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CA train project needs another $100B to complete route from San Fran to LA
- dekhn 3y agothis project will never be complete; they will finish the central valley and stop there. There is no way to get a high speed train all the way to SF on the same two tracks that caltrain uses, even after electrification. It will be a miracle if they get to Diridon.
- mc32 3y agoMore likely Tamien, then it slows to commuter speed the rest of the way.
- Hobadee 3y agoI take it you haven't been from Tamien to Gilroy. Those tracks are worse than everything else from SJ-SF. (HSR would likely cut over somewhere around Gilroy, so taking those tracks up would make sense, but they would all need to be redone.)
- hedora 3y agoCrazy idea: We could have a train corridor from Sacramento to Oakland, then San Jose and Los Angeles, then run a ferry between SF and Oakland. Oh wait, we had exactly that, and then ripped it out / prioritized freight on it. I don’t see why they don’t just imminent-domain the tracks, and straighten them so the existing amtrak trains could run at their top speed on them (125mph vs today’s 60mph if I remember right). They could even run frequent commuter trains within cities at rush hour. Later, they could upgrade the trains and tracks, until it’s ratcheted up to modern speeds (> 200 mph) in remote areas.
- russellbeattie 3y agoIt's a rule that all infrastructure projects will be behind schedule and over budget. A correlary to this is, like a vacuum, a project will always use the money and time that is originally allocated and need more. With this in mind, the way the current project is being funded and run is actually the most practical way (regardless of the horrible optics): Doing chunks at a time, rather than trying to plan and fund the entire time and cost up front. The fact is that estimations are inherently political and always, always, always incorrect. Though it seems a ludicrous way to work, the project would never had started had the actual time and cost had been known at the outset. Though some parts of the project cost more because of the lack of complete funding and slower pace (things cost more now), the overall efficiency is actually improved by making sure that the money is spent as needed. So, if they're saying it'll cost another $100B to complete, the real cost is probably $250B. If they say it'll be done by 2030, it'll probably be 2035 at the earliest. And that's fine. As a country we need to stop thinking in the short term. Unless we want to start acting like China and just bulldoze our way across the country regardless of property owners, residents and the environment, this is how it has to be. Anyone who's been on this earth for more than a few decades should know this by now.
- alephnerd 3y agoThe RoI just isn't there for this specific project though. That additional $100B could have been used to drastically enhance the existing public transit systems within California. Projects like the ACE expansion, the LA Metro expansion, the Caltrain electrification, etc have all had tangible positive effects, and a bit more money could have been poured into multiple local projects instead. At this price point, what would the ticket be for a SF to LA train?!? If it reaches the $100-200 range you can't beat flying.
- jeffbee 3y agoSure, the cost of flying looks great, because you completely externalized the cost of the airports and all of the pollution.
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- exabrial 3y agoWhere is all the money fricken going? Seriously? Who in California is vacuuming this up and buying lambos with it? Absolutely unbelievable. What's worse, is if you even begin to question this stuff, people are like "stop being anti-<insert buzzword> blah blah"
- david_shi 3y agoI suspect it's the same bureaucratic, managerial corruption that's endemic to many of the institutions of our time. One day, a hundred trillion dollars in debt and 1000's of million dollar restrooms later, the bill will be due and we won't be able to pay.
- cduzz 3y agoI suspect it's just the opposite. There is no bureaucracy tasked with building. Instead there is an executive committee tasked with supervising consultants who are supervising construction firms who are contracted to do the work. There is no professional project management class in the actual government because "we don't need them when we can save money hiring consultants." https://www.google.com/search?q=consultants+to+run+infrastructure+projects https://www.google.com/search?q=consultants+to+run+infrastru...
- avs733 3y agoI see the push back on bureaucracy all the time in ways that imply government is the problem. When explained, what it ends up perpetually looking like to me is rent seeking middlemen who are really good at pointing at every one but themselves while they line their pockets.
- Jensson 3y agoThe government giving money to rent seeking middlemen is corruption and a common problem with bureaucracy. The corrupt bureaucrats here realized it is more efficient to extract value by using private corporations, so the root of the problem isn't the corporations but the corrupt bureaucrats. Private corporations often gets good value from outsourcing, why can't the government? Corruption, plain and simple.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- iknowstuff 3y agoWhat if everyone involved received equity which is worth more with every dollar from the initial cost estimate not spent? Giving them an incentive to save money and pocket the difference
- etrautmann 3y agoI think the second order effects of this would be a TON of cut corners and shoddy work, no?
