It's rare for any human endeavor to achieve perfection, but California's High-Speed Rail Authority has done it – albeit in reverse.

Every single independent review of its project to link the northern and southern halves of the state with a bullet train has concluded that it's not working. No exceptions. Not even one.

The only ones saying that the bullet train will work as promised are the rail authority itself, its highly paid consultants and media cheerleaders, and those on the political left who hate cars and planes and love trains.

A University of California review of the authority's ridership estimates found them to be highly suspect.

The Legislature's budget analyst has been highly critical of the project's management.

Meanwhile, a "peer review" panel has been equally skeptical of the authority's ability to deliver the project – three times.

And all of that criticism is coming from authorities nominally in favor of building the project. Opponents are even more scathing.

The peer review panel's latest critique warns that the authority's plans to break ground next year on a short segment of the system – which critics have dubbed the "train to nowhere" – could be starting something California cannot finish.

"Final route selection is incomplete and local opposition emerges when any route approaches finalization," says the panel's nine-page report.

"Construction costs and schedules are uncertain and subject to upward pressure; demand estimates are in dispute and subject to a significant range of uncertainty that could produce outcomes ranging from financial profit to economic pain. In plain language, there are significant gaps and problems with Plan A, and there is no Plan B."

The report is loaded with similar warnings as well as advice that state officials seize the "last available opportunity" to straighten out the project, if it can be done.

The peer review panel of transportation experts was appointed at the behest of increasingly skeptical legislators.

They and other critics are concerned that if construction were to begin on the test line in the San Joaquin Valley, as an oddly worded federal grant requires, the state would be committed to something it doesn't have the funds to complete, nor the prospect of having enough revenue from fares to cover operating costs.

The authority is supposed to be producing a "business plan" to answer all the questions, but its first draft was laughably skimpy and contained pie-in-the-sky projections of federal and private construction funds, ridership and operational revenues. A new draft is due later this year.

We don't have to do this, and we probably shouldn't.

We've spent millions, but we're on the verge of committing billions without a realistic plan. This is a disaster in the making, and it's time to step back.

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Call The Bee's Dan Walters, (916) 321-1195. Back columns, www.sacbee.com/walters

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