Posted on 10/02/2023 5:41:25 AM PDT by MtnClimber
In 1996, the California legislature created the high speed rail authority.
In 2008, voters passed a $33 billion bond to build an envisioned 800 mile project eventually to link Sacramento with San Diego.
Fifteen years later, a scaled-down plan from Bakersfield to Merced remains not even half finished. Yet the envisioned costs will exceed that of the original estimate for the entire project.
The rail authority now estimates that just the modest 178 mile route—only about a fifth of the authorized distance—will not be completed at least until 2030. Past high speed estimates of both time and cost targets have been widely wrong and perhaps deliberately misleading.
Total costs for the entire project are now estimated at nearly $130 billion. Many expect that figure to double in the next quarter-century. Planners also concede there will likely not be much high speed rider demand from San Joaquin Valley residents willing to pay $86 to travel at a supposed 200 mph from Bakersfield to Merced.
Nine years ago voters amid drought and water shortages also passed a state water bond, authorizing $7.5 billion in new water projects and initiatives.
Some $2.7 billion was targeted for new dams and reservoirs. The current water storage system had not been enlarged since the early 1980s, when the state population was 15 million fewer residents.
So far not a single dam or new reservoir has been built. And Californians expect more water rationing statewide anytime the state experiences a modest drought.
In 2017, a $15 billion bond authorized a complete remodeling of Los Angeles International Airport—recognized as one of the more congested, disorganized, and unpleasant airports in America.
(Excerpt) Read more at amgreatness.com ...
How much of the money gets spent on government meetings?
VDH ping
FIXED!
VDH is preaching fire against the California elite, with a warming to the rest of us to not let our leaders at the federal or state level do the same.
No wonder the film industry left CA and moved to GA, which is now #1 worldwide in film production. That’s why GA’s two Senators are Dems.
VDH should have run in the California recall as an elder statesman intellectual. He wouldn’t win but people got to know how crazy the state has become.
Typical government operation. Big ideas ... big taxpayer money grab ... puny results
by all means, let’s have government run healthcare....
Ha...beats Button-Willow to Bakersfield.
And California’s lesson for the nation?
If you want to topple a statue, re-label an historically named street, burn up millions of pine and fir trees, blow up a dam, turn parks and the public square into dangerous and toxic squatter cities, then the state can do all of that and in record time.
And what is next? We await the 2024 national elections, when a few California politicians may run for our highest offices, no doubt with the campaign promise, “I can do to America what I did to California.”
Oh L_rd, please don't let the kleptocrats from California do to the rest of the country, what they have done to Sacremento and San Fran.
Well worth your time to read the entire VDH article at American Greatness!
FR Index of his articles: Victor Davis Hanson on FR
Town Hall: Victor Davis Hanson on Town Hall
American Greatness: Victor Davis Hanson on American Greatness
His website: Victor Davis Hanson
Please let me know if you want on or off this new VDH ping list.
As a reminder, Professor Hanson has asked that we do not post the full article of his writings. Thank you for following the link to finish his article.
Content created by the Center for American Greatness, Inc. is available without charge to any eligible news publisher that can provide a significant audience.
America of the 21st century is a debt-addict. Its bloating our government, making them completely corrupt, political and dysfunctional. It will kill us.
Who are they kidding? Who WOULDN'T want to travel between the two bustling metropolises of Merced and Bakersfield, known for their cultural sophistication and shopping opportunities?
I miss California, a lot. But the state I grew up in no longer exists. It's just becoming more and more dysfunctional. It's like helplessly watching a beloved family member sink into heroin addiction.
Ping
Add in “consulting fees” from big donor firms and there’s not much left for the work itself.
Which will NEVER happen, because that is not the goal of either the "immigrants", or the people who have enabled their illegal immigration.
I'm glad I haven't had that experience, but sadly, it's a pretty good analogy.
ALL PART OF CLOWARD PIVEN!
California High Speed Rail + Earthquakes = Disaster
Sounds like it would work huh Moe.
Why are they Dems?
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