California’s High-Speed Train to Nowhere: What Went Wrong?
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- Опубліковано 24 кві 2019
- On November 4, 2008, California voters voted in favor of Proposition 1A which effectively brought high speed rail in California from concept to reality. Lawmakers pitched the system as a “safe, convenient, affordable and reliable alternative to driving and high gas prices,” with the ability to “provide good-paying jobs and improve California’s economy while reducing air pollution, global warming greenhouse gases, and our dependence on foreign oil” (California Supplemental Official Voter Information Guide, 2008). The project came with several guarantees, including a 200+ MPH transportation system capable of transporting passengers from Los Angeles to San Francisco in 2 hours, 40 minutes or less and $1 billion per year operating costs offset by fare revenue. Unfortunately, nearly nine and a half years later, we don’t have much to show for it other than lawsuits, mismanagement, delays and severe cost overruns.
Some fear that California - the same state that took nearly 20 years to retrofit the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge with a nearly 2,500% cost overrun - may have grossly underestimated yet another massive infrastructure project. In this video, I breakdown California High Speed Rail’s timeline of events, what derailed the project, and what an uncertain future might hold for what some consider a massive governmental boondoggle.
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Maybe high-speed rail in California was just too ambitious of a project. What are your thoughts on how the state should proceed? Should it continue forward, or cut its losses?
WE should build something like they have in Barcelona, at a tenth the cost and way safer and better looking and ecologically friendly to boot. Read below.
The problem is the project started in the central valley without the proper employees and a severe mismanagement of the project. I used to live in LA and now live in Florida. They should've started between LA and San Diego to prove the concept to the public. Or even better finish the extension into SF Transit building, several years later and still no train for the station! hey should've done exactly what Florida did, build out the lines to get revenue and PAX traveling (80-120 mph good enough to establish proof of concept), electrification and high speed can come decades later. Orlando, Tampa, and Miami will be connected before a single train runs on CAHSR.
@@YukarioMashimato : They started with the useless "Train to Nowhere" route in central California on purpose in a cynical move to force completion of the entire route.
That portion of the route in central California is the cheapest & easiest to build, so it would be easier to complete before political support for the project fizzled. Then, with that section completed -- a section that goes from a low-population area to another low-population area (basically a useless "train to nowhere"), the theory was that the public wouldn't want to abandon the project at that point, having already invested so much time and money so far without connecting any major cities and therefore having almost nothing to show for it. So then there would theoretically be public support to finish connecting the rail line to the major population and economic centers (L.A. and San Diego in the south, and the San Francisco Bay Area in the north), despite the enormous expense.
MAYBE?
THEY COULD OF MADE FREEWAY LANES FOR 100 MILE AN HOUR SPEED LIMITS THAT PEOPLE COULD OF USED FOR A FRACTION OF THE PRICE! BUT THEN....SMART PEOPLE AREN'T CALLING THE SHOTS IN KOMIFORNIA!
Just imagine the amount of affordable housing that could have been built with that money. Oh wait a minute, its California. With all the red tape, it will be nowhere near affordable.
gvmnt just needs to get out of the way for regular housing development
Who needs more housing when u got a train to nowhere
Tutor Perini - lowest bid and lowest technical score - sounds like they're saying "We won't charge much but then again, we don't know much."
Yeah, there has to be some sort of an investigation into that guy. Every project he works on is always late and at least 2x the budget! I smell a rat!
@@TohaBgood2 why aren't you against this stupid project then? You admit the prime contractor sucks.
@@neutrino78x So you’re not going to address any of my points or provide any evidence whatsoever fir any of you lies above, huh? Cool, cool… Typical FUDster!
This is an expensive project, bunch of crazy rightwingers and even crazier lefty NIMBYs want to kill it off. Between these two groups you’ve successfully interfered with the project to slow it down and make it cost about 2x the original price.
Nevertheless, everyone else is again you. And while it’s so much fun to see you far left and far right crazies squirm that I would support this project just to spite you, I support it because it simply makes financial sense.
We’ve run out of highway and airport capacity. Expanding our airports means buying land in literally the metros with the most expensive real estate in the entire world. LAX and SFO won’t grow. This is it. We’ll have to make do with what we have. The alternative costs hundreds of billions maybe even upward of a trillion just to eminent domain the land! This is a complete nonstarter.
Expanding highways is even stupider. Not only will it take incredible amounts of land compared to HSR, it will also be many times more expensive. Estimates for adding the capacity that CHSR will provide on the 5 are again in the hundreds of billions. And we haven’t even began to consider what expanding all the other roads and highways to accommodate all those cars will cost. How about all the extra parking? Care to try convincing people in SF and LA that we need yo pave over half the city for parking lots, again? Remember how well that conversation went last time?
In other words, nothing has changed since we had this same conversation in 2008 and before. HSR is still by far, by orders of magnitude (!) the cheapest and highest throughput option. This is just the reality of the situation.
Despite what you FUDsters like to lie now, the original cost was projected at $44 billion in 2008. With inflation and your opposition shenanigans, it went to between 78 and 105 billion now. But it is still the cheapest and most convenient option. Nothing comes even remotely close! More that half of the state understands this. Get on board or move over! Alternatively, move to Texas, or Florida, or some other third world state. It seems that that’s where you belong anyway with how narrow your thinking is.
Look at BART, if san mateo county and santa clara county voters didnt vote it down back in early 70's, BART would be so much more robust and it would have been paid for with 1970's dollars.
rich champaign progressives of the bay area may love spiting trump and open borders for cheap housekeeping and landscapers; but they are ultra hard core nimby's.
_Trains transport crime, muh properly values!_
Michael Schneider that is California democracy for you
@ Michael : *So true!* (Except that the vote was in the early '60s, not the '70s.)
Such a short-sighted vote on San Mateo County's part! It's very frustrating for those of us living in northern Santa Clara County who are tantalizingly close to BART but have no access to it. 😠
@@Milesco yeah i meant opened in 70's voted in 60's.
Michael Schneider I’m so happy that San Mateo County didn’t vote for BART.
We don’t want that human debris coming into our communities.
Have you ridden on BART recently?
California simply needs to learn how to manage projects.
Eugene Balfour truth! 🤣👍
High-Speed Rail is an Infamous hard to do in areas where you do not have space. So of course it's very hard to manage because unlike in the 50s and 60s were you could just bulldoze entire neighborhoods to make way for highways and infrastructure projects we don't do that anymore which greatly increase the cost when you have to go straight and have very minor bends when compared to standard rail infrastructure.
Hahahahahahahahahahahaha
@Eugene Balfour Lol. Good luck with that. California is a shit hole run by morons.
Communist governments never do.
Japanese National Railways' high-speed rail called the Shinkansen, was privatized in 1987 and broken into six regional rail companies and one freight company. Five of those companies - JR East, JR Central, JR West, JR Kyushu, and JR Freight are profitable. JR East, West, Central, and Kyushu are publicly trade.
