California High Speed Rail Thread

[craigs]

• Video Link

[LAsam]

^Those videos do a good job highlighting how ambitious this project is and how much new infrastructure is required. Not to mention the fact that this is the easy portion they are currently constructing!

[Roy_Batty]

I have been trying to research in previous posts and other websites how is this project funded and how much time is it going to take to have all the money to complete Phase 1. As of now, I understand the total cost is estimated to be around 100 billion USD. I appreciate your feedback:

- It seems the only funding secured by the project is a combination of 10 billion USD bonds approved in 2008 by Proposition 1A + 3.5 billion of federal funds received by the federal government during the Obama administration in 2009/2010 (ARRA and HUV) + 25% of annual Cap-and-Trade taxes obtained by the California government from 2014 to 2030 (500 million USD annual average from 2014 to 2020). This totals something around 20 billion USD depending how does Cap-and-Trade average varies during this decade. Am I missing something?

- I just recently read the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act approved in November 2021 by the federal government allocates 66 billion USD to train infrastructure; 22 billion USD for Amtrak and 36 million USD for “competitive grants”. However, it seems the project is seeking to get only 1.3 billion USD from federal funding which I understand comes from this. Is this true? 1.3 billion from 36 billion USD seems too low for such an important project.

[jmecklenborg]

Originally Posted by Roy_Batty

I have been trying to research in previous posts and other websites how is this project funded and how much time is it going to take to have all the money to complete Phase 1. As of now, I understand the total cost is estimated to be around 100 billion USD. I appreciate your feedback:

- It seems the only funding secured by the project is a combination of 10 billion USD bonds approved in 2008 by Proposition 1A + 3.5 billion of federal funds received by the federal government during the Obama administration in 2009/2010 (ARRA and HUV) + 25% of annual Cap-and-Trade taxes obtained by the California government from 2014 to 2030 (500 million USD annual average from 2014 to 2020). This totals something around 20 billion USD depending how does Cap-and-Trade average varies during this decade. Am I missing something?

- I just recently read the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act approved in November 2021 by the federal government allocates 66 billion USD to train infrastructure; 22 billion USD for Amtrak and 36 million USD for “competitive grants”. However, it seems the project is seeking to get only 1.3 billion USD from federal funding which I understand comes from this. Is this true? 1.3 billion from 36 billion USD seems too low for such an important project.

^Yes, you are generally correct, from what I understand. Only a tiny fraction of what is needed to build the full system has been allocated or spent.

[Roy_Batty]

If this project only gets 1.3 billion from the infrastructure bill, I will be very disappointed. I do understand the bill intent is to fund many projects, but not so long ago there were talks about canceling this project and the federal government (under the Trump administration) even tried to pull out some of the agreed funding. CHSR represents the future of passenger rail transportation in USA, if it “succeeds” (that is the project gets operational in its full route) it will be followed by more of these initiatives, if it fails there will be a huge disinvestment for any such project in the next 50 years. This project should receive more money from the trillion of dollars that have been approved during this administration.

https://hsr.ca.gov/2022/05/24/news-relea...ard-of-new-federal-infrastructure-funds/

[markb1]

On the last slide of the Construction Update from the Nov 17 board meeting (https://hsr.ca.gov/wp-content/uploads/20...Agenda-Item2-111022-FINAL-DRAFT-A11Y.pdf), there's a list of grant applications. There are two lines for future applications with unspecified amounts, and the last line is "Multi‐year Target / Various Future Programs", with a value of $8B.

[jmecklenborg]

There was no money for HSR when the state was posting its gigantic surpluses - surpluses so gigantic (almost $100 billion last year) that Newsom sent everyone a gas card. Now there's going to be no money with the state facing a shortfall:

https://www.wsj.com/articles/california-...s-11668958109?mod=hp_opin_pos_3#cxrecs_s

The WSJ takes a victory lap - which is to be expected:

As usual, Democrats spent like this would never end.

Not really - most of the surplus went to shoring up the state pension fund. Not a single dollar of the epic surpluses went to California High Speed Rail.

[markb1]

Originally Posted by jmecklenborg

There was no money for HSR when the state was posting its gigantic surpluses - surpluses so gigantic (almost $100 billion last year) that Newsom sent everyone a gas card. Now there's going to be no money with the state facing a shortfall:

https://www.wsj.com/articles/california-...s-11668958109?mod=hp_opin_pos_3#cxrecs_s

The WSJ takes a victory lap - which is to be expected:

As usual, Democrats spent like this would never end.

Not really - most of the surplus went to shoring up the state pension fund. Not a single dollar of the epic surpluses went to California High Speed Rail.

To be fair, the surplus did allow for a deal to be made that released the second half the 2008 bond money.

Half of the surplus actually went to education, since that is required by law. $38B went to reserves, including $23B for the rainy-day fund.

[craigs]

California law requires the state to refund taxpayers when there is a surplus beyond a certain limit.

[Busy Bee]

Travel Woes Reignite Debate on CHSR

That Steve Glazer sure is, let's call it... misguided.

[jmecklenborg]

Originally Posted by Busy Bee

Travel Woes Reignite Debate on CHSR

When Southwest buckled under pressure this past week, I had the thought that if the same had happened to Amtrak or mass transit, we would have heard accusations that the mode itself is the problem. You don't hear that airplanes are inherently bad when people miss seeing their families (or worse - get stuck with them!) due to weather, staffing, and computer problems.

[38 Geary]

Def could’ve used the HSR during this Southwest fiasco. I’m sure a lot of people would’ve booked tickets rather than rented cars. In some cases there weren’t any car rentals left either so they were just stranded. And the other airlines took advantage and price gouged. Hopefully there would be systems in place in the future that would prevent CAHSR from price gouging as well in such a situation.

[jmecklenborg]

https://www.nbcnews.com/science/environm...ared-california-bringing-havoc-rcna75942

[Busy Bee]

Wow.

Im sure engineers are evaluating whether this level of soil saturation affect the settling of the piers.

Also this thread shouldnt go three months withoit a post. Pretty pathetic.

[MAC123]

There's plenty of news about it, especially in 3 months. Dunno why no one posts it here.

But as for the rain, that's exactly why the entire line is on those raised berms you see all over the place (and the aqueducts, etc) among other reasons

[JDRCRASH]

I was wondering about how the project would be affected by the rains, given that the segment most furthest along just so happens to run smack dab over part of the old Tulare Lake area.

With all the cost overruns and longer timetable for completion I would hope the authority had scenarios like this in mind when they were handing out contracts.

[AndrewK]

It doesn’t help that there have been no major updates to the Build HSR website in a year.

[Busy Bee]

I've been saying this for years. CHSRA loves to toute the economic benefit of _______ thousand jobs created by building the central valley IOS but bizarrely neglects the PR media campaign by having subpar and infrequent project updates, and for lack of a better word "selling" of the project, which does them no favors with the politics of this megaproject. I don't understand what they're thinking. And maybe its more for nerds and super advocates but their Flickr photostream has been dormant for two years. That's like one person that could make sure thats kept current along with performing their other media relations tasks. Its just weird and broadcasts an instability about the whole endeavor.

[38 Geary]

I don't think there's any Central Valley forumers here either that can drive by and take photos to provide updates.

[Busy Bee]

YouTuber "Drone Zone Flyovers" does some pretty excellent video updates for major structures. Another "The Four Foot" did some epic drone update videos but hasn't posted anything in ages.