California Hi-Speed Rail Appears to be DOA

[George Harris]

It would be different if it were actually going to be high speed, like what voters approved. But the unions will say "Well, we can't stop now". Flying will still be faster.

Huh?? Don't see how what you are saying has anything to do with what is happening.

What is being funded is the middle section between the end points, which is an obvious place to start, and it does connect two significant cities that are on the route. Look up some of the real information that is available.

 

[saxman]

It would be different if it were actually going to be high speed, like what voters approved. But the unions will say "Well, we can't stop now". Flying will still be faster.

It's still going to be over 200 mph. Not sure how you got the idea it won't be.

 

[roomette]

These guys will tell you.

 

[Eric S]

These guys will tell you.

Putting aside whether talk-radio show hosts are experts on HSR, and CA HSR in particular, they questioned funding and ridership, not speeds/travel times.

 

[leemell]

These guys will tell you.

Wow, what a mish-mash of misinformation and real facts put together to fit their dislike of CA HSR. I won't even attempt a rebuttal of this mess.

 

[Shawn Ryu]

But the fact of the matter is the money being spent on HSR is during when school,s are underfunded and prisoners are getting early release because CA cant afford to lock them up any longer.

Am i the only one who sees the problem here? That fed money needs to be spent getting CA in to a better shape financially.

 

[Trogdor]

Schools have been underfunded for decades, and nobody seemed to care before.

I highly doubt that axing HSR would suddenly see billions being made available for schools or other needed public services.

 

[John Bredin]

But the fact of the matter is the money being spent on HSR is during when school,s are underfunded and prisoners are getting early release because CA cant afford to lock them up any longer.

Am i the only one who sees the problem here? That fed money needs to be spent getting CA in to a better shape financially.

(1) That's not what the Feds were giving out the money for. Gov-elect Walker in Wisconsin wanted to take the $800 million in HSIPR funds and spend them on highways instead. US-DOT said no, you got the money for rail, and that's where it'll be spent. An opera fan who donated a couple of million dollars towards an opera house likely wouldn't be amused if a ballpark was built with his money instead, either. :giggle:

(2) Speaking of highways, do you (A) want California to, or (B) think California would, stop taking several hundreds of millions of dollars annually in Federal transportation funds for highway, airport, and transit improvements until the state is in "better shape financially"?

 

[Shawn Ryu]

Thats what Feds should be giving money for though.

I dont think anyone can disagree that giving kids education and locking up criminals are more important than HSR.

 

[John Bredin]

Thats what Feds should be giving money for though.
I dont think anyone can disagree that giving kids education and locking up criminals are more important than HSR.

"Should" depends on who you ask. Personally, I would have liked the stimulus (remember, that's where the HSIPR funds came from) to include more general aid to the states so that we didn't have the bizarre situation of state and local governments hiring people (directly and through contractors) for stimulus-funded projects while simultaneously laying off other people because general revenue was short due to the recession. But some in Congress were already squawking about the "moral hazards" of "bailing out" "profligate" states and local governments as the bill actually was, so it's highly debatable that a stimulus bill composed that way would have passed Congress.

As to what's "more important", you still haven't answered whether highways are also more important than education or prisons, and whether you think it would also be a good idea for California to also spend no more money on roads, airports, ports, or transit until the state is in that nebulous and highly-debatable state of being in "better shape financially"??

Because that's not going to happen, for the same reason that government at various level spends on parks, museums, and zoos while society still has homeless people. By your logic, no city should ever spend a cent of tax money on mere recreation so long as there are poor people without shelter, or adequate food, or basic health care living within the city limits.

 

[leemell]

But the fact of the matter is the money being spent on HSR is during when school,s are underfunded and prisoners are getting early release because CA cant afford to lock them up any longer.

Am i the only one who sees the problem here? That fed money needs to be spent getting CA in to a better shape financially.

That is the way long term projects work and every time infrastructure and long term projects are proposed the cry is always we can't afford this now. There never is a right time and you can see this if you check on all the very large projects in the past. At the height of the depression, FDR got a large number of infrastructure projects underway and completed. There wasn't a "worse" time financially speaking.

 

[saxman]

Thats what Feds should be giving money for though.

I dont think anyone can disagree that giving kids education and locking up criminals are more important than HSR.

Schools will always need new band uniforms and computers and smaller classrooms. Roads will always have potholes and need new stripes. So waiting for that magical time when everything is perfect before building a new project is just living in fantasy land. And when you consider the number of direct and indirect jobs this project can create, schools and roads will also get better automatically, because that's how building infrastructure works. It creates economies and makes the world go round. They are intertwined.

 

[George Harris]

But the fact of the matter is the money being spent on HSR is during when school,s are underfunded and prisoners are getting early release because CA cant afford to lock them up any longer.
Am i the only one who sees the problem here? That fed money needs to be spent getting CA in to a better shape financially.