- anon291 3y agoYeah but you'd have a train that runs. Part of the issue is that the transit lobby seems allergic to private sector investment. The golden gate was funded privately via bond sales to bank or America.
- darth_avocado 3y agoThis was a project that was never needed. High speed rail make sense in corridors that have a large number of big population centers that are just far enough where driving is not a great solution and flights are inefficient to move large number of people around. Europe, Japan, American North East etc. There’s not a whole lot between LA and the Bay Area, and people didn’t need the train when flights work. It’s the same kind of feasibility study that put a multi billion dollar transit terminal in the middle of San Francisco, that is not connected to all major transit operations that exist in the city
- anon291 3y ago> multi billion dollar transit terminal in the middle of San Francisco, that is not connected to all major transit operations that exist in the city Are you talking about Caltrain? Caltrain is highly used.
- schoen 3y agoProbably the Salesforce Transit Center. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transbay_Transit_Center https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transbay_Transit_Center It's a somewhat shiny bus terminal near downtown San Francisco which is now actually used a lot (though it would have been used a lot more if not for COVID and work-from-home). It has a basement level prepared for the California High-Speed Rail (the original subject of the article we're discussing) but it doesn't connect to Caltrain, BART, or Muni Metro, although the latter two are a relatively short walk away.
- anon291 3y agoOh right that was being built just as I left sf shortly before COVID (unrelated).
- ulfw 3y ago> High speed rail make sense in corridors that have a large number of big population centers that are just far enough where driving is not a great solution so exactly SF Bay Area (7.5 MM people) to LA Area (13.5 MM people). Distance 350 miles or 560km. 1 hr flight is inefficient with starts/landing/checkin/checkout/TSA/infrastructure costs/getting in and out of airports etc Proper high speed rail like Shinkansen could do it in 2-2.5 hours easily. (same distance as Tokyo to Osaka, which is the OLDEST Shinkansen line)
- downvotetruth 3y ago40M CA residents (/4 HH)x 100k per Tesla = 1T
- CaptainNegative 3y agoThe article is using short scale billion, thank the lord. (note: parent comment was edited)
- Y_Y 3y agoTeslas-for-Babies is a voter-sponsored initiative which promises to receive broad bipartisan support.
- inference-lord 3y agoIt seems concerning that the US isn't able to complete basic infrastructure projects. Even if they're a little over time and budget. In other parts of the world, infrastructure is getting done. Looking at how much high speed rail China has built, and operates, then you look at the USA who cannot event get a train built between to major cities it's quite crazy that this is such a struggle. I know that it's not a priority because Americans are "rich" and like cars, but something about this failure seems deeply problematic to me.
- jimbob45 3y agothe US I would caution against lumping everyone else in with California. There are definitely functional states in the US that can finish projects. California, however, is not one of them.
- dclowd9901 3y agoLarge scale projects? Give even one example. Isn’t the big dig in Boston still going on 20 years later?
- cduzz 3y agoI think the only holes left from the big dig that haven't been filled are in the MBTA's budget from the imaginative financing used to make it happen. The actual physical digging and stuff is all done. And it made Boston a habitable city. https://www.boston.com/cars/untagged/2015/01/05/can-we-talk-rationally-about-the-big-dig-yet/ https://www.boston.com/cars/untagged/2015/01/05/can-we-talk-...
- rented_mule 3y agoHow about we add Michigan, Indiana, Kentucky, Tennessee, Arkansas, Mississippi, Louisiana, and Texas to the California example? The Interstate 69 project through those states has been going on for decades, and it is nowhere near completion. But I-69 doesn't get the same scrutiny. Maybe because it's about cars rather than trains?
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- CaptainNegative 3y agoThat's only $180k per meter.
- anarchogeek 3y agoThere needs to be massive reform in the way infrastructure is built in the US yet nobody is even proposing a fix.
- baggy_trough 3y agoThe people who would be capable of proposing a fix are the ones who benefit from bleeding the system dry.
- ETH_start 3y agoMany of the special interests that benefit from the status quo have a stranglehold over narrative. How would a consensus ever emerge to strip labor unions of their power in the current social landscape for example?
