Posted on 12/20/2011 2:38:41 PM PST by lasereye
An 80 billion dollar train from Pixley to Hooterville.
How do I sign up for some of this?
Idiots! Dump the boondoggle!!
If they could just figure a way to get enough of our money, they could solve all our problems.
The only way high speed rail can be built in the USA is under the umbris of government. A Texas consortium tried to build a HSR line and Southwest Airlines spent millions to lobby against it - not unlike how some interests are lobbying aganst the Keystone Pipeline.
With California it makes sense to build HSR because with environmental rules there is a ZERO chance that a new north-south freeway can be built to link SoCal and NorCal. And adding additional airport space is all but impossible for the same reasons. Rail, on the other hand allows travelers to go from city center to city center in far less time than can be done via a combination of freeway and air.
Given the population of the state will expand to probably 50 million by mid-century and to as much as 80 million or more by 2100 having an alternate means of transport in place for all of those people is responsible governance.
As to the opposition to HSR? The HSR plan mirrors the 1956 Federal Interstate Highway Act because that method of building transportation infrastructure is proven. You build in the rural areas first and then build in the urban areas so you can keep the political momentum going. God bless their pointy little heads, but the French, Germans, and Britis built their HSR systems the same way we did our Interstates because that model worked.
That’s what failed with the US Route system of the 1920’s.
The urban areas got their US Route expressways built and then those expressways terminated into gravel and dirt roads in the rural areas. At best those roads were mere two lane ribbons in rural areas. The Feds learned from their mistakes and despite huge Republican opposition the first Interstate construction was started not in NYC or Boston or LA, but in rural Missouri and Kansas on I-70.
If HSR was built the way critics want it built it would not link up to anything and would only be a series of regional or urban rail systems that did not link urban areas.
What irks me about the opponents of the program is that most of them will go out of their way to ride on this thing once it’s built. Another group will say they supported it all along just like so many do with the Interstates now.
“An 80 billion dollar train from Pixley to Hooterville.”
There actually is a little hick town named Pixley near Fresno that will be served by the bullet train. We can build a town named Hooterville with additional federal funding.
What a great way to put it!!! And don't forget that Crabwell Corners will demand a stop too.
There are only four freeway lanes in each direction, going from north to south on I-5 and Hwy 99. There are seldom traffic delays driving through say Kettleman City.
There are plenty of delays in San Jose and in Van Nuys.
If they want to prove and accept, then build HSR from Van Nuys to Irvine; as alternative to the 405.
As for Europe. Germany has a freeway system like ours. In France, they built the TGV for example to go from Paris to the German border. However, the fares are 120 euros each way. A bus is way cheaper and not that much slower. As I drove along that TGV there was very little train traffic.
Yes, detractors will ride and pay; if for example it delivers them from Van Nuys to Irvine in under and hour; when driving is an excruciating 2-3 hours.
But north to south, we're taking Southwest Airlines.
I’m familiar with Pixley.
Some of Green Acres scenes were filmed there too.
Based on highly inflated passenger loads and already rising costs, the project is already bankrupt. $800 mill spent so far on planning and publicity. Any one who has driven several times up the I-5 or Hwy 99 could design the route in 30 minutes.
Why have they hired 8 PR firms over 20 years? It’s not workable and they sold it enough to pass the bond at the last election. The feds, who are the only ones in the US more bankrupt than the state of Cal keep the project alive with tax money from the over 49 suckers, er states.
Were I governor, I would go to Vegas and meet with Steve Wynn, other casino owners, and the governor of Nevada. I would invite them to build a line from Vegas to Ontario and Burbank with the two lines going to Barstow and forming one line north to Vegas. The road from southern California to Vegas is the real place that has a passenger load. And you don’t need a car when you’re in Vegas. NO PUBLIC FUNDS, but expedited permits and rights of way etc.
Then if someone wants to do Barstow to SF or Barstow east, they would get the same government assistance, but no funds.
High speed rail makes no sense anywhere.
If the truth were ever told WRT the cost, people would be showing up to meetings with 10Ga shotguns loaded with 00 buckshot to moderate the meeting. In the end it would cost close to a trillion bucks to complete the promised routes. A ticket would have to cost $4,000 more or less.
Californis is an especially poor candidate due to the fact that it would have to travel through the most active siesmic zone in the US.
Thank God for Southwest Airlines!
“build HSR from Van Nuys to Irvine”
Pay attention. The reason the Feds will not allow that is because such a line would probably never reach Northern California. As to your taking SWA, once HSR is in place it’ll be a 2.5 to 3 hour trip from LA Union Station to downtown San Francisco - regardless of traffic on the 405 or of delays at LAX, Burbank, or Ontario. Meanwhile, even on a good day, travel from city center to city center is around four hours on a good day.
You go ahead and take SWA, I’ll be waiting for you in SF.
Then the feds are dopes.
If they can't demonstrate the solution where it is needed and difficult to implement, then they don't deserve approval of the effort to build the easy part in the central valley.
The central valley probably be sparsely populatated for the next century and ready to link the two populated regions 50-100 years from now.
“High speed rail makes no sense anywhere.”
Your argument and etc. were also stated about the Bay Area Rapid Transit System. I remember someone on FR saying it would’ve been cheaper to buy every BART user a BMW than to pay for the Concord to Antioch extension. Yet let something happen where BART isn’t available and you see its true value in that the whole Bay Area subsumes into gridlock. Conversely, for several weeks back in 1989 BART was the best (and sometimes only) way in and around the Bay Area due to damage from the Loma Prieta earthquake.
HSR is the same thing. It’s being built as an altearnative and as pressures build on air and road infrastructure the HSR will be there to take up the slack.
I am a fan of SWA, for sure. But what they did in Texas to stymie a 100% privately funded HSR project bordered on criminal because if that project had gone forward then the same firm had planned on building HSR in California with 100% private money.
So you can thank Southwest for forcing private investors out of the HSR business.
By the way, if HSR was going to have been the flop that you and all of the naysayers believe it will be then why do you think Southwest Airlines spent an estimated $35 million to stop it? Hmmm?
Oh, and now Texas is building HSR as part of the Texas Corridor project and it’s being done at taxpayer expense when it could have been done privately. You can be sure to thank your friends at SWA for that.
Given that the model for building HSR is the same as the model for the Interstate Highway System I take it then that you also oppose the Interstate Highway System?
The fastest "high speed" Amtrak train between Chicago and Detroit, for instance, takes a half hour longer (when it's on time) than the Pennsylvania Railroad steam train of 75 years ago.
In the year 2040.
“When there was a market demand for high speed passenger trains, private railroads in the US provided the service.”
True. And then the government spent around $800 billion on the Interstate Highway System and then when passenger rail and short haul rail was no longer profitable the government required the railroads to keep both money-losing services available.
It was only after rail was deregulated that intermodal and container transport returned the private railroads to profitability.
According to the logic you’re promoting here, the government had no business building Interstate Highways.
Frankly, I’d prefer privately funded HSR but the good people at Southwest Airlines made sure that no such thing can happen in this country.
Good thing they were not around in 1956 or we would not have the Interstate System.
“In the year 2040.”
Napoleon once told his Minister of the Interior that he wanted trees planted along every major road in France so that the French Army could march in the shade. The minister replied that it would be 25 years before the trees would be tall enough to provide such shade. Napoleon replied, “Then we must not waste any more time.”
By the way, the Interstate system was started in 1956 and it is still not completed fifty-five years later. Should we abandon it as a failure? Or do we recognize that certain things take time?
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