This argument is always brought out whenever someone does nto like a project. Somehow though, it seems to be forgotten when the proposal is for something the person likes.

Outstanding example was the proposed $1.00 a pack cigarette tax in California. The revenue was to be 100% designated for health care and cancer research. The estimated revenue something on the order of $700 million. The thrust of the oppositions advertizements was that it was a tax increase that would send money out of state and increase bureacracy. The underfunded schools and othere such was also raised. The opposition outsent the proponents by over 10 to 1. The measure was just barely defeated. Yet, the opposition's advertizements were essentially dishonest. First off, it was not a tax that you were stuck with, like a sales tax, property tax, income tax, etc. If you did not smoke, it did not affect you at all. If it hurt the schools, it would only be because a smoker thought his tobacco habit more important than his children. If the smoker had no children, it had no effect on the schools at all.

There are plenty of other things that much more the poster children of wastefulness in California. The west side of the Bay Bridge comes immediately to mind. It is being built more as a monument than to improve transportation. In fact, it does not add one single lane beyond that already there. The steel came from China. The cost of all this is somewhere well above a billion.

If the money spent on this structure, which seems to more for the purpose of stroking some politicians egos than anything else, was to have been spent on schools, prisons, whatever, and whatever it would have taken, probably only one or two percent spent of dealing with deficiencies in the existing bridge, that sounds good, but then again, how mcuh of this came from designated transportation funding, (which could almost certainly have been better spent elsewhere) so it was not really available for the school, prison, etc needs.

 

[johnny.menhennet]

I believe the EAST side of the Bay Bridge was closer to 6 billion. And in all honesty, affing more lanes than are currently there would not be a good idea, and would increase traffic. Because there are no plans to redo the west side or the tunnel through Yerba Buena Island. So having like 8 lanes suddenly go down to 6 would require a lot of merging that really slows things down. It's better if you get the traffic and merging over before the bridge and then have the bridge be full but not so slow.

 

[tp49]

Thats what Feds should be giving money for though.

I dont think anyone can disagree that giving kids education and locking up criminals are more important than HSR.

However, your analysis shows a rudimentary knowledge of California's budgeting practices and the structural issues it entails. Currently 50% of California's general fund goes to K-12 education (Prop 98). Thus any California general fund agency outside of the Department of Education is getting their budget from the remaining 50% of the general fund. The state needs to make difficult decisions when it comes to budgeting and allocating it's resources. In reality the Department of Education should not be getting that big a percentage of the general fund and school districts need to better spend the resources they do get.

CDCR is another story entirely...

HSR is not being funded from the general fund at all. All of the money is coming from bonds which the voters passed back in 2008 and from federal matching funds. HSR is a part of infrastructure which in this state also needs serious repair including roads and bridges, etc. As a California resident I welcome HSR.

 

[johnny.menhennet]

Thats what Feds should be giving money for though.

I dont think anyone can disagree that giving kids education and locking up criminals are more important than HSR.

However, your analysis shows a rudimentary knowledge of California's budgeting practices and the structural issues it entails. Currently 50% of California's general fund goes to K-12 education (Prop 98). Thus any California general fund agency outside of the Department of Education is getting their budget from the remaining 50% of the general fund. The state needs to make difficult decisions when it comes to budgeting and allocating it's resources. In reality the Department of Education should not be getting that big a percentage of the general fund and school districts need to better spend the resources they do get.

CDCR is another story entirely...

HSR is not being funded from the general fund at all. All of the money is coming from bonds which the voters passed back in 2008 and from federal matching funds. HSR is a part of infrastructure which in this state also needs serious repair including roads and bridges, etc. As a California resident I welcome HSR.