Why bother building a train when you have an airplane, which is faster and more economical, and besides we have already had airports that are already in place. Trains are good only when the landscapes are elongated like in Japan or in San Francisco to the San Jose route, but not on the American continent. Let say in you want to go to Chicago from Los Angeles, you rather fly an airplane than a fast train. An airplane has an unlimited option to fly anywhere. You don't want to build a railway from LA to Chicago directly just for that trip. How about going from LA to Houston? Built another railway? California's high-speed train is very expensive. How much you charge on the passenger if you built a very expensive high-speed train? California's real estate is so expensive. The state has to buy those expensive real estates to built train railways and Port. Also, the mountainous terrain of southern California is also a problem. Maybe the railway is good when California will reach 100 million population and built cities along the way. But for now is not feasible, no one will ride it.
@@MrJSabadojr trains are for distances too long for cars too short for planes. In Europe and Asia this is mostly every city. In usa some major cities fit this criteria. The mid ranges are faster than planes since you don't wait for trains like planes and train stations are already in the heart of the city unlike airports, so mid ranges you get there generally faster than planes. Plus they are of course greener if electric.
@@MrJSabadojr Mainly airport capacity. There's no room to expand California airport. But most pressingly, airports and air travel are heavily subsidized and we just don't want to endlessly subsidize private companies. Let them pay for their own way!
@@TohaBgood2
" Let them pay for their own way!"
They do pay their own way, jackass. The initial construction of an airport is funded by the government, but after that, operations AND EXPANSIONS are funded by user fees FROM THE AIRLINES.
When was the last time you saw an airport expansion on the fucking ballot? That's right, you didn't, because the airlines paid for it.
@@WelshGuitarDude
"rains are for distances too long for cars too short for planes"
Sure, but very, very few places in North America fit that description. Maybe the Seattle to Vancouver BC area, or the Northeast corridor. And the problem is, you get beyond those regions and the next one over is 800 or 1000+ miles away. So jet aircraft are really the best solution for North America and Australia.
It's not just the USA. Canada, Australia and Mexico don't use it either. Nor Brazil. All geographically large countries with large distances between population centers.
We are not Japan or Europe. We don't have to solve problems the same way they do.
In Barcelona there's a superior design for an elevated rail, suspended between the tracks with the wheels located on the car's sides, it cannot derail. The tracks are strung between supports in the shape of a softly curved capital Y, every 100 meters or so; and have a minuscule footprint compared to the engineering necessary for ground track. It can cross uneven terrain like phone polls do. The installation price is one tenth of common track, so we might have enough now! Pass it on....I read about it decades ago in "GEO". It could be solar powered, as well as rev its own power on downward slopes.
molly cruz I love this info but the crooks in California will never try and save money or think outside the box for the greater good
CAHSR's original ED was from Spain - he built the Spanish system. He quit, fed up with California BS.
@@williamsmith1475 That's a nice up attitude.
Yeah this isn't a real thing.
The busiest freeway in LA, the 405 was expanded and made ZERO difference. We need alternatives. We need a train service.
Why bother building a train when you have an airplane, which is faster and more economical, and besides we have already had airports that are already in place. Trains are good only when the landscapes are elongated like in Japan or in San Francisco to the San Jose route, but not on the American continent. Let say in you want to go to Chicago from Los Angeles, you rather fly an airplane than a fast train. An airplane has an unlimited option to fly anywhere. You don't want to build a railway from LA to Chicago directly just for that trip. How about going from LA to Houston? Built another railway? California's high-speed train is very expensive. How much you charge on the passenger if you built a very expensive high-speed train? California's real estate is so expensive. The state has to buy those expensive real estates to built train railways and Port. Also, the mountainous terrain of southern California is also a problem. Maybe the railway is good when California will reach 100 million population and built cities along the way. But for now is not feasible, no one will ride it.
@@MrJSabadojr the plane will do nothing for traffic in LA dude planes are for 800+ mile trips my guy
believe n see, that's an argument for better public transit in Los Angeles, not a need for HSR from SF to LA.
The only thing that will save high speed rail is to make it exempt from environmental reviews and immune to environmental lawsuits public transport projects should not have to be reviewed by environmental standards
The main problem is the lack of political will and vision. I look at it as building the interstate highway system. You don;t do it for profit you do it for the public good. The airports are too congested, and the car, oil, industries have too much influence on our government. High speed rail will be a public good just like the highway system.
wrong..the main problem is there is either a non-existent,or low desire to ride ANY train ANYWHERE in the US by ANYONE..with the exceptions being in NYC,Chicago and any other heavily populated cities..there is nothing more free than owning an automobile,filling it up with fuel, and driving to whatever destination your heart desires..get that through your feeble mind and stop trying to force this nonsense on us. We arent the rest of the wordl. We already have trains you fuckin douche and they have poor ridership.
@@herbyverstink Many people would much rather ride a train and the low quality of Amtrak is why people don't like to use it
@@herbyverstink When Eisenhower proposed the interstate highway system it was a vision he related to the American people. American people had no desire until him and others like him gave them the vision. It takes leadership. We are behind China, and many European countries and its time to get with the program.
@@herbyverstink no desire lmao you probably live in a place where they wouldn't bat an eye if you married your cousin. Here in the city it is congested and gas prices are ridiculous.
@@herbyverstink "and other heavily populated cities" gee like San Francisco and Los Angeles?
And speaking of freedom, as a one time carless commuter I saved thousands annually. I'm not able to because of bare bones transit where I live now, but avoiding car maintenance, vehicle depreciation, fuel, and parking expenses amount to the second highest annual expense for most Americans next to housing. Avoiding all that? Now that is freedom.
I got to admit, I love the engineer's hat!
Continue with the project. This is good stuff for jobs and the environment. 77 billion dollars sounds like a lot. To us common folk. But with inflation and time it will look cheap 100 years from now.
Who the hell thought it would be a good idea to build out in the middle of nowhere? They should have built from LA to San Diego and SF to Fresno. Then you expand over time until you reach one another. If this were the case, the project would be full speed ahead.
Lack of funding means lack of federal funding? Some reason I think they thought the 49 others states were going to cover this. in order for that to happen IMHO plans should consist of an interstate path for at least three states. Ie a pacific HS rail from Vancouver to Tijuana or if one wants to be really ambitious transcontintal but that would have to part of 'the great infrastructure ACT of 20..........
We subsidized the Red states for decades. It's time we get at least some of our money back and you stop suckling at California and New York's teat. You guys need to start paying for your own highways and bridges from now on.
@@TohaBgood2 close some of their highways give em HSR and let em shutup
I attended several early state-level planning sessions regarding California’s proposed HSR. Even then, the proposed ‘smoke and mirrors’ cost projections, and the ‘as the birds fly’ route maps, should have scuppered the folly. To be cast as high speed, projected travel times from A to B were grossly unrealistic. Then ‘All Aboard’ the bureaucrats and politicians. Costs escalated as routes were expanded to a more alphabetically inclusive A to Z. More stops, more stations. Gotta make those pork deliveries. The Great Train Robbery Revisited. Watch out San Diego, you’re next.
Nobody hires US companies to do engineering works around the world, they are absurdly expensive. But they make great movies and beautiful electric cars, not everything has to be bad.
What are you talkin about, some of the largest engineering firm in the world that are not state-sponsored that work on the international stage are American. The Americans are some expensive because their companies produce the best quality products that compete with other top International Company. What you don't think the Europeans aren't just as expensive of course they are, the big hindrance for American companies is geographical you have to move people and equipment a half of Worlds Away to work in either Asia or Europe.