- dclowd9901 3y agoA fix to what? The people who would have to propose the fix are the ones benefitting the most from it not being fixed.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- 93po 3y agomy proposed fixed: election reform so we can have representatives that actually serve the people
- anon-sre-srm 3y agoMust first start with the political operating system that cannot be reformed from within. After that happens, then it's possible to have sensible governance and effectively implementing megaprojects. Public-private "partnerships" are just subsidies to corporate profits.
- throwaway5959 3y agoThere must be a black hole sucking money in from this project.
- ulfw 3y agoIt's called corruption and is rampant in the US.
- jeffbee 3y agoYou're not allowed to write on this topic if you fail to mention the freeway budget over a similar time horizon.
- nwiswell 3y agoThe entire CA transportation budget is $21 billion per annum (not counting federal funds, which were elevated at $8.8B in 23-24). That includes DMV and CHP as well as the city/county road funds, state highways, transit programs, bridge retrofitting, general maintenance, and existing rail programs. https://lao.ca.gov/Publications/Report/4804 https://lao.ca.gov/Publications/Report/4804
- jeffbee 3y agoGreat. Can you get a job at KCRA?
- nwiswell 3y agoIt seems pretty clear what you were implying. I don't see a problem with their journalism.
- jeffbee 3y agoI think I am being crystal clear. The government spending on the car transportation scheme costs so much that it spends every few years enough money to build a statewide bullet train system, even though the car system is only treading water and not adding capacity. That isn't even counting the private spending on the car scheme, which is far larger. HSR is the deal of the century.
- nwiswell 3y agoThis bullet train is absolutely not statewide. You can get from basically anywhere in California to anywhere else using the state highway system, and millions and millions of Californians actually do. (CA has 2,459 miles of Interstate highway and 11,982 miles of freeways and principal arterial roads; the final length of the HSR as planned is 800 miles) This $100B is a marginal cost on top of what has already been spent, and does not include the cost to operate the system. It seems unreasonable to imply that the cost of the highways which actually connect the entire state, somehow dwarfs the cost of this project -- that's just not true. It's even more unreasonable to to imply that the journalism is flawed because it does not make that argument.
- Bud 3y ago[dead]
- gogasca 3y ago[dead]
- rayiner 3y ago> told lawmakers the project has $28 billion dollars on hand, but noted it was still a few billion dollars short to complete the Central Valley segment between Merced and Bakersfield. Depending on how long the segment takes to finish, it could cost between $32 Billion to $35 Billion California will spend tens of billions and multiple decades connecting two cities in the middle of nowhere. And in the most conservative part of the state, where people didn’t want high speed rail to begin with. And then the project will get cancelled because no way this thing is ever getting built. Truly excellent trolling.
- hedora 3y agoMost of the transportation budget goes to lowering the capacity of commuter corridors (car and public transit) in the cities, and devising ever-more-dangerous non-standard bike lanes.
- akamaka 3y agoOne fifth of California’s population lives in this “middle of nowhere” called the Central Valley, and its existing rail line is in the top 10 busiest train routes in the USA, with thousands of daily riders.[1] Although the project needs to connect to the coastal cities to really make sense, it is certain that the initial operating segment from Bakersfield to Merced will prove popular as soon as it starts running. [1] https://www.railpassengers.org/site/assets/files/3477/39.pdf https://www.railpassengers.org/site/assets/files/3477/39.pdf
- panick21_ 3y agoUn Switerland any town with 1000 people is expect to have regular trains. Even mountain towns of a few 100 people have regular buses synced up with the train. In the US, multi million cities are somehow 'in the middle of nowhere'. If that doesnt tell you the difference in additide then I dont know what will. You literally have two metro areas with 10+ million people and multible towns with millions or multibe 100k people in the middle. Maybe just improving the projects organisation instead of cancling it makes sense.
- pavelstoev 3y agoMeanwhile - Brightline, Orlando to Miami 125 MPH, $6B and 4 years. https://www.wptv.com/news/region-martin-county/stuart/brightline-trains-ready-roll-to-orlando-amid-treasure-coast-concerns#:~:text=%E2%80%94%20The%20first%20Brightline%20trains%20will,runs%20starting%20in%20early%202022 https://www.wptv.com/news/region-martin-county/stuart/bright....
