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<p>SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) -- California lawmakers approved billions of dollars Friday in construction financing for the initial segment of the nation's first dedicated high-speed rail line connecting Los Angeles and San Francisco.</p> <p>The move marked a major political victory for Democratic Gov. Jerry Brown and the Obama administration. Both have promoted bullet trains as job generators and clean transportation alternatives.</p>

A wide range of California voters are willing to give Gov. Jerry Brown's tax initiative the support it needs in November, but that could change in a hurry if the Legislature approves billions of dollars for the proposed high-speed rail project later this week, a new Field Poll shows. More than a fifth of those voters backing Brown's tax plan, which would temporarily boost the sales tax by one-quarter of one cent and increase state income tax for those making more than $250,000 a year, say they would be less likely to support it if the state starts spending money...

The Los Angeles Times reports today: _______________________ After encountering criticism from environmental groups, Gov. Jerry Brown signaled Wednesday that he plans to withdraw his controversial proposal to protect the California bullet train project from injunctions sought by environmental lawsuits. Brown’s staff told key environmental groups that he would no longer include modifications to the California Environmental Quality Act in a package of legislation this month asking for $6 billion to start construction of the high-speed rail project. …........ Dan Richard, chairman of the California High-Speed Rail Authority, had first raised the possibility of some legal protections from lawsuits in a...

If the high-speed train we call the Moonbeam Express will cost anywhere from $68 billion to $117 billion, we wonder how much this one would cost: “Engineers in the U.S. and elsewhere are working on the technology for trains that could shoot through airless tunnels at speeds up to 4,000 miles per hour, the BBC reports. The transporters, which remain at least a decade away, could eventually cut travel time between New York and Beijing to about two hours,” according to the New York Daily News. Actually, at only a decade away, it’s closer than the one floundering today in...

The California High-Speed Rail project is absurd on the face of it, which gives reasonable people reason to wonder – “What in the world are they thinking?” Gov. Jerry Brown says . . .

Imagine your finances are down, and you need to cut back. You get rid of the premium cable channels, start shopping at the discount market, scrap date night at the movies, and ... buy a new house?California politicians may decide to embark upon a similar strategy, on a far bigger scale. Even as they must ax crucial services by Friday to help close a $15.7 billion deficit, state lawmakers are weighing California's costliest project ever: a $69 billion high-speed rail line."You don't run your home like that," said Assemblywoman Diane Harkey, R-Dana Point, who's tried, unsuccessfully, to kill the bullet...

California's politicians have until Aug 31 to give a final green light to an initial $6 billion, 130-mile section of track in the Central Valley Ambitious plans for a fast track linking Los Angeles and San Francisco at speeds of up to 220mph in just over two-and-a-half hours were slimly approved by 53 per cent in a statewide ballot in 2008. That allowed the state to raise $10 billion from bonds and secured an injection of $3.5 billion in stimulus money from the Obama administration. There is currently no direct train route between the two. Construction is expected to begin...

A strong majority of voters is against the bullet train project just as Gov. Brown is pressuring the Legislature to green-light the start of construction, a USC Dornsife/Los Angeles Times poll finds. Across the state, 55% of the voters want the bond issue that was approved in 2008 placed back on the ballot, and 59% say they now would vote against it. Since voters approved that $9-billion borrowing plan, the state and national economic outlook has dimmed and some of the promises about the bullet train have been compromised. 55% of the respondents said the state has bigger priorities than...

Jerry Brown, not surprisingly, used a ceremony marking the 75th anniversary of the iconic Golden Gate Bridge to tout his two bids for public works posterity – a north-south bullet train and a tunnel for water to bypass the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta. "Suck it in!" Brown said. "We got to build, we got to do it right. And this bridge I think really expresses that sense." Just as the bridge proved to be an economic boon, Brown said, so would a bullet train and a tunnel to improve water supply reliability, adding that just as the Golden Gate Bridge "connects...

Alternate title for this post: Dreams from My Freightcar: A Story of Pace and Incompetence 1. Why can't private passenger trains operate like plane companies? 2. Why don't we rip up some old tracks and turn them into true high-speed elevated rail that travels at 500 kilometers/hr? 3. Why is Amtrack, as it is now, so inefficient and crappy when train transportation is supposedly so efficient (CSX's 430+miles/gallon fuel) 4. There seems to be an inverse relationship of luxury to efficiency. Plane travel is torture, but it's efficient. Train travel could be luxurious since it's not fuel inefficient, but is...