@@kijj7187 lol
Scrap it and let it be a constant reminder to the public they are stupid for voting yes to a pointless train when we already had a freeway and an airport that is the same path as the high speed rail and far cheaper to ride.
Whether you guys like it or not, this project is being built right now, and it’s going to be successful whether your are doubtful or not. A place like California needs this kind of transportation. We need people to get off of the highways. What is expanding a highway going to do for anyone? It’ll just create more traffic. The more lanes, the more traffic, and you only have so much space for those traffic lanes. Once you expand the highway to a certain amount of lanes, you can’t go back, otherwise there will be more traffic jams. It’s as simple as that, yet the government continues to fund the highways. Plane travel. It might be quick, but what about passenger comfort? And flight delays or cancellations? You can’t do that much on a plane. Not as much scenery, very little legroom, small aisles, only one bathroom at the back of a plane, you can’t move around as much, and other things. Plus the amount of security at the airports, you’re like forced to strip down just to get through security and board your flight, and plus there can be delays for flights due to different things like weather conditions, airport congestion, etc. . On a train, you can do so many things, you can walk around on the train, look out the window and enjoy the scenery, grab food or a drink in the diner car (if it has one,) work while on the go, sleep, etc. . More versatile than being in a car or on a plane. I know there’s people that want to get away from being in the car or riding on the plane and would rather take a high speed train to their destination, so stop saying that nobody is going to ride the train, and stop saying that this train route goes to nowhere, with your ignorant misleading “facts”. And where else would you want your money to go to? Funding a wall?
Aidan Bible Apparently There’s People who still don’t understand that.
Why bother building a train when you have an airplane, which is faster and more economical, and besides we have already had airports that are already in place. Trains are good only when the landscapes are elongated like in Japan or in San Francisco to the San Jose route, but not on the American continent. Let say in you want to go to Chicago from Los Angeles, you rather fly an airplane than a fast train. An airplane has an unlimited option to fly anywhere. You don't want to build a railway from LA to Chicago directly just for that trip. How about going from LA to Houston? Built another railway? California's high-speed train is very expensive. How much you charge on the passenger if you built a very expensive high-speed train? California's real estate is so expensive. The state has to buy those expensive real estates to built train railways and Port. Also, the mountainous terrain of southern California is also a problem. Maybe the railway is good when California will reach 100 million population and built cities along the way. But for now is not feasible, no one will ride it.
"Plane travel. It might be quick, "
Which is what really matters. If you don't care about speed, you'll drive, that's cheapest. If you want to get there quickly you'll fly. At best, HSR competes with driving, not flying. And for $100 billion it's really not worth it. I would however support 1 billion to enhance the speed of Amtrak California on existing UP track.
"but what about passenger comfort?"
Considering I'm only on the plane for an hour, it's not that important.
" And flight delays or cancellations? "
Rarely happens on this route, I fly it typically once a month or more.
High Speed rail , needs guarantee right of way access.....property owners be damn! compensation is to be provided not negotiated.... ...Want something bad enough....sacrifice!
Great job with the info thanks
Thanks for watching!
Come on folks, remember BART, it started back in the 60s and 411,000 people ride it everyday,118 million a year. and guess what it 's not finished yet, so lets forget the High Speed thing, how about transportation from San Francisco to the Central Valley, instead of paying 4000 dollars a month for rent, how about 1500 a month in the valley, thousands of cars travel from the Bay Area to the valley every day, lets reduce pollution keep the train on tract.
That’s what HSR can do tho
Amtrak San Juaquins already goes there. increasing the speed of that existing train would have made more sense.
Honestly we do need a faster means of transportation. If you have taken Amtrak from LA to Fresno or vise versa you know what I mean? our state public transportation sucks. I Live in the Central Valley and have lots of family and friends that live in the LA area and in the Bay area. So driving 3 to 4 hours one way or the other is tiring and hard, and especially when you hit traffic now your stuck an additional 2 to 3 hours more. I understand this project is gotten out of hand and its budget has skyrocketed. But its all because of improper management and politics as stated in this video. Let's get the right people to manage it and finish whats already been started. And hopefully once the central segment is up and running and people start using it, it will get some attention and funding from some 3rd party investors to complete it. Just look at what's happen to Bright-Line being merged with Virgin in the State of Florida as an example? So Please Lets stop hating and give some support so we can all work together to get this train to go somewhere. It's good for our future and our Kids will thank us, everything is about making sacrifices and this Project it just one big one we all have to deal with. Just Look as our Past especially with our Water state Project and look now how we have benefited from it? It too was expensive and miss handled but it was finally done and now California has the best farming areas as an example?
Do you honestly trust our current leaders to appoint good folk to these positions? They haven't in the past.
"I Live in the Central Valley and have lots of family and friends that live in the LA area and in the Bay area. So driving 3 to 4 hours one way or the other is tiring and hard,"
Have you heard of this thing they invented that goes really fast? It's called a jet aircraft. Drive to Fresno and take a jet to Los Angeles or SF/SJ.
Don't know where to start. Trying my best. First of all, I think that California right now is in an urgent need of such a system, probably more urgent than many imagines.
Yes, traffic is not bad in the Central CA valleys, however it is a relatively long distance to drive. Distance between LA and SF is similar to that of Boston and Philly, or Central PA to central CT (Hartford area) where I drove back and forth before, which was nothing less than a total nightmare. It's probably better to travel by planes right now, and, the traffic around LAX and to other places in the area is confirmed bad(since I've been there). I've not been to SFO or other airports in the bay area such as Oakland and San Jose, but from what I know traffic there is a nightmare too. So in some cases a HSR, which provides downtown-downtown connection is likely to solve the traffic problems for travelers between the two cities. And it makes no sense believing that CA doesn't need a passenger railway network.
However there's another, more important reason for this project, that is to turn the entire corridor into a megalopolis, like the Northeast of the US. With both LA and SF turn themselves and places around them into 2 of the world's largest metropolitan areas. Especially with Hollywood in LA and the Silicon Valley starting right south of SF and the high tech industry moving into the downtown SF limits. And there seems to be nothing to reverse any of those trends. Thanks to their proximity (so close that they're in the same state) there're a hundred million reasons that the places in between would be more developed and modernized, and be an integral part of the area, as well as being home for smaller sections of the industries, commerce and residences. Or in short, the CV should look somewhat like NJ or CT. Maybe not yet at that scale, but definitely not what it's like right now. And to give you a visualization about what the situation is, do this simple math: what's the difference between 16,18 and 21? Especially compared to 53? As CA congressional districts are generally assigned with some sort of orders, the location of the 16th, 18th and 21st districts shouldn't be far away. And they aren't. 16th and 21st are in the CV, around Fresno, while 18th is west of SJ and south of SF, probably the luxury homes of the riches people working in the city and Silicon Valley tech giants. However, according to 'measure of America', which reports every congressional districts' American HDI (American human development index, a measurement weighing health, wealth and level of education for an area) around the US as well as DC, Cali's 18th district is the highest (of the 438) around the US in terms of HDI, while the 21st is the lowest. And the 16th is also one of the lowest (like bottom 20) around the entire country. That's a result that's more than shocking to me. I do know that severe disparities do exist around the US and the world, and I know that thanks to the large population such problems are going to be exaggerated when it happens in CA, but how can people living in the same state having such different stories? Especially when they don't live that far away from each other? A modern high speed rail would truly connect the two more developed ends of CA, and bring more life, blood and opportunities into central valley. Highway and aviation systems would cost a lot more to achieve anything close(which is what CA has done in decades). And that's why I said, that CA actually BADLY needs such a modern passenger RR system. It does sound weird I know, but the fact that LA and SF are packed with traffic 24/7 and the central valley in between rarely sees any, even during 'rush hours', is actually somehow a macroeconomic evidence that such a passenger rail link should be established.
