California High Speed Rail Boondoggle

High Speed Rail makes no sense for California, so they wasted many billions of taxpayer dollars and got nothing. The answer for every program is "compared to what?" There are so many problems that the $100B in wasted funds could have helped (Water, Traffic, Power, etc), but they wasted it on transportation that was better served with limo-busses or planes. But Democrats and their allies got rich picking the public's pocket for something that never was going to get built, and would have been a drain if it had. ℹ️ Info           ~ Aristotle Sabouni

🗒️ Note:
I owned property 1/2 mile from the SJ Station. It would have benefited me greatly. But it would have stolen billions from poorer parts of the state and nation, to subsidize a rail line that will be under-utilized. Planes are cheaper and faster unless you subsidize the train (e.g. lose money on every rider). But I wasn't as greedy as leftist city dwellers, so was against it.)

Facts

• 2008 the rail was promised to be $33B and be completed in 2020 (12 years). By 2018 it was over $120B and estimated to be completed in 2033 (25 years) - 2x as long to complete and almost 4x original cost. Then it got cancelled... but promises to comlete service from nowhere to nowhere. The only thing accomplished was paying Democrat linked engineering firms billions (Pelosi, Boxer, etc) for plans and studies.

• Alternatives for the money (before it was up to final estimates) included: desalinated clean water, completing the aqueduct, more sewage treatment, 3,000 miles of more lanes with 9,000 miles of resurfacing.

• The difference between investment and public works is in the former you have to convince investors to voluntarily support something risky, because of the potential returns (either to society or economically). Public works is when you can't make the math work, so you just force people to invest, even if they completely disagree with the risks/returns).

• High-Speed Rail makes sense when you have two major cities, 120-240 miles apart (2-3 hour drive), with cheap land between them (before it is fully developed). So it makes sense Dallas-Houston (240 miles), Miami-Orlando (240 miles) - both are privately funded. It doesn't work Orange County to SF (450 miles): too long, and land is too expensive - which is why the government had to get force it and fuck it up. The math doesn't work.

• French Company doing some of the work, quit working with California because they were less functional and more corrupt than their North African efforts.

Conclusion

After wasting billions of dollars, Democrats Boondoggle Crazy-train was canceled in 2020, the year it was supposed to originally be completed. But 19th-century travel was going to be obsoleted before it was finished. Planes, Hyper-tube, Mag-Lev, Self-Driving Cars, Electric Limo Busses, can all do the routes better -- and are more versatile. <

The total costs of the boondoggle is $5.5B spent so far, without any track being laid. And they still want to run it 171 miles from nowhere, to nowhere (Bakersfield to Merced), which has NO chance of getting the traffic necessary to pay for the maintenance, let alone payback the loans. That doesn't count the $3.5B that the state owes the Federal Government for not living up to the agreement they had to take the money. Of course California will dispute that, but if you break the terms of an agreement in the private sector, you owe the other side their money for that malfeasance.

---

🔗 More

Main Page The root of all evil... and the home page for this website.

California This article lists some of the intolerance, incompetence, and progressivism that have come to exemplify the Golden State.

California Incompetence Incompetent and sanctimonious is a heady mix that makes California one miserable place to live your life.

🔗 Links

• https://www.mercurynews.com/2019/02/12/californias-high-speed-rail-by-the-numbers/
• https://www.yourcentralvalley.com/news/high-speed-rail-audit-report-released-shows-mismanagement-wasteful-spending/1600586269
• http://www.breitbart.com/california/2016/12/26/high-speed-rail-lame-duck-obama-admin-rejects-ca-loan/
• http://www.investors.com/politics/capital-hill/californias-overpriced-bullet-train-could-be-obsolete-before-its-ever-built/
• https://hotair.com/john-s-2/2022/10/10/ny-times-how-californias-high-speed-rail-project-became-a-loser-n502284

Tags: Fact  California  Incompetence