Altamont Corridor Planning Begins

As mandated by Proposition 1A, the California High Speed Rail Authority is beginning its process of studying the Altamont Corridor alignment. Have a look at their announcement newsletter for some details.

The project corridor is defined as San José to Stockton, with a possible spur to Modesto:



As you can tell, this is basically an upgrade and electrification of the Altamont Commuter Express - the full newsletter includes drawings of electric ACE trains traveling along a high speed rail corridor with overhead wires. The projection is that Stockton will be anywhere from 55 to 75 minutes from downtown San José once the corridor is completed, with trains operating at 150 mph or greater.

And the explanation given on the newsletter of the project's scope and goals:

The Altamont Corridor Rail Project will provide a vital link in the regional transit network, connecting our communities like never before. The project will create a dedicated passenger train corridor between Stockton and San Jose, with stops in key cities in between. A spur link to Modesto is also a possibility. The project study area is shown to the right, along with opportunities for strategic intercity rail connectivity. Specific route alignments and station locations will be identified through a community-based planning process. Once developed, alternative scenarios will be evaluated through the preparation of an Environmental Impact Statement/Environmental Impact Report.

The project could allow operation of trains between the Bay Area and points north including Stockton and Sacramento, as well as points south including Modesto and beyond, within the California High-Speed Train system. The project will provide intermodal connections to Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) to serve the Oakland Airport, cities of Oakland and San Francisco, as well as other Bay Area communities. Intermodal connections to BART could be located in the Livermore vicinity, should the Dublin/Pleasanton BART line be extended, as well as in the Fremont/Union City area, meeting either the Fremont line or planned Warm Springs/San Jose extension.

The Altamont Corridor Rail Project could also accommodate a future connection to the Dumbarton rail service in the Fremont/Union City area, as well as connect to the Valley Transportation Authority light rail in Santa Clara County. The project will coordinate with local bus services, providing access to proximate market areas and interfacing with regional bus links where appropriate. Whether for intercity trips, daily commutes, or access to the statewide High-Speed Train system, the Altamont Corridor Rail Project will serve our communities like never before!

My own view is that while faster ACE trains would be nice, this really isn't as high a priority for the state as upgrading the Capitol Corridor, restoring the Coast Daylight service along the Central Coast, and upgrading and speeding up the Pacific Surfliners, to name but a few projects more deserving. The inclusion of the Altamont Corridor in Prop 1A was a sop to Assemblywoman Cathleen Galgiani and interests in San Joaquin and Stanislaus Counties to compensate for the choice of the Pacheco Pass route for the main HSR trains.

I don't have much of a preference about the implementation on the route, though we will predictably hear from residents in Fremont and Pleasanton concerned about the impact on their neighborhoods. And while it'll be nice to throw that in the faces of the people suing because the Altamont alignment was rejected for the main HSR trains, I'm not entirely sure what the Altamont high speed corridor project gets us. It doesn't deserve to be funded ahead of other higher priority corridors. I'm all for improved passenger rail and I wish the CHSRA and its corridor partners well in the development of a sensible plan, but if this never got funded, well, that's an outcome I could live with.

The scoping meeting schedule is below. All meetings are from 3PM to 8PM.

Livermore - Tuesday, Nov. 10
Robert Livermore Community Center
4444 East Avenue

Stockton - Thursday, Nov. 12
San Joaquin Council of Governments
555 E. Weber Avenue

Fremont - Tuesday, Nov. 17
Fremont Teen Center
39770 Paseo Padre Parkway

San José - Wednesday, Nov. 18
Le Petit Trianon Theatre
72 North Fifth Street

Should CHSRA Be Abolished - Or Improved?

by Robert Cruickshank

Leaving no doubt as to where he stands on high speed rail (he hateses it!) Palo Alto Vice Mayor Jack Morton, who misrepresented reality to the Senate Budget Subcommittee last week in Sacramento is now demanding that the CHSRA be abolished:

Vice Mayor Jack Morton of Palo Alto caught City Council colleagues by surprise with a suggestion Monday night that perhaps California's High Speed Rail Authority ought to be dissolved.

He said the $40 billion rail project could be turned over to some other entity with staff that has experience handling large planning/construction projects -- possibly including even Caltrain.

Morton made the suggestion Monday night when he was reporting to the council and public on a trip he, Councilman Pat Burt, Deputy City Manager Steve Emslie and citizens and officials from other Peninsula communities made to Sacramento last Thursday to convey a key message: Don't allow the rail authority to override local concerns.

Morton said authority staff members at the subcommittee hearing revealed a general lack of experience in putting together a large-scale project, and there was a feeling that the planned $40 billion rail project needs a staff highly experienced with large-scale projects.

Unfortunately, as I have reported here before, Senator Joe Simitian seems to have fallen hook, line and sinker for this nonsense, agreeing to delay the CHSRA's $130 million bond money request.

Let me ask everyone this - if you believe an agency needs to "staff up" with people who have experience implementing a big project, why would you deny them the funding they need to accomplish this? It's like telling someone to repair their roof and then garnishing their wages.

Jack Morton and his fellow HSR deniers are hoping that if they kill the CHSRA, then they might be able to either destroy the project outright by neutering it along Sen. Alan Lowenthal's preferred lines (taking the money away from an SF-LA train and instead building glorified commuter rail) - or put it in the hands of a more pliable agency.

