For nearly 40 years I've advocated building high-speed rail lines, including in testimony before Congress and in speeches in Europe and Japan.
But for the first time, I see a project that I can't endorse - the proposed California system. A due diligence report, which I co-authored, found that the state's planners are projecting ridership to be so high as to be absurd. The promoters are understating cost estimates by billions of dollars, are exaggerating reductions in greenhouse gas emissions, and are ignoring the invalidation of environmental reviews as some planned rights-of-way have been lost.
Even the expected travel times are unachievable because trains would have to operate at an average speed of 200mph, a feat that has yet to be accomplished anywhere in the world. The California High-Speed Rail Authority's failure to issue a business plan prior to the election, as required by law, is alarming.
How can we vote on a $9.95 billion ballot proposition when we lack information about how, where and when the funds would be spent? The agency that can't give us that information after spending $58 million now wants us to trust it with billions of dollars? It's likely funds will run out - potentially leaving the San Francisco-Los Angeles line only partially built, and the Sacramento, San Diego and Anaheim links never built - unless taxpayers provide bailouts in the tens of billions of dollars.
Voters would be wise to vote "No" on Prop. 1A.
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