That being said, I do reserve the skepticism on the details of this project. First is its high speed promise. It's obvious that the trains need to travel at a decent speed to offer a decent travel time. Higher speed also allows more frequency, allowing more potential passenger capacity without incurring too much additional cost. However I insist that it should serve the practical needs only. I don't want any thoughts of showing off to influence the decisions of the HSR project, both in terms of personal or collective 'showing off'. That being said, the speed shouldn't really be compared with counterparts around the world. If that's the case, then is 200 mph really necessary? For the entire length? Building new tracks is an expensive and hard job to do, as well as their maintenance. And the higher the max speed, the more it would cost. I would personally suggest looking into other approaches, such as the 'hybrid approach', to build new, dedicated ROW in some areas, while for others the train would upgrade some of the existing commuter rail or even freight train infrastructure up to its needs. Of course it looks bad if there was such a nice promise made to voters.
That brings to the second point. Supporting the building of the project doesn't mean I'm not skeptical about who runs this thing, the CA government. As we can see, the previous administration seems to be pretty bad at finance, management and operation strategies. However, I also do think that the new administration is even somewhat worse in that they don't seem to care a lot. As I described before building a modern passenger rail link between LA and SF should be a priority. With all being said, I think other builders, such as private investors or private-public partnerships with more private involvement and so on should be explored.
Why bother building a train when you have an airplane, which is faster and more economical, and besides we have already had airports that are already in place. Trains are good only when the landscapes are elongated like in Japan or in San Francisco to the San Jose route, but not on the American continent. Let say in you want to go to Chicago from Los Angeles, you rather fly an airplane than a fast train. An airplane has an unlimited option to fly anywhere. You don't want to build a railway from LA to Chicago directly just for that trip. How about going from LA to Houston? Built another railway? California's high-speed train is very expensive. How much you charge on the passenger if you built a very expensive high-speed train? California's real estate is so expensive. The state has to buy those expensive real estates to built train railways and Port. Also, the mountainous terrain of southern California is also a problem. Maybe the railway is good when California will reach 100 million population and built cities along the way. But for now is not feasible, no one will ride it.
"LA and SF is similar to that of Boston and Philly"
Bro are you kidding??? Boston to Philadelphia is only 308 miles vs 380 miles for SF to LA.
"However there's another, more important reason for this project, that is to turn the entire corridor into a megalopolis, like the Northeast of the US"
The NEC is like that simply because the distances are a lot smaller. Plus, 80% of the traffic between cities in the NEC is still by car.
@@neutrino78x Then how about Boston to DC? I think it's more than 380 miles? Much more I guess?
Yet there's still this Acela thing and it's popular. And I believe the reason that it's not that popular yet is that it's not in a great condition
@@davidfreeman3083
"Then how about Boston to DC? I think it's more than 380 miles? Much more I guess?"
Yeah it's over 400 miles. If you're in DC and your actual destination is all the way in Boston, the fastest way to get there is by jet aircraft.
Most of the traffic in the region, though (80%), is by car. Probably because most people aren't going that far. They're going say DC to Baltimore, a much shorter trip, only 57 miles. Nobody goes on a commercial jet for such a small distance. They would either drive or use a helicopter. Or when eVTOL is implemented on a wide scale, which is very soon (5-10 years) they would use that.
That region -- the NEC -- is one of the few in North America where the cities are as close as in Europe. But you know, in Europe, it's still 80% car, just like in the NEC.
www.eea.europa.eu/data-and-maps/daviz/passenger-transport-modal-split-2#tab-chart_1
It's really hard to replace what a car does. It goes from EXACTLY where you currently are to EXACTLY where you want to go.
Trains are a little bit more useful in the NEC than commercial aircraft, probably because trains make a lot of intermediate stops, and like I said before, most people aren't going the full length of the NEC. They're going from one of the towns within the NEC to another. So if a train goes from the city within the NEC where they are to the one where they want to go, and the commercial aircraft doesn't go there, they would go with the train.
There's probably three or four more regions like that in the USA but they are FAR APART FROM EACH OTHER. So basically you can't replace aviation with trains in North America and Australia.
You also have the issue of, what about going to places where there no train has been built? Airplanes go from airport to airport without requiring any infrastructure in between.
Last weekend, I went from San Jose, where I live (aka Silicon Valley), to Las Vegas, to see the incomparable Lady Gaga, live in concert playing with acoustic instruments. So, Las Vegas is 528 miles away, via the highway, or 849 km. By air it's shorter, about 370 miles. It took 50 minutes from takeoff to touchdown. I think on paper it's 1 hr 30 min or something like that; the airlines wouldn't want people to plan on it being exactly 50 minutes because sometimes the wind is not in favor of that speed etc. But you see, Amtrak doesn't even go there. And there's no train track that goes directly there. There's a lot of mountainous and uneven terrain between San Jose and Las Vegas. Theoretically, if you did build an HSR out there, at 173 MPH -- the average speed of the French TGV -- it would take three hours.
So why would someone want to turn a one hour trip into a three hour trip? I wouldn't want to.
btw the modern 737-800 I traveled in consumed less fuel to move me, as an individual, than would a Volkswagen Passat. In other words less pollution was created to move me than would have been created had I driven in a VW Passat. Jet engines have become VERY fuel efficient because fuel is very expensive for the airlines.
I left San Jose at about 3 PM and got there at about 4 PM, and I had four hours in Las Vegas until Lady Gaga's show started at 8 PM.
They should have focused on yearly cost vs total cost. Say 4.5 billion per year for 10 years. They could have also not focused so much on HS. Perhaps just calling it a vital rail link, leaving out the speed bs. Basically they should have convinced people why they needed it. What benefits would it create. Like how the rail line would unlock the economic benefits that have driven the insane cities growth over the last 20 years.
Well, high speed rail is not really suited to the USA. We have a very low population density and cities located far apart. That's the opposite of what HSR needs.
Britain, for example, has 10x higher population density and their major cities are more like 200 miles apart.
We already have a system of high speed vehicles: jet aircraft. And they actually don't pollute that much. On a modern 737, to go from SF to LA, to move ANY GIVEN PERSON, the jet is burning less fuel than would a VW Passat or Ford Focus.
And they're working on lessening that. In about 10-15 years, short haul routes like SF to LA will be done by zero emission aircraft; they will either use hydrogen fuel cells or batteries. Longer haul routes and supersonic routes (Lockheed and NASA recently developed a shape for airliners that will let them go supersonic with a barely audible sonic boom) will use low carbon biofuels.