- hedora 3y agoI’m not sure if that’s meant to be a success story or not. 125MPH is the max speed of the train. It runs the route at an average of 67mph, end to end. Adult tickets start at $79 for a 235 mile ride. That’s about $0.33/mile, which is cheaper than driving with only two people in the car. With three, it’s cheaper to drive. Ridership is over 2 million per year, which seems good. (Ten years at that ridership means the track construction cost $300 per passenger trip though. No idea how much maintenance has cost.) However, overseas, the older trains are averaging well over 100mph, and the new workhorse trains routinely run faster than 200 mph. For a train and tracks completed in 2013, I’d expect the 235 mile trip (6 stops; say, 4 minutes per stop: 235 mph top speed) to take about 90 minutes; 100 minutes figuring in time to accelerate and decelerate 6 times. It takes 3.5 hours. That’s probably slower than a car. Also, according to wikipedia, the system is incredibly unsafe (by train standards).
- panick21_ 3y agoThe trains has to run on legacy private routes in a state the has barley invested in trains in centuries. It is a line not well integrated in the larger transportation system and has a limited scope. Getting to as many riders as they have is impressive. Its unsafe because of Florida insane traffic engineering, not because of any issue with the trains or the company. In the context of the US Brightline is clearly a success by a large margin.
- hedora 3y agoIt sounds like the tracks are a severe safety and performance issue, even after $6B in upgrades. The construction cost already puts the system at the edge of insolvency, even without considering operating costs. I agree they're doing well by US standards.
- EricDeb 3y agoI'm very pro train but this is ridiculous.
- 8f2ab37a-ed6c 3y agoThe project is too profitable for it to end. Why would anybody at the trough be against stretching the timeline and budget in perpetuity? Yum yum, unless you're a CA taxpayer. The $1.7M toilet feels like a steal in comparison to this.
- hehhehaha 3y agoManagerial bloat is a side effect of ridiculous anti-growth legislation and nimbyism.
- hayst4ck 3y agoI've spent large amounts of time in other countries. America is an absolute embarrassment. There are countries you can go where it feels like the government actually cares about trying to help people have a better life. There are countries where infrastructure projects get completed. There are countries where infrastructure isn't just completed, it's good. There are countries where the administrative overhead of health care is 2% instead of (a likely underestimated) 25%. You can't fix infrastructure policy, or any other policy, in America without first fixing campaign finance reform. As long as senators and justices can be openly bought and sold there is no hope of getting responsible leadership that acts in the interests of citizens. Very good video explaining the core issue of American politics by Harvard Law professor and founder of creative commons Lawrence Lessig-- Our democracy no longer represents the people: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PJy8vTu66tE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PJy8vTu66tE
- anon-sre-srm 3y agoYep. America has the simultaneous problems of being both too spread out and too busy/dense in most areas without sufficient public transport. There has been a widespread, long-term lack of planning to arrange smaller residential areas closer to commercial and industrial areas. It's largely dependent on long commutes and automobile commutes, which is unnecessarily expensive and wasteful.
- tnmom 3y agoFor reference, Wikipedia says SpaceX has spent $3B on the Starship program through May 2023. Another 2B estimated in 2023 at that point, so somewhere less than 10B total, easily. It went to space today, and these jokers can’t lay railroad track like we did in the 1800s.
- nailz1911 3y agohttps://archive.ph/uG7KA https://archive.ph/uG7KA for those who get "Sorry, this content is not available in your region."
- anon-sre-srm 3y agoTitle author clearly isn't from CA. They've been hyping HSR since the 80's. Never gonna happen without lots of pork barrel waste and, like VTA light rail, no one's going to use it. Americans are in love with meat agriculture, political toxicity, feelings over knowledge and competency, uninformed opinions, and single occupant vehicles stuck in traffic with long commutes.
- johnea 3y agoThis is a one-party failure of the California democratic party 8-( They're so in bed with the real estate mafia that it's almost impossible to get anything involving land accomplished. With the number of people flying daily between southern California and the bay area, a high speed rail would be boon for the region. It's ironic that after the whole idea of California high speed rail was first introduced by a San Diego legislator in the '80s, after a trip to Japan, San Diego is no longer even on the initial planned route. There's a simple solution to the funding problem: a $5-$10 dollar tax on each flight between SoCal and the bay area. These short hop flights are exactly what the high speed rail is supposed to eliminate, and the number of people taking them everyday is huge. Make the problem pay for the solution. The same approach could fund the transition away from petroleum. The problem, of course, is that both major US political parties primarily represent the entrenched equity stake holders, not the population at large.
- xnx 3y ago"The purpose of system is what it does". High speed rail (and almost all US train systems) are not about moving people in a cost or time efficient way. The purpose is to transfer taxpayer dollars to employees, consultants, and politicians.