The project simply is not ready for prime time, ever after 10 years and $58 millions being spent.

The bond measure should be pulled from the fall 2008 ballot.

HSR is just something I felt needed some love. Californians are embracing passenger rail so I’m not convinced the unfamiliarity of HSR is going to be a problem. It’s a simple concept that most Californians easily grasp. Fast service that allows people to get around the state without the airlines using a sustainable system that is independent of oil prices and helps the climate for an affordable cost.

In fact it usually comes up in conversation unprompted. I was at San José Diridon Station last weekend waiting for a Caltrain to SF and a woman and I were talking about travel. “Wouldn’t it be nice if there was a bullet train to LA?” she asked.

Music to my ears.

There are a thousand such stories up and down the state, such as, what if we don’t spend $7 billion on new prison medical facilities? What will that cost us? What if we don’t retrofit hospitals? What if we continue to skimp on our schools?

Those are the kinds of things that will be competing in voters’ minds when they go to vote on the HSR bond measure in November. The difference is, those other things are things we already have and can understand the need for, while HSR is a new thing we’ve done without for all our lives.

Again, I DO see the need for it, and I DO understand the costs associated with not doing it. But you and your fellow boosters have your work cut out for you.

good catch indeed. According to my trusty Google map, the network with only Pacheco comes to 810 miles. Not sure where the figure of 700 came from.

However, any “HST overlay” through Altamont Pass would then be over-and-above those 810, adding another unfunded $5.7-8 billion to the tab – the higher numbr applies if a spur to West Oakland BART is included. That’s why Altamont-only would be preferable. However, if Pacheco it absolutely, positively must be, let’s take it. A bird in hand is worth ten in the air.

http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?ie=UTF8&hl=en&msa=0&msid=107511680599374219842.00044e26854cb91cf518e&ll=34.216345,-117.79541&spn=3.21117,4.630737&z=8

Note that the 220 miles of additional track to Las Vegas shown are *not* part of CHSRA’s proposal or even under consideration. They’re purely my personal suggestion of how the completely separate and incompatible maglev project to Anaheim could be avoided IFF California voters approve the HSR bond.

Either way, Nevada would have to raise the funds for any high-speed ground link into California all by itself, the *state* of California would not chip in – though the federal government, individual counties in California and private investors would be free to do so.

Of course we’re used to this – I still haven’t seen any effort by anyone in the state media to calculate the cost of not building HSR or the financial risks to the state of not constructing the project.

Gilroy -> Fresno: 115
Merced -> Fresno: 56

Central CA gets the short end of the stick again

Cal HSR website:

Sac -> SD: 588 miles
SF -> Gilroy: 79 miles
Norwalk -> Irvine: 38 miles

So that’s 705, and that’s NOT including the not-immediately-obvious (cause they don’t hit right at a station) branch distances. So let’s estimate:

Gilroy -> Merced: 115 miles
Fresno -> Merced: 56 miles

So that’s at least another (115-56=) 59 miles, probably more like 85. In a similar vein, the segment between the LA branch and Norwalk is probably say another 7 miles.

So 588 + 79 + 38 + 85 + 7 = 797. I don’t know where the 700 miles came from, but it’s quite easy to get to 800 without discussion of Altamont. Let’s not get ahead of ourselves here.

The quibbling over numbers is specifically designed to obfuscate that. At least the CHSRA is providing some guidelines – the HSR opponents have literally nothing else to offer the state for a solution to our mobility problems and fuel prices.

It’s as if HSR is being assessed in a time warp, where it’s forever 1995. It is not a credible way to deal with the project.

Construction cost projections – if you choose to believe at least their relative ratios – are comparable. Note that the estimates for the Pacheco options include the Central Valley section between Chowchilla and roughly Stockton airport.

What is different is that Altamont does a much better job of serving the future Northern California megaregion in addition to nearly comparable performance into Southern California. There’s absolutely no need to build any “HST commuter overlay” for an extra $8 billion if Pacheco is abandoned. Of course, Parsons Brinkerhoff want to maximize the business opportunity…

The problem appears to be that CHSRA has held fast to its original remit of an SF-LA starter line. It grudgingly accepted project bloat to include Sacramento and San Diego, in order to build a broad enough base of support for the bond measure. However, expanding the network definition wasn’t just about letting more people benefit from the north-south link.

It was also – indeed, primarily – about serving passengers traveling within California’s two emerging mega-regions. Indeed, that concept never really entered into the Authority’s thinking, even though it has come to see the car – not aircraft – as the primary competition for high speed rail. For evidence, look no further than the fact that CHSRA is not even considering a shortcut for travel between San Diego and Anaheim, e.g. along highway 57 south and west of Pomona. It merely noted that upgrading the Amtrak/freight coast line to dual track might be useful and then promptly scoped it out of further consideration.

CHSRA’s own ridership study suggests that total inter-regional trips between the megaregions forecast for 2030 are dwarfed by more local travel there and within the Central Valley. IMHO, it would make sense to switch from a single SF-LA starter line to two smaller ones linking SF-SJ-Sacramento via Altamont Pass and San Diego-LA-Orange County, respectively. The north-south link is definitely needed and, network growth should proceed as rapidly as possible toward Tehachapi Pass in phases 2 and 3.

Exploratory tunneling in Soledad Canyon and at Tehachapi Pass should start early, though – the geology there could hold a few nasty surprises.

http://www.spur.org/newsletters/1107Urbanist.pdf
http://www.cahighspeedrail.ca.gov/image/chsr/20080128160332_PT1_Meeting_Feb07.pdf