0:19 MUSIC TOO LOUD and ANNOYING. Retired railroad conductor So Cal 37 years DON'T BUILD THE TRAIN. SCRAP IT TODAY !
The corridor is NO failure the route has over a million riders a year up from just 5,000 in 1972. And if you think this is expense (Because of all the safe highway fly overs!) Just wait and see what it costs to expand road and air systems if it's not built.
It's funny that this exact calculation was done before the project was started and was the main reason for it in the first place. One lane on the I-5 would cost more money and move fewer people in more time. Somehow everyone wants to forget about this little fact.
uh when they're proposing 100 billion they can't really say that. It doesn't cost 100 billion to expand an airport. Plus the airlines pay for airport expansions, that's why they're never on the ballot, because the airlines are spending their own money.
@@TohaBgood2
" One lane on the I-5 would cost more money"
More than 100 billlion? I question that.
" and move fewer people in more time."
Actually as currently planned the CAHSR would take four hours to get from SF to LA. Might be "competitive" with driving, but if you want to get between those places quickly, you fly. It's not worth 100 billion.
Enhance existing public transit rail for higher speed, yes. Spend 100 billion building 380 miles of track and digging a bunch of tunnels, no.
@@neutrino78x Source???
The most recent study says $25 billion per lane per direction of travel on the 5 SF-LA. One single added lane will cost $50 billion, and this is an older estimate! What would it cost now 35, 40 billion per lane per direction? Look it up! Literally google ”how much would it cost to add an extra lane to I-5”!
Meanwhile, CHSR will carry 6 (!) lanes worth of traffic in each direction. Do you think that everybody building HSR all around the world is crazy? Do you think people don’t have access to Excel?
Also, that $105 billion figure is CHSR’s estimate for the worst case scenario. Why are you taking the $33 billion low estimate from 2005 and comparing it to the high estimate from 2022? How does that make any sense in your brain?
Again, studies were done. Due to the terrain, there’s no way to make SF-LA lower that 9 hours without building the tunnels and straight, grade separated ROW. This has been studied and the conclusion is out. Stop pulling numbers out of you backside.
@@neutrino78x Your crazy, airlines DO NOT PAY FOR AIRORT EXPANISIONS. That government money is there and spent on airports that have NO service anymore or have lost their service. There is no ballot! The airport money is on going EVERY YEAR.
Well if you recheck your records. I got up the high speed rail. Not jurk brown. I also introduced green technology, is not the new green deal! And all was stopped by the old republicans, that now I am for trump, and being delayed by democratic b.s.but I intended a third party pay off and a light duty high speed magnetic rail system and/or from the roof of your microcar in the center of the freeway rather than underground. Not made yet. And just a note, I am the one the got California out of depression. We have to have a price for a goal, or it stops and depleted misguided funds. I live in Michigan & not a government official. So all I can do is wate, my book will be out soon. And I have brought back infrastructure to us the American people.
They knew they underbudgeted it, but that was the strategy. Back in the 60's during the SWP bond, Gov. Pat Brown learned about Huey Long and a road project. Pat Brown said, "why don't we do that: build a little here, a little there, and they'll have to finish it." Well, his (national security asset) son Jerry and (national security asset) Arnold said - it worked for the Water Project, let's do it again. Unfortunately, they didn't address the more fundamental problems that had really shown up during the Bay Bridge replacement and they chose a corridor that was stupid - trying to be everything to everybody. Ugh, it's such a logical thing to do and they could have done it in the 70's, but the State has be come a pay-to-play cesspool. California doesn't have a mafia but it does have organized crime, and these types of projects don't work with the leeches.
I wonder how literally stable the rail line would be, what with all the brush fires and earthquake fault lines between San Diego and San Francisco and points north.
I really want this high speed train, it would connect the central part of California with the Bay Area to the north and LA to the south. Interstate 5 is a joke, it can take up to 6 to 7 hours to get to San Francisco from LA. We need high speed trains not only in California but a network of high speed trains throughout the country. The train burns less fossil fuels than cars and jets and you get to see parts of the country you would never see by air.
Nice insight on HSR issue. I was very interested in this project as a stepping stone of creating a HSR network in USA. Northeast Corridor, Texas HSR and others would follow, greatly reducing travel times, emissions, while increasing capacity, speed, comfort. I hope the project nonetheless to provide a modern 350 kmh HSR, connecting SF to LA in 2,5 hrs. This would truly transform California. HSR is not a bubble, it's a very efficient mode of transport as shown both in Europe and in Asia. There has been no clouse of HSR line while they have phased out airlines on many routes.
Well California is just too corrupt to get anything done
totally different dude.
Europe and Asia both have much higher population density -- Britain has 10x our population density -- and cities that are much closer together.
Our existing system of high speed travel -- jet aircraft -- works great. The same solutions aren't going to work everywhere my friend.
Instead of Building High speed rail that far away, they should have made it closer together like San Francisco to Sacramento just like what India is doing now by building Mumbai to Ahmedabad High Speed Rail rather than building Mumbai to Delhi High Speed Rail which would be longer and due to it, costlier....
We can't change the distance between our cities. The major population centers in California are the San Francisco Bay Area and the Los Angeles/San Diego area. They're simply too far apart to get there with HSR. It's 380 miles (611 km). A plane takes an hour, HSR takes (as currently planned) about four hours.
Nice hat!
Where is the !Billion now?. Oh I know it's in some Politicians pocket.
The project should be cancelled because, as was pointed out in the video, there is too little demand for passenger rail between Los Angeles and San Francisco. California would be better off diverting funds designated for CAHSR to light rail (commuter rail) and bus mass transit. The latter would much more likely reach the desired goals of less reliance on cars and less pollution.
Like along the 405 corridor then yes but speed up commuter rail lines in the LA and SF areas
I want the high speed rail
Sheridan Peddicord I want a unicorn and a fluffy puppy and peace on earth! We all want something!
Incompetence.
Things like this are why I'm leaving California.
Designed by voters, politicians and bureaucrats. What could go wrong?
why they criticise hsr but they don't criticise road spending. Do you think roads are free and profitable at the same time?. Just the time spent in a traffic jam is more costly than the train. California is becoming backwards
Well, if our politicians actually spent the tax money allotted for road repair on actual road repair, we'd be in much better shape. Unfortunately "road repair" has become a shield word in pitching new tax increase bills. A lot of the tax revenue raised doesn't end up going to road repair as promised, rather it becomes a piggy bank for other projects not related to transportation.
@@ExploreAlways I don't know about California these days, but highway taxes in most states only generate about half of what it takes to maintain them. A lot of the money has come from the general fund. Given California's population increase, The cost of the alternatives (more highways) is a lot more for a lot less capacity and makes the cities a lot less livable.
I wish they would use the funding to improve in city transportation in the major cities. A well planned high speed rail between the bay area, LA and Nevada would be grand. But it needs better planning than what this project got.
LA is doing a shit done of upgrades to its public transit. They've got a ways to go and the built environment will constantly be at odds with their effort, but their ambition and progress has been promising.