You do not live here and experience it first hand, but I can assure you that California and its districts are doing an incredible amount of good for what they are provided. We've had 5 straight years of huge budget cuts to our schools, to the point where after 4 years of first taking off busing then taking off janitors then taking off office staff then cutting art and music then making the class sizes larger, there is nothing left to cut. The San Diego Unified School District issued more than 1,000 pink slips this year to teachers. Most were eventually rescinded, but that is not the case. My high school district is so cash-strapped. My Health and PE class had 67 students. Does that not sound wrong? My geometry honors had 41 in a tiny little trailer. My elementary school district in Solana Beach, as well as the one in Rancho Santa Fe and the one serving Del Mar and Carmel Valley, are the only 3 in San Diego County and only a few in the state that actually receive no state funding. We live in a wealthy-enough area that the property taxes fully support the schools. So the state general fund already pays the Solana Beach district nothing, yet they now have a campaign to divert much of our property tax revenue to the general fund. They are taking away money we don't have. A worker at my dad's office has a girlfriend who is the principal at a charter middle school in Golden Hill, a troubled neighborhood just east of downtown. Being a charter, they are given grants that pay for things rather than a steady stream of funding. They are just now being allowed to cash some checks for things promised in 2004 and implemented in 2007. So the state is 8 years behind in payment. There was recently a report out that if California were to pay all debts right now it currently owes or has promised, whether through pensions or whatnot, that it would cost a one-time fee of 200 something billion dollars. With mandated transitional kindergarten for elementary schools starting to take effect this year, there is no money. The state has told us to provide more services, but with continually declining money. The situation is not good, nor is it anywhere in California. So living in China as your profile says you do, please do not bag on the California schools for doing enough. The districts are providing an incredible amount of education for what they are given, and I'd like more first-hand knowledge than something you pull out of your ass when you don't know what you're talking about. In a state with almost 38.5 million people, you have to spend on education. The main thing killing us is our state prison system. And yet Jerry Brown continues to cut another 1 billion this year from the 10 UC's and 1 billion from the 23 CSU's in the state university system. 100 million from every single individual school. This is after 1 billion in cuts to both the years before as well. The systems simply cannot take more cuts. Think about this. Please.

If you say you are a California resident, update your profile so I might be less critical of your lazy answer.

 

[tp49]

Thats what Feds should be giving money for though.

I dont think anyone can disagree that giving kids education and locking up criminals are more important than HSR.

However, your analysis shows a rudimentary knowledge of California's budgeting practices and the structural issues it entails. Currently 50% of California's general fund goes to K-12 education (Prop 98). Thus any California general fund agency outside of the Department of Education is getting their budget from the remaining 50% of the general fund. The state needs to make difficult decisions when it comes to budgeting and allocating it's resources. In reality the Department of Education should not be getting that big a percentage of the general fund and school districts need to better spend the resources they do get.

CDCR is another story entirely...

HSR is not being funded from the general fund at all. All of the money is coming from bonds which the voters passed back in 2008 and from federal matching funds. HSR is a part of infrastructure which in this state also needs serious repair including roads and bridges, etc. As a California resident I welcome HSR.

You do not live here and experience it first hand, but I can assure you that California and its districts are doing an incredible amount of good for what they are provided. We've had 5 straight years of huge budget cuts to our schools, to the point where after 4 years of first taking off busing then taking off janitors then taking off office staff then cutting art and music then making the class sizes larger, there is nothing left to cut. The San Diego Unified School District issued more than 1,000 pink slips this year to teachers. Most were eventually rescinded, but that is not the case. My high school district is so cash-strapped. My Health and PE class had 67 students. Does that not sound wrong? My geometry honors had 41 in a tiny little trailer. My elementary school district in Solana Beach, as well as the one in Rancho Santa Fe and the one serving Del Mar and Carmel Valley, are the only 3 in San Diego County and only a few in the state that actually receive no state funding. We live in a wealthy-enough area that the property taxes fully support the schools. So the state general fund already pays the Solana Beach district nothing, yet they now have a campaign to divert much of our property tax revenue to the general fund. They are taking away money we don't have. A worker at my dad's office has a girlfriend who is the principal at a charter middle school in Golden Hill, a troubled neighborhood just east of downtown. Being a charter, they are given grants that pay for things rather than a steady stream of funding. They are just now being allowed to cash some checks for things promised in 2004 and implemented in 2007. So the state is 8 years behind in payment. There was recently a report out that if California were to pay all debts right now it currently owes or has promised, whether through pensions or whatnot, that it would cost a one-time fee of 200 something billion dollars. With mandated transitional kindergarten for elementary schools starting to take effect this year, there is no money. The state has told us to provide more services, but with continually declining money. The situation is not good, nor is it anywhere in California. So living in China as your profile says you do, please do not bag on the California schools for doing enough. The districts are providing an incredible amount of education for what they are given, and I'd like more first-hand knowledge than something you pull out of your ass when you don't know what you're talking about. In a state with almost 38.5 million people, you have to spend on education. The main thing killing us is our state prison system. And yet Jerry Brown continues to cut another 1 billion this year from the 10 UC's and 1 billion from the 23 CSU's in the state university system. 100 million from every single individual school. This is after 1 billion in cuts to both the years before as well. The systems simply cannot take more cuts. Think about this. Please.

If you say you are a California resident, update your profile so I might be less critical of your lazy answer.

Au contraire Johnny...I don't have to update my profile to please you. I like how it is just fine because I did at one time live in China. I can also guarantee you that in my line of work I deal with the decision makers in this state on a very regular basis. And yes, I am a California resident and taxpayer.