The California High-Speed Rail project already has raised enough red flags to justify stopping the proposal in its tracks, so to speak. . . In light of critics' continuous detailed inspection of its every plan and the looming legal proceedings, what should we make of a new policy that the rail authority is considering – destruction of its email records after 90 days? Were we the suspicious type, we might conclude the rail authority has something to hide. . .

The Wall Street Journal has the backstory about how Governor Jerry Brown is insisting on trying to complete the high speed rail plan despite a budget shortfall of $16 billion: Transportation experts warn that the 500-mile bullet train from San Francisco to Los Angeles could cost more than $100 billion, though the Governor pegs the price at a mere $68 billion. The state has $12.3 billion in pocket, $9 billion from the state and $3.3 billion from the feds, but Mr. Brown hasn't a clue where he'll get the rest. [Snip] In 2008 voters approved $9 billion in bonds for...

We wrote for the weekend (see our column Sunday morning when it goes up here) that Gov. Jerry Brown is a bad guesser. The ink wasn’t even dry yet – in fact the Sunday paper hasn’t even been printed yet – and we learn that Brown guessed wrong again. Back in January Brown guessed that the state budget would be $9.2 billion in the red. Wrong. Monday Brown revised his estimate. Then he said it would be $15.7 billion in the red. Wrong. Today the independent Legislative Analyst affirmed that Jerry’s wrong again. It will be $17 billion plus some...

Poker players often use the phrase "betting on the come" to describe a willingness, if instincts and odds indicate, to wager big on the hope that they will draw winning cards. That's a perfectly valid tactic when one is playing with one's own money and therefore bearing the risk. But is it appropriate for California politicians to bet on the come by approving many billions of dollars in spending on very shaky assumptions that the money will be there when it's needed to pay the bills? Risk was the underlying theme of two hearings in the Capitol on Tuesday. One...

They are from the federal government and here to help. Or so goes the classic line by the last decent president. Federal transportation Sec. Ray LaHood has “warned” California lawmakers not to wait until the fall to vote on the Moonbeam Express high-speed rail boondoggle. “We need to make sure that the commitment is there to obligate the money,” LaHood lectured. In short, the feds are threatening,...

U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood warned the California Legislature today that the Obama administration will not wait until fall for a vote on high-speed rail, urging its approval in a budget vote next month. "We need to make sure that the commitment is there to obligate the money," LaHood told reporters at the Capitol, where he was meeting with lawmakers and with Gov. Jerry Brown. The state's commitment, LaHood said, will be demonstrated when lawmakers "put it in the budget and take a vote on it." Brown and the California High-Speed Rail Authority want to start construction on a $68...

For the sake of argument, let’s concede the high-speed rail will cost only $68 billion as most recently advertised. Of course, it will cost far more, probably even more than the $98 billion to $117 billion previously estimated, and certainly nowhere close to the $33 billion originally estimated. But let’s give them that. For the sake of argument. And let’s concede, for the sake of argument . . .

Prison crowding seems to be improving, but the bullet train still lives and Gov. Brown still pursues billions more from an overtaxed populace. . . .

With the state budget mired in deficits, Gov. Jerry Brown and legislators, especially his fellow Democrats, are searching under every fiscal rock for money to spend. That search has spawned an odd syndrome involving what could be three big pots of money – a competition among liberals over how they should be spent if, indeed, they materialize. The pots: • What could be several billion dollars a year in "cap-and-trade" fees that industries must pay as part of the state's anti-greenhouse gas crusade. • Another billion-plus bucks that it's believed would appear were the state to change taxation of multi-state...

Real-life Futurama tube-transport will catapult you from New York to Beijing in 2 hours The Simpsons have the monorail. Futurama has the Tube Transport System. The difference is that tube-transport is a fantasy — at least for now. The folks at ET3 want to make what they call "Evacuated Tube Transport" a reality. Their proposed maglev system would be capable of propelling six-person-capacity cylinders to speeds of over 4000 miles per hour, making it possible for people to travel from New York to L.A. in just 45 minutes, or from New York to Beijing in two hours. What's more, ET3...