These pathetic boludos governors are smoking weed. As a Project Leader I met with contractors and vendors gathering information on time frame, cost on materials and labor for each and every phase of a project. I met with the customer and also my management who held me accountable to the reports and information I gave them. I in turn held everyone else accountable as well, including my inspections on progress reports I would conduct to assure everyone was on track. By the way I managed multiple projects not just two or three. And we did the work complying with the budget given, if at anytime you couldn't perform as per the contract given , you are gone and replaced ASAP with a contractor that would. Don't try to B.S. me with unforeseen circumstances, your supposed to be the best of the best.......you best perform !
Strike down air quality act
If you don't care about the environment why do you want trains to replace aircraft. Internally inconsistent.
Great beard train Guy video!!!!!!!
It hurts. I live in San Luis Obispo county and I would have had to drive all the way to the Valley to get onto the rail, and now it is canceled.
RIP Diablo Canyon
Amtrak already goes from SLO to LA/SD
I live in the Central Valley I see this first hand as of today there is still not 1 foot of rail set. The original path was along the coast to get the time and speed promised many problems here majors are funding and the San Andreas fault so new path in the Central Valley to get funding from many city’s along the way but can no longer reach speed or travel time and the monthly cost to ride would exceed 1300.00$ also you have to be a union member to step foot on any of the construction sites or provide products for the project to keep Browns unions funded for pensions and such. There have already been many law suits over land from farmers and high speed authority bid shopping that is illegal. At this point all the land needed for this still has not been bought and a path through the mountains unstable structures is impossible to get through at a reasonable cost that is currently why Amtrak uses busses to get over the grapevine to la from Bakersfield. Even the guy that originally proposed this now says no way. We need water storage (dams) due to the no water allocation farmers are drilling wells to get water for their crops which is causing the Central Valley to sink at an alarming rate but the politicians do nothing while millions of cubic feet of water flow to the ocean on the Sacramento River and others. It’s a boondoggle alright caused by Democrat leadership lying to the people. The only reason newsom wants to keep the section from Bakersfield to Madera is so they don’t get sued from the people who have already been forced off their land for eminent domain California regulations have made any type of building to cost astronomically more than anywhere else in USA. For instance a 800 square foot app. In San Francisco is 3500 a month! Now homeless shit on the streets and they hand out needles to the drug users and have a poop patrol to clean up human waste but they claim it to be a sanctuary city. Democrats have turned the golden state into a shit hole highest taxes roads suck schools are ranked 48 out of 50. People need to wake up start holding these morons accountable for what they have done. SHUT DOWN THE HIGH SPEED RAIL!! STOP WASTING OUR TAX MONEY ON A PIPE DREAM!
There are a lot of preliminaries that have to be done before rail can be laid - highways moved. over- and underpasses built, utilities moved, etc. Once they have prepped the right of way, the laying fo the rail should only take a year or two.
I suspect many of those lawsuits have been paid for by interests that want to see the HSR stopped - airlines, oil companies, etc.
Amtrak uses buses across the Tehachapi and Grapevine because the present rail line from Bakersfield to Mojave is at capacity hauling freight, a lot of it is still single track. The freight railroads would not allow Amtrak across that route.
They built it wrong, they should have built a segment that was shorter and likely to make more profit, such as LA To San Diego
That would not be much cheaper due to the mountains in the way. Also, this would have to be a local not a statewide project. Where would LA and San Diego get the money?
@@TohaBgood2 what i'm trying to say is that they should have first built the la-sd section, made trains run along that line, and then build the rest
@@sd8313 Well, I think they should have first built Sacramento-SF-SJ-Merced! You can probably tell where I am from by that answer :)
But objectively speaking, there were numerous reasons why they started with that section first, some technical some, political. One of the main reasons, though, was to appease the Central Valley Republicans. (This is also partly why they routed it via the 99 vs the 5.)
If the coastal metros appropriated a bunch of money for a "statewide" high-speed rail system and then proceeded to build themselves the lines locally for the first 5-10 years, well, then this thing would not have even passed in the first place! Letting the Republicans in the Valley see all the early investment was the only way to make sure they have skin in the game and let it pass.
This is just a byproduct of having the kind of democratic processes we have in this country, everyone gets to have a say. Even if what they have to say is stupid. In China things might have gone differently. But I would not want to live in China :)))
Why not turn the trillon dollar train to nowhere into a slow speed bike path to bakersfield
And thank you for detailing on Governor Get us Nowhere (Gavin Newsom)'s claims on HSR. That he first said he's going to hit the brake, then starts retraction and denial mode, claiming it's 'temporary' and 'he's still contributing' stuff like that. It proves my hypothesis, that he's an 'excellent politician' who's really good at making him look good and trying to appeal to as many people as he can, however he probably doesn't really care too much about the project, or even the people and everything else of his state's, long term future.
Why bother building a train when you have an airplane, which is faster and more economical, and besides we have already had airports that are already in place. Trains are good only when the landscapes are elongated like in Japan or in San Francisco to the San Jose route, but not on the American continent. Let say in you want to go to Chicago from Los Angeles, you rather fly an airplane than a fast train. An airplane has an unlimited option to fly anywhere. You don't want to build a railway from LA to Chicago directly just for that trip. How about going from LA to Houston? Built another railway? California's high-speed train is very expensive. How much you charge on the passenger if you built a very expensive high-speed train? California's real estate is so expensive. The state has to buy those expensive real estates to built train railways and Port. Also, the mountainous terrain of southern California is also a problem. Maybe the railway is good when California will reach 100 million population and built cities along the way. But for now is not feasible, no one will ride it.
the project is a huge boondoggle, and I say that as a lifelong centrist Democrat. My first election was 1996 when I voted for Bill Clinton, and I proudly voted for Obama both times and Biden in 2020.
But 100 billion to get something that will still take twice as long as a jet aircraft -- in fact probably four times as long, the way it is currently planned -- is ridiculous. It should have been "higher speed rail", enhancing the speed of existing Amtrak California track to let the trains go as fast as they can, 100+ MPH average.
The cost of that is one billion or less, not 100 billion like with CAHSR.
Both Higher Speed Rail and CAHSR will take about four hours to get from SF to LA, but with CAHSR, you're spending way too much to get the same thing.
I am VERY proud I voted no on this nonsense. Everything I thought would go wrong has gone wrong.
This is why we can't have nice things.
Start putting people in jail when the project design cost is 50% and 5x greater fraud.
Japan always understated real cost of hi speed rail.
Why do we need a high speed trillion dollar train to nowhere. Make it a slow train to somewhere. As U don't want to further space out the passengers.
Good job explaining this, thank you
What went wrong is that it is to nowhere. And don' jump one. I live there and have see the construction many times. I can tell you, it will be literal generations before high speed rail will be relevant to California.
First of all, there is no sense to building high speed rail connection between Northern and Southern California. I imagine, someday, there will be an urban heavy rail connection between Bakersfield and Los Angeles, going right along the I-5 corridor. Someday, that's why I said "generations". The other postualted function of the high speed rail system was daily high speed commutes from the Central Vally (Stockton and Modesto) into the Bay Area. This idea is less plausible than people think.
