In this file photo, Amtrak's Lincoln Service train passes Illinois cornfields as it speeds through a crossing en route to Chicago. A 68-page guideline released Wednesday, June 17, 2009, by the Obama administration gives an edge in the race for federal stimulus cash, to states like California and eight states in the Midwest that have cooperated closely to promote a network with Chicago as its hub. In California, at least, that network is suddenly at risk.
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In cash-strapped California, plans for a high-speed rail line are rebuked
By Matthew Shaer | 07.07.09
There’s debris on the tracks of the White House’s revolutionary railroad plan.
In April, with Vice President Joe Biden at his side, President Barack Obama called for the creation of a high-speed rail network with corridors in the Pacific Northwest, the Midwest, California, the Pacific Northwest, the Southeast, the Gulf Coast, and Pennsylvania, among other areas. Obama said the network, which would be funded in part by the $787 billion stimulus plan, was necessary to cut down on traffic congestion, reduce dependence on foreign oil, and encourage environmentally-friendly travel.
“My high-speed rail proposal will lead to innovations that change the way we travel in America. We must start developing clean, energy-efficient transportation that will define our regions for centuries to come,” Obama said at the time.
As Monitor reporter Mark Clayton noted in May, “The idea is not to lay tracks coast to coast, but to zero in on densely populated regions such as the Midwest, California, and Florida, where short distances between cities would let fast trains compete with planes and cars.”
In addition to opening new corridors across the country, the White House’s blueprint would upgrade existing lines to accommodate faster trains, and improve the quality of the busy Northeast Corridor, which runs from Washington to Boston.
Not so fast
But in California, where a long-simmering budget crisis has exploded into a full-blown emergency, the rail proposal is being met with stiff opposition.The Associated Press reported Monday that residents of San Francisco and Los Angeles are raising concerns that the network would level trees and homes and adversely impact area businesses.
Obama’s plan for California calls for a corridor that would link Sacramento, the San Francisco Bay area, Fresno, Anaheim, Los Angeles, and San Diego – an 800-mile system of rail lines.
“We’re supportive of (high-speed rail), but we have some deep concerns over potential implementation,” Patrick Burt, a city councilman from the town of Palo Alto, 30 miles southeast of San Francisco, told the Associated Press.
The Mercury News is reporting that residents of the area near Palo Alto are primarily concerned about the “noise and construction of concrete bridges and overpasses near [some] neighborhoods.”
It’s the economy, stupid
Meanwhile, the planned corridor has run into other, more pressing concerns. According to the Sacramento Business Journal, the wording in a new budget-balancing bill contains a line that would require further study before the rail network could be implemented:
The language was attached as a condition of the state spending $139 million to hire staff and engineering firms. High-speed rail backers, however, warn that such a study would delay their project beyond when it would be eligible for $1.3 billion in federal stimulus money they have been promised.
Full steam ahead, please
But many have argued that the high-speed rail network could help save California a bunch of cash. Although the plan is expensive, the Bakersfield Californian wrote in an editorial, “expanding roadways and airports would cost us even more. To provide the same transportation capacity, roadway and airport expansions will cost around $80 billion, according to state estimates, while the high-speed rail network will cost around $45 billion.”
Who knows how the whole mess’ll turn out? In the meantime, let’s hear what Ozzy has to say:
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2. Holding On | 07.07.09
The high speed rail line will induce sprawl into the state’s agricultural region furthering the state’s decline by inducing the paving of our last economic engine. Agriculture. By by California dreaming.
3. Dead On | 07.07.09
At least someone has it right… the state is broke in part because they’re paying about 12% of the state budget directly to pay for highway projects.
Cheap, affordable public transit saves tax dollars. The elitists who fight public transit funding don’t get that it doesn’t threaten their way of life: in fact it creates a two tier system that maintains the viability of automobile travel for the better off, by helping keep roads unclogged. And that’s not a bad thing.
4. Karl | 07.07.09
I’m an American who has lived in China off-and-on for over ten years. The leadership here in the 1990s was all about building cars and roads, but that has shifted over the past decade, with the focus now on public transportation. An incredibly fast train that runs between Beijing and nearby Tianjin will soon be expanded to Shanghai. Subways have sprouted up around Beijing and other cities. The article above notes that Palo Alto residents are concerned about “noise and construction of concrete bridges and overpasses near [some] neighborhoods.” Yes, I suppose someone is bound to lose something when a rail line is built. But it is sad to see how political systems in the United States have been unable to overcome entrenched interests to build a transportation network that looks to the future. Maybe some of this is based in the American love of the car, and will be overcome with the hollowing out of the U.S. auto industry. Or maybe Americans will continue the love affair, just with Toyotas and even lowly Fiats.
5. lexslamman | 07.08.09
Uh, these folks in SF and LA do know that HSR will prevent widening highways from leveling trees and impacting businesses, and will spur the kind of economic development that densely populated areas like the LA basin and the SF peninsula desperately need, right? It seems like they are trying to shoot themselves in the foot with all their ‘not in my back yard’ complaining.
6. Demographia | 07.08.09
Wrong… The Bakersfield Californian editorial quoted was not an editorial at all, it was rather a column by a high-speed rail booster. Our report on the California High Speed Rail system showed that the costs used by the agency for highways and airports give new meaning to the definition of “trumped up.”
See http://www.reason.org/files/1b544eba6f1d5f9e8012a8c36676ea7e.pdf
Wendell Cox
Principal, Demographia
7. Tina Andolina | 07.08.09
I’m with the Planning and Conservation League and we support High Speed Rail. However, folk like to think opposition to high-speed rail only comes from NIMBYs. That is not true here. When one looks closely at how the Rail Authority has chosen where to put the lines, they quickly see that politics played a bigger role than engineering. Those folks who want to save their communities (and wouldn’t we all) know there are better, cheaper, more environmentally and community friendly alternatives. The only problem is the fact that the Authority would rather push the project forward faster instead of doing a complete study. This is evidenced by the fact that the State Legislature has to require the Authority to do a complete review of the Bay Area segment. If the Authority continues to disregard public concerns and continues to shine-on our review processes, the train will be stopped in its tracks and we’ll all lose.
8. Daniel Krause | 07.09.09
It is really such a tragedgy that the Planning and Conservation League (PCL) is working hard to kill high speed rail in California because they are unhappy with one segement of the route decided upon for the California project. Whether you agree or disagree what the ideal route should be, the decision was made. Now, PCL is trying to kill a project that if built, will help lead this country into a rail boom. If it gets tied up in the petty politics of people who can see the greater good, even if the project is not perfect, then America will suffer yet another 20 year delay in getting to the task of constructing a sustainable transporation system. PCL’s position reminds me of environmentalists who are “no-growth” and prevent denser development because they want to preserve there little slice of environment, while helping to accelerate suburban sprawl.
Think big, and don’t make the perfect the enemy of the common good. Reject short-sided environmental politics that will greatly harm progress towards helping the environment.
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1. California Affordable Homes | 07.07.09
Persons who own their own homes have many advantages, as the tenant. Many studies have shown that owners are more interested in their communities, wealth creation and training. The owners are also less likely to be crime or placing on the public support. Only stability, life in a place, and pride of ownership of a house.