New cost estimate for high-speed rail puts California bullet train $100 billion in the red

Cal Matters ^ | MARCH 7, 2023 | RALPH VARTABEDIAN

[cymbeline]

“It will never carry a single passenger.”

Not if they have casino and brothel cars on it. What am I leaving out?

[Billthedrill]

What am I leaving out?

A smoking lounge. No tobacco allowed.

[Drago]

Or will be the most expensive “Rails to Trails” bike path ever!!!

[Bon of Babble]

The original notion of the “bullet” train was to provide high speed rail service from Los Angeles to San Francisco - routed through Central California. This is where the politicians are dead wrong - I can get from LAX to San Francisco in a little over an hour on Southwest.

Good luck with completing the line. They can’t figure out how to get over the mountains (and never will) - that’s why the “demonstration” tracks are supposed to be laid from Merced to Chowchilla (where it’s completely flat) - from nowhere to nowhere, and not from anywhere in So Cal to points north.

This while the electrical grid in California is failing (rolling blackouts and outright blackouts when the system is overloaded) - and water rationing up and down the state because we don’t have enough water storage.

But keep funding the bullet train, maybe one of these decades before I die, some track will be laid (but I doubt it).

[rxh4n1]

Cheaper to buy every would-be passenger their own car.

[P.O.E.]

And probably 100 billion years for the benefits to offset the costs.

[Bon of Babble]

I love rails to trails!!

We walk on old coal train routes in upstate Pennsylvania, the organization has done a great job of making the old train routes into trails.

It would be a far better use of the land than a high speed rail.

My own town is arguing about it right now - whether or not to build a tunnel, where it should come in, where the station should be - they’ve been arguing for at least five years with no resolution.

[gathersnomoss]

Go, go, go, go....
Never stop.....
Gee what a fantastic state!!!!!!!!!!

[gathersnomoss]

Homo individuals, illegals and the homeless just love speed trains. Especially the Transportation Secretary.

[taxcontrol]

Going to take a lot of tickets to make up for $100 Billion.

[Syncro]

China owns our debt.

It won’t be long until they own our country if something is not done.

[George from New England]

I am from Florida. When I look online am I correct ? Not even 1% is built ?
I see a few miles of structure in Fresno and not much more.
Can any Californian share any useful links here.

[Captain Peter Blood]

Soon it will be at an estimated cost of $250 Billion with no end in site. Several families will have Generational Wealth because of this. Your Tax Dollars at work.

[Syncro]

1 % sounds about right.

I’m in California and I thought they scrapped the whole idea years ago.

Probably kept alive by Newsom.

Maybe someone can give you some info.

[hanamizu]

I can get from LAX to San Francisco in a little over an hour on Southwest.

---

Of course you can and likely at a cheaper cost than the train fare. But, if the project ever gets finished, I’d expect California to attempt to ban intrastate flights in the name of ‘climate change’ or to tax them so that only the elites can fly, which of course is how it should be. /s

[LachlanMinnesota]

By Comparison, we could have a one-year stint of war in Ukraine, or a choo choo train.

Money no longer means anything.

[ronnie raygun]

This was the bottomless pit used to subsidize all their stupid leftist projects including the support of illegals

[Organic Panic]

And the collie idiots will blame capitalism for this communist failure.

[dforest]

Maybe Zelensky can bail them out.