People have to first get to the train, commute #1. Then they have wait for and ride the train, commute #2. Then they have to get to their place of work, commute #3. The only part of this mega-commute that high speed rail speeds up is the middle link. The present rail commute travel time between Stockon and San Jose is 132 minutes. High speed rail could shorten that to 55 minutes, apparently. But with improved operation and some lesser upgrades, maybe the commute time with the present rail line could be cut down by even 40 minutes. Where's the beef?
A better idea would be to get the moribund population of welfare recipients, subsistence workers, undereducated and often ineducable landless peasants and lower strata retirees out of the big cities. Then maybe the people with an economic reason to be there could afford to live close to work and have a perceived fit atmosphere to raise their children in while living close to work. But this approach is seriously politically unpalatable. Nor do the metropolitan political machines want anything like this to happen. They would still win the elections but it would mean less seats in Washington and less seats in the state capitols.
Why bother building a train when you have an airplane, which is faster and more economical, and besides we have already had airports that are already in place. Trains are good only when the landscapes are elongated like in Japan or in San Francisco to the San Jose route, but not on the American continent. Let say in you want to go to Chicago from Los Angeles, you rather fly an airplane than a fast train. An airplane has an unlimited option to fly anywhere. You don't want to build a railway from LA to Chicago directly just for that trip. How about going from LA to Houston? Built another railway? California's high-speed train is very expensive. How much you charge on the passenger if you built a very expensive high-speed train? California's real estate is so expensive. The state has to buy those expensive real estates to built train railways and Port. Also, the mountainous terrain of southern California is also a problem. Maybe the railway is good when California will reach 100 million population and built cities along the way. But for now is not feasible, no one will ride it.
@@MrJSabadojr ask the first world countries that. Ohh USA ain’t one of them. It creates economic activity in areas planes bypass think of planes as express and high speed train as the local for long distance travel
@@MrJSabadojr we are not asking for a Chicago to LA route dude
@@MrJSabadojr you can’t ride what doesn’t exist.
Continue with the project.
Why bother building a train when you have an airplane, which is faster and more economical, and besides we have already had airports that are already in place. Trains are good only when the landscapes are elongated like in Japan or in San Francisco to the San Jose route, but not on the American continent. Let say in you want to go to Chicago from Los Angeles, you rather fly an airplane than a fast train. An airplane has an unlimited option to fly anywhere. You don't want to build a railway from LA to Chicago directly just for that trip. How about going from LA to Houston? Built another railway? California's high-speed train is very expensive. How much you charge on the passenger if you built a very expensive high-speed train? California's real estate is so expensive. The state has to buy those expensive real estates to built train railways and Port. Also, the mountainous terrain of southern California is also a problem. Maybe the railway is good when California will reach 100 million population and built cities along the way. But for now is not feasible, no one will ride it.
Even if China's rail is funded by a debt bubble there is still Europe and Japan. Surely California has dense enough population to build a high speed rail.
Why bother building a train when you have an airplane, which is faster and more economical, and besides we have already had airports that are already in place. Trains are good only when the landscapes are elongated like in Japan or in San Francisco to the San Jose route, but not on the American continent. Let say in you want to go to Chicago from Los Angeles, you rather fly an airplane than a fast train. An airplane has an unlimited option to fly anywhere. You don't want to build a railway from LA to Chicago directly just for that trip. How about going from LA to Houston? Built another railway? California's high-speed train is very expensive. How much you charge on the passenger if you built a very expensive high-speed train? California's real estate is so expensive. The state has to buy those expensive real estates to built train railways and Port. Also, the mountainous terrain of southern California is also a problem. Maybe the railway is good when California will reach 100 million population and built cities along the way. But for now is not feasible, no one will ride it.
@@MrJSabadojr REPOST!!!!!!! SHAME
nope. Britain has 10x the density that we do. And these cities are 380 miles (611 km) apart. You can fly it in an hour.
We really have to be honest! This was pie in the sky! It was never going to be implemented! This was a Union high jacking from the beginning. A lot of people got paid and the tax payers will be on the hook for 20-30 years! From 9 billion to 70 billion? Amtrak is cheaper and does the same shit!
Why bother building a train when you have an airplane, which is faster and more economical, and besides we have already had airports that are already in place. Trains are good only when the landscapes are elongated like in Japan or in San Francisco to the San Jose route, but not on the American continent. Let say in you want to go to Chicago from Los Angeles, you rather fly an airplane than a fast train. An airplane has an unlimited option to fly anywhere. You don't want to build a railway from LA to Chicago directly just for that trip. How about going from LA to Houston? Built another railway? California's high-speed train is very expensive. How much you charge on the passenger if you built a very expensive high-speed train? California's real estate is so expensive. The state has to buy those expensive real estates to built train railways and Port. Also, the mountainous terrain of southern California is also a problem. Maybe the railway is good when California will reach 100 million population and built cities along the way. But for now is not feasible, no one will ride it.
Bakersfield to Madera
No more train way way over budget what is the train down to 130 miles an hour to manny environmental issues use common sense
Why not just build an overnight train from La to San Fran? After all it’s to painfully long to drive, and to short to fly. A conventional overnight train would to the trick.
(EDIT) Apparently a spring up company from Newport Beach is trying to do it. I support it all the way. It’s called “Dreamstar Lines” Shame that literally nothing has been written on it.
According to google flights, on an average tuesday there are 37 flights on different carriers with about a 1.5 hour gate to gate time. So no, it is not too short to fly. Furthermore, an overnight train would not be popular, because it would not capture the economy crowd as they are on greyhound, and scare off the premium passenger as they will choose to fly as it is faster. The only way for a train to compete with the airlines is for it to be high speed. Without that, it is a joke.
@starventure Flying is faster? Well yeah, but that’s not accounting for the half century you’ll spend in lines for tickets and the ridiculous security. In total my experience flying from La to San Fran lasted a total experience of 5 hours. Because of traffic, the ungodly California traffic, and the ex gym coaches, that love to fondle passengers, at the TSA.
@@starventure You will never bid 1.5 h gate to gate time with a train (even a high speed one), but you can connect cities which are not reachable by planes in a decent amount of time. I think you are right with the economy crowd and premium passengers.
"and to short to fly."
Are you kidding, the flight is only an hour and costs about $200 round trip. Less if you have a lot of frequent flier miles with Southwest like I do, then you get some of those flights for free.
Keep Building.
STOP IT,, CUT OUR LOSSES,, WORK ON OTHER things THEN SOME """PIE IN THE FUCKING SKY"""".
Cut our loses. It makes no sense. Airplanes work just fine. Very little demand for going back and forth from Nor cal to So cal. SF and LA are two unrelated cities.
Why bother building a train when you have an airplane, which is faster and more economical, and besides we have already had airports that are already in place. Trains are good only when the landscapes are elongated like in Japan or in San Francisco to the San Jose route, but not on the American continent. Let say in you want to go to Chicago from Los Angeles, you rather fly an airplane than a fast train. An airplane has an unlimited option to fly anywhere. You don't want to build a railway from LA to Chicago directly just for that trip. How about going from LA to Houston? Built another railway? California's high-speed train is very expensive. How much you charge on the passenger if you built a very expensive high-speed train? California's real estate is so expensive. The state has to buy those expensive real estates to built train railways and Port. Also, the mountainous terrain of southern California is also a problem. Maybe the railway is good when California will reach 100 million population and built cities along the way. But for now is not feasible, no one will ride it.