The state has massive structural budget issues. This is not conjecture or anything new it's been known for a long time. Two keys in the structural problems are Prop 13 and Prop 98. Another part of the problem is that the initiative and referendum process can, and is used to circumvent the legislature and set up the unfunded mandates that are so popular here. Those unfunded mandates also come from the general fund. There is a big problem when 50% of the general fund (the prop 98 mandate) goes into one area which is the major flaw of the Prop 98 funding formula. A proposition that was pushed in large part by CTA. I am not suggesting that education not be funded but I am suggesting that the proportion of the general fund used be reconsidered and that school districts need to better manage themselves.

Also, the pink slips to teachers has been happening in every school district statewide for the past few years and in the end the large majority get hired back with relatively few layoffs. Additionally the depth of the UC/CSU cuts are dependent upon the passage of the tax initiative in November. I also don't have a problem with having the users of services pay more for those services. I and many others went through tuition hikes when I attended higher education of which I earned one of my degrees at a UC school where I paid out of state tuition.

I don't agree with a lot that Brown's done but I do agree that tough decisions need to be made especially when it comes to budget cuts. Fact of the matter is the state is broke and in case you weren't aware some of Brown's cuts will do severe harm to the economy of the city I reside in through furloughs of state workers. Then again Arnold damn near crippled the economy of this city when he instituted the three day a month furloughs a couple years back. Furloughs that saved the state next to nothing in the end. The pain is being felt at all levels as the branch that covers part of my line of work is taking a $500 million cut in this budget.

In not wanting to write a treatise I am coming close to tl/dr territory. My point is this infrastructure is just as important to California as education or prisons or other things. The sources of funding for CalHSR do not come from the general fund but from voter approved bonds and federal matching funds earmarked for this purpose. The money used for this can't be used for another purpose and some areas that have been hard hit by unemployment here in the Central Valley may even see some construction jobs as an end result.

 

[Ben]

Could lawsuits coming from Kings County, the Bay Area, Palmdale, etc. still derail the project?

 

[afigg]

Could lawsuits coming from Kings County, the Bay Area, Palmdale, etc. still derail the project?

Yes, they could certainly the project and start of construction. Delay it long enough and the federal stimulus funds expire.

There are many hurdles still ahead for the CA HSR project. The CA legislature approval to proceed with the first segments was indeed a major step forward. But CA HSR system will need continued full support from the CA Governor, leaders of the state legislature for, I'm guessing, the next 6-8 years to get to the point of enough of the system built and the remainder to final design that the project would be very difficult to kill. Although delays or dragging the project out for so many years that it remains incomplete is a possibility until the first test train is ready to run from LA to SF.

 

[George Harris]

If any part of it ever gets built and in use, the concept will sell itself from there, at least to most people. A look at what has happened elsewhere would make that obvious. Taiwan being an outstanding example.

However, there will still be, and for that matter always will be opposition from those that are living examples of "None is so blind as he who will not see."

 

[leemell]

If any part of it ever gets built and in use, the concept will sell itself from there, at least to most people. A look at what has happened elsewhere would make that obvious. Taiwan being an outstanding example.

However, there will still be, and for that matter always will be opposition from those that are living examples of "None is so blind as he who will not see."

Yah, just ask any truckers using the interstate highway system.

 

[Anderson]

Honestly, CA has a lot of structural problems that still haven't been dealt with. The majority approval for a budget is part of the solution, but I'm fairly certain that won't be enough.

If nothing else, I think a fair change would probably to be to require that any "spending initiative" also include a bundled "tax initiative" that is projected to cover the cost of the plan (or to cover X% of it). Still, I remember talking with a friend out there...and if there's a bad double dip out there, the state may seriously need to look at some sort of constitutional reorganization under bankruptcy.

 

[Hotblack Desiato]

My high school district is so cash-strapped. My Health and PE class had 67 students. Does that not sound wrong?

That does not sound wrong. Think about it. You could have a baseball game with two complete 25-player rosters, plus a manager, batting coach, pitching coach, two base coaches and a bullpen coach, plus four umpires and a PA announcer.

Think how neat that would be!

 

[jis]

Honestly, CA has a lot of structural problems that still haven't been dealt with. The majority approval for a budget is part of the solution, but I'm fairly certain that won't be enough.

If nothing else, I think a fair change would probably to be to require that any "spending initiative" also include a bundled "tax initiative" that is projected to cover the cost of the plan (or to cover X% of it). Still, I remember talking with a friend out there...and if there's a bad double dip out there, the state may seriously need to look at some sort of constitutional reorganization under bankruptcy.

Hey! When New York City built its IND system it was eyeballs deep in structural problems. Nobody talks about those anymore. They continue to have structural [problems and that ain't stopping them from building ESA, SES and 7 Extension, though not at quite the tearing pace at which they built the IND system. New york City of course did one trip through bankruptcy in the meantime.