Pacheco is a bit out of the way for service to Saramento, Oakland, and Livermore and the Altamont obviates the need for need for condemning property south of the new bridge. However blasting through the coast range either at Niles or on the interstate will still cause problems with grade and existing overhead bridges.

Pacheco appears slightly less convenient (for the East Bay) but slightly more expensive. I’ll take any service rather thna no service.

Now THAT’s funny!

Of course a project of this size is going to be political. How could it not be?

Altamont vs. Pacheco was a technical decision based on populations within city boundaries? Riiiight.

UNFORTUNATELY, California high-speed rail plan has been hijacked by the political animals on the CAHSRA board and staff. The Pacheco decision is a blatant abuse of proper choice of alignment, manipulated by Rod Diridon to favor San Jose interests. The ideal HSR system would come into the Bay Area over the Altamont, and split 3 ways: 1) through SFO and into downtown SF, 2) down to SJ Airport, and 3) up to the Oakland airport. Anybody with a map, however, would recognize that this would obsolete BART. Much of the political push to relocate HSR over the Pacheco is coming from the “BART Preservation Society”. It’s no coincidence that Quentin Kopp is on the CAHSRA board, since he was the main backer of the ridiculous BART-SFO overpass into the International Terminal, despite all transportation planner recommendations to the contrary.

I’m all for HSR, but this plan in California is something I can’t get behind. Ed Jordan (former Chair of CA High Speed Rail) quit because he was disgusted with the political influence over key decisions. I’m also disgusted.

The public sector was the single largest source of new jobs in the state, adding 4,600 new jobs in April alone. “The statistic can’t help but stand out given the state’s worsening budget situation,” says the Beacon Economics report.

Interesting. The U.S. Board of Labor reported that 65,000 people lost their jobs in June alone.

I can only assume that the roads, schools and levees were “looked at” with rose colored glasses if the state of California was able to move on to high-speed rail. Our current systems of roads, highways, rail lines and public transportation systems are in such a decrepit and outdated state that they will soon be laughed at by even the world’s poorest nations.

While our state moves forward with high-speed rail, which I might add it vital to our state’s economic and environmental future, I suggest we take a second look at the roads, schools and levees, all of which are in need of funding and have suffered from decades of neglect and underinvestment.

In Bavaria (Germany), former Prime Minister Edmund Stoiber had for many years aggressively championed a Transrapid (maglev) line from the center of Munich to its new airport, some 25 miles to the north. This was supposed to be an eat-your-own-dog-food showcase designed to ramp up export contracts, which so far remain limited to a single similar project in Shanghai. For such short distances, the time savings relative to conventional rail technology amount to just a few minutes, so public support was uncertain in spite of supposedly moderate construction cost. Only after Stoiber was forced to resign in the context of an unrelated scandal did the companies in the Transrapid consortium roughly double the price tag to reflect their actual cost. Voters promptly nixed the project in favor of something appropriate to local transportation needs, as opposed to high-falutin’ industrial policy.

Conclusion: if highly visible political figures become evangelists for a project too early in its gestation process, this can undermine the objectivity of the planning process and ultimately, voter support. If their endorsement comes late in the game, they risk being labeled as opportunists. Timing is everything. If the State Assembly and Senate reach agreement on the verbiage of AB3034, IMHO the Governor will have to come off the fence one way or the other. Hopefully, various amendments designed to limit the financial risk to the state will be sufficient to secure his active participation in marketing Prop 1 to the California electorate.

I’m not a fan of Arnold’s term in office, as a cursory glance at Calitics will show. But if he wants to campaign for HSR more power to him. He desperately needs something to leave as a legacy for the state, since he has little else positive to show for his five years in office.