@@MrJSabadojr we are not talking about trains that long idiot
@@MrJSabadojr you can’t ride what doesn’t exist
Waste
Of
Our
Money
I love the hat. And the sass. I’m a fan.
Duh:- Japan, France, Germany, Spain, and even Russia and Morocco *are happy with* high-speed rail. So get your success factors list from there by applying some legwork. You are just fixating on China. Disappointing!
There is a gigantic political fault line in the California High Speed Rail scheme. The costs of this project are staggering, not just construction, but in operation as well. Even if construction was free (built overnight by magical elves) operations would have to be subsidized by the state government forever.
California is a huge state and the entire planned system will only serve a fraction of the state. It will serve the densely populated and wealthy coastal cities (where the democrats live) and do nothing for most of the Central Valley, the Eastern and Northern counties (where the Republicans live - yes folks there are lots of Republicans in California they don't allow them to be shown on TV but they are there).
Fiscal realists of all political stripes in CA have been apoplectic since the first cost estimates came out.
Why bother building a train when you have an airplane, which is faster and more economical, and besides we have already had airports that are already in place. Trains are good only when the landscapes are elongated like in Japan or in San Francisco to the San Jose route, but not on the American continent. Let say in you want to go to Chicago from Los Angeles, you rather fly an airplane than a fast train. An airplane has an unlimited option to fly anywhere. You don't want to build a railway from LA to Chicago directly just for that trip. How about going from LA to Houston? Built another railway? California's high-speed train is very expensive. How much you charge on the passenger if you built a very expensive high-speed train? California's real estate is so expensive. The state has to buy those expensive real estates to built train railways and Port. Also, the mountainous terrain of southern California is also a problem. Maybe the railway is good when California will reach 100 million population and built cities along the way. But for now is not feasible, no one will ride it.
They also don't have a comprehensive road system that we have in the US
Their road system is far larger than the US one better maintained too. You can’t even keep bridges in operating order
When an Airplane is faster and cheaper than a high-speed train, why need a train then? Plus we already have an existing airport. I wonder how much money they will spend when buying those expensive properties in Los Angeles. The train will go through the mountain before entering Los Angeles. And how spend you charge to each passenger to offset the cost?
Please take care of the homelessness.
California wants to spend $77.2 billion for 520 miles of high speed
rail! That is $148 million per mile, or $28,000 per foot of rail! That
is way too expensive. $148 million with a 5% annual return on investment
would produce $7.4 million per year. If you divide that by 100, one get
$75,000 per year. One could fund 100 middle class jobs per year forever
for each mile of high speed rail. Our society would be giving up a
permanent job for every 52 feet of rail line. This is something I can
not get behind.
The failure not to invest in high speed rail will be regarded as a major mistake in the not to distant future.
The country is good at failure
California politicians never thought that CEQA (California Environmental Quality Act) would ever apply to them or the state. Well a judge ruled that it did and therefore, the California High-Speed Train will never be able to get through all of the required CEQA environmental impact studies brought about by anybody and everybody who are going to be suing the state every inch of the way---especially when they try to get through the Bay Area corridor. So it has now become a fool's errand to try and continue this project. They have environmentally excluded themselves from ever completing any such large project like this, at least at an acceptable price and timeframe.
They can just repeal CEQA
Who needs homeless housing when u got a train to nowhere?
Finish the damn train
Thanks for watching!
Tax & Spend Democrats is what happened.
No doubt money was deferred to other pet projects and the majority of the waste was due to Cal EPA oppressive regulatory fees.
Yes, tax and spend. Deficits yearly of almost a trillion dollars. Caused by the party of "fiscal irresponsibility ".
I hope they finish the project it's much needed in California.
Brian Smith It will never happen.
It's no just building it, it's operating it and maintaining it. A very expensive proposition. Interesting that it's being built from the middle out.
Huge fan! Great job! Cut our loses!!!
The only solution to California's problems is to let it sink into the sea.
STATE OBLIGATION BONDS = taxpaying sob's.
I think we just need to stop the project and focus on the inner cities.
Why? We would have to return the Federal grant money and repay the bonds because the inner city projects are not covered by that pot of money. That would mean literally losing billions in investments and going into debt. How does that make sense vs finishing the project slowly with Cap-and-Trade money?
9:28 Thats exactly what I've been saying for years.
Oh that dead end train has a destination, you get your skateboard and mountain Dew and go to Bakersfield on a 110 degree day and you skateboard then come back to San Francisco and step over homeless and poop.
What a joke! Count me out...
Why bother building a train when you have an airplane, which is faster and more economical, and besides we have already had airports that are already in place. Trains are good only when the landscapes are elongated like in Japan or in San Francisco to the San Jose route, but not on the American continent. Let say in you want to go to Chicago from Los Angeles, you rather fly an airplane than a fast train. An airplane has an unlimited option to fly anywhere. You don't want to build a railway from LA to Chicago directly just for that trip. How about going from LA to Houston? Built another railway? California's high-speed train is very expensive. How much you charge on the passenger if you built a very expensive high-speed train? California's real estate is so expensive. The state has to buy those expensive real estates to built train railways and Port. Also, the mountainous terrain of southern California is also a problem. Maybe the railway is good when California will reach 100 million population and built cities along the way. But for now is not feasible, no one will ride it.
REPOST!!!!! SHAME
HOW MANY DAMS AND RESERVOIRS could have been built with the $70 BILLION allocated SO FAR?
Cancel it and fix the roads!!
I'm sure that will work out cough cough 405 cough cough
California is a joke
Getting too political for me. Unsubscribed.
Blah blah blah, yada yada yada! Your vids are like sitting in traffic, a bigger waste of time and $$$! Public transport is a no brainer!
Waste
Of
Our
Money
California wants to spend $77.2 billion for 520 miles of high speed
rail! That is $148 million per mile, or $28,000 per foot of rail! That
is way too expensive. $148 million with a 5% annual return on investment
would produce $7.4 million per year. If you divide that by 100, one get
$75,000 per year. One could fund 100 middle class jobs per year forever
for each mile of high speed rail. Our society would be giving up a
permanent job for every 52 feet of rail line. This is something I can
not get behind.
California wants to spend $77.2 billion for 520 miles of high speed
rail! That is $148 million per mile, or $28,000 per foot of rail! That
is way too expensive. $148 million with a 5% annual return on investment
would produce $7.4 million per year. If you divide that by 100, one get
$75,000 per year. One could fund 100 middle class jobs per year forever
for each mile of high speed rail. Our society would be giving up a
permanent job for every 52 feet of rail line. This is something I can
not get behind.
California wants to spend $77.2 billion for 520 miles of high speed
rail! That is $148 million per mile, or $28,000 per foot of rail! That
is way too expensive. $148 million with a 5% annual return on investment
would produce $7.4 million per year. If you divide that by 100, one get
$75,000 per year. One could fund 100 middle class jobs per year forever
for each mile of high speed rail. Our society would be giving up a
permanent job for every 52 feet of rail line. This is something I can
not get behind.