examples of that
Maybe you need some help from China? They only have 40,000 km that, you Americans, are saying that the trillion dollars they spent was a waste of money. OH THE HYPOCRISSY.
Yep, still a waste of money.
The project is already too far along to be suddenly scrapped. CAHSR can always be privatised, which is the better solution than outright cancellation. Brightline is more successful because it was built by a private corporation.
Brightline has built a conventional train with an average speed of 70 mph. It's still losing money on their Florida line. It's nowhere near the break even point. And people are already complaining about the rising prices. That's not success.
Believe me or not, but I helped to design this rail route. I was responsible for all of the Rights of Way legal drawings and descriptions for the project. It was not only to run from the Bay Area to Los Angeles, but also to Texas later. I could see that it would never be realized even back then. BTW I exited the state in 1999.
I very much doubt that design is what ended up in the 2008 ballot measure if you left almost 10 years before it was approved.
Gonna be hilarious when it thrives, because it will.
California needs high speed rail, but the government is too stupid to do it.
How about just funding and building the project in one go instead of making it take so fucking long inflation makes the project go 10x over the budget? You know, it's simple finances.
Not to mention if you were to actually account all externalities and cost for highways and general car use and compare it apple to apples, even Cali HSR would be cheaper per person, per emitted CO2eq, per amount of land used, per amount of energy resources used etc. etc.
We need more mass transit. High speed rail is a must. Hopefully Texas can lead the charge on how it’s done right.. Florida is doing something at least.
CAHSR is the only one who has built anything yet. The others are vaporware. When they build their first viaduct, we'll talk
More like slow speed rail
The California HSRA still hasn't solved the problem of getting over the Tehachapi Grade and tunneling through the San Gabriel mountains. Sacramento should to cut bait on this boondoggle and focus on water infrastructure to prepare for the next series of droughts.
Stop encouraging water dependence in drought prone areas.
What drought? lt's raining and the lakes are overflowing.
They're doing both things.
I thought that Elon Musk would build it in a tube, for next to no money, and at a ticketprize of 1 dollar each way?
He did but it is not for riffraff like you.
Let take this to court
I remember voting against the high-speed train, for this very reason. When you could fly to LA to SF for $35, and $32 billion was a lot of money.
And this was before there was an Environmental Review.
Thank you for this. Here in Florida there are people who honestly believe HSR between Tampa and Orlando would have happened on the pittance offered by the Administration back then. We really dodged a bullet. For the record, I’m retired from the American pax railroad industry.
It's pure genius actually. Think of it this way, if you're a land developer and you've got family members well placed in political positions, you purchase otherwise worthless land out in the middle of California. Miles and miles of barren land cheap! Next, you get your family members in California and Congress to start a project that needs to purchase right of ways for miles and miles out in the middle of California. Viola!
Like solving homelessness, it’s hard to give up on a reliable scam
North America NEEDS high speed rail. We are woefully behind many nations, and have instead decided to go all in on expensive auto infrastructure.
"Expensive" US Freeway system: Cost $600 billion in 2022 dollars to build 48,756 miles of freeway between every major urban area in 48 states
"Inexpensive" High Speed Rail: $100 billion to build 500 miles of rail between two cities in one state
You can't be serious.
@@StephanAhonen you’re not accounting for total cost since it’s construction, it’s maintenance costs, the cost of land to be acquired to build it, the cost caused by destroying minority communities to build these highways, the cost to our health, the cost to the environment, even federal grants that make the aviation industry remotely profitable… I’m perfectly serious.
So ignoring geography is not material? No one runs high speed rail through mountains, and California has no continuous coastal plain.
@@MrHeff Look, at $100 billion for 500 miles, that's $200 million per mile. At that price, to recreate the US Freeway system as a railway would cost $10 trillion. With a T. Unless all of those costs you mentioned add up to more than that, the roads are cheaper.
@@tomhalla426 Obviously they don't run high-speed rail through dense mountain ranges like we do highways - they build massive tunnels and go underneath the entire range.
California has some weird geography which adds challenges to the construction of various kinds of infrastructure (see some of the weird tricks employed to build BART in a way which can withstand earthquakes as an example) but none of these challenges are anywhere near insurmountable with modern technology.
Sounds like California is about to learn why big gov't is a failure. Like it hasn't learned it often enough... The Netherlands and Germany have a beautiful case to sample on how dumb this sort of project is: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betuweroute
My favorite part: "concluded that construction of the line would never pay for itself." As heard in newspapers at the time of its completion.
The Fed keeps bailing out broke ass states by buying their debt. This is sucking capital from productive things and sending investors to metals and crypto.
Just make a god damn debate with @alanthefisher. Or @NotJustBikes. Or @AdamSomething. Or any other pro-public transit youtuber.
It’s a grift they’re paying off all their friends for not building the railroad. It’ll never end.