The CHSRA's strength is in its independence. It is an agency charged with the task of building a high speed train to connect SF to LA. Putting that power under a single agency is a smart move as it allows the agency to focus solely on building the train. Staff aren't being pulled away to look after the Pacific Surfliners as they might under a Department of Rail, or focus on a roads project as they might under Caltrans.

Further, "governance reform" has often been used as a trojan horse by those who want to kill a passenger rail project - as our friends up in Seattle discovered. Using claims that the Sound Transit agency was somehow flawed or in need of reform, various state legislators floated proposals that would have gutted the agency's ability to implement the light rail project voters had repeatedly supported. Sound Transit's supporters were able to fend off governance reform, although various forms of it still crop up from time to time.

That all being said, this blog's focus is, has always been, and will always be to support the best implementation of the SF-LA high speed rail plan. We want it built, but we want it built right. If there are legitimate ways to improve the CHSRA to help build HSR, we're more than open to it. What we rightly and strongly reject are calls for "reform" by known HSR opponents.

Which takes us to the state legislature, which already has several bills floating around that would impact the work of the CHSRA and the HSR project itself. Some of them are worth supporting, others are not. They include:

SB 455 (Lowenthal): Despite its author, this one actually looks workable. It would provide the CHSRA with more eminent domain power, which it needs to quickly, affordably, and efficiently build the system. It also provides for Senate confirmation of CHSRA board members, which might politicize the agency's work but is something I could probably live with. The bill would also mandate the creation of a project schedule, which I'm all for.

AB 289 (Galgiani): This would make clear that existing CEQA exemptions for building grade separations for existing tracks would be extended to the CHSRA as well. I am all for this, as it could prove an invaluable asset to ensure that the project gets underway in a timely fashion.

In fact, I believe we should go further and exempt the entire CHSRA project from CEQA entirely. Instead we should set up an alternative method to evaluate the project's environmental benefits, one that includes carbon emissions, impact on pollutants, impact on traffic and sprawl, and renewable energy and gasoline savings, while making absolutely clear that non-environmental issues, like aesthetics and "community values" are excluded from the evaluation process. NIMBYs have found ways to abuse the CEQA process, and a project like HSR is too important to allow to be held up like that.

Two other bills are less welcome:

SB 783 (Ashburn): Would mandate yet another business plan, this time by September 1, 2009. I do not believe this bill is being offered in good faith, since Senator Ashburn surely knows that September 1 is not enough time for an agency whose funds are once again the subject of political wrangling to produce this plan. This bill should be rejected out of hand.

SB 409 (Ducheny): This is the 2009 version of Senator Denise Moreno Ducheny's Department of Railroads bill. It would transfer the CHSRA to the new DOR as a specific division within that department, and move all other passenger rail projects to the DOR as well. I've always said I'm open to this concept, and I'm not going to close the door on it entirely - but it doesn't strike me as a necessary move, and brings with it the risk that passenger rail funding could be ghettoized.

Ultimately the key issue here is that there is no real or strong pro-HSR leadership in Sacramento. And that enables the Peninsula NIMBYs to fill a vacuum. Why aren't Central Valley, or Los Angeles, or San Francisco and San Jose legislators firing back against Palo Alto's effort to dictate terms to the rest of the state? Those regions have an enormous stake in this project and their representatives should not tolerate their colleagues' effort to kill HSR or to give fuel to a small and unrepresentative group of people who are trying to reverse the will of the people and destroy one of this country's cornerstone projects for the 21st century.

And just so we have a sense of perspective, two people have been killed in recent days along the Caltrain tracks. That is what the Peninsula NIMBYs are so determined to defend. Makes me sick.

Labor Day Open Thread

Busy here in SoCal for the weekend, and heading back up to Monterey tomorrow on the Coast Starlight. So this post will have to suffice for Sunday and Monday. I'm sure you all can manage.

• Bart Reed of the Transit Coalition was on LA CityView earlier this week defending the pro side on Prop 1A against Joel Fox, former head of the Howard Jarvis Association and predictable train hater. Click "Roundtable 48" to see the video. Reed made an excellent case for Prop 1A. Definitely worth watching. I'll have more detailed responses to Joel Fox's claims in a post later this week.



• Cathleen Galgiani was the subject of a positive piece in the Stockton Record about her work in getting AB 3034 shepherded through the legislature. This bill was originally going to be carried by Fiona Ma, probably the best HSR advocate we have in Sacramento, but when Ma's legislative calendar got too full she handed it off to Galgiani, whose persistence helped get the bill passed. This blog hasn't been totally supportive of Galgiani's approach to HSR, as we disagreed with her efforts to weaken the LA-SF "spine," but she has become a key HSR figure in the state and deserves to have her fine work recognized.

Anything else you guys want to discuss? Put it in the comments. Enjoy the rest of your holiday weekend, everyone.

The Final AB 3034 Deadline

According to the Secretary of State's office, Sunday August 24 is the real, true, absolute drop-deadline to put AB 3034 on the ballot as Prop 1A. Apparently county election officials are under pressure to move ahead with ballot printing and can't delay much further. It is possible, depending on exactly what the Legislature does over the next few days and how they do it, that we could see two high speed rail propositions - 1 and 1A.

That needs to be avoided. At this point I don't much care whether AB 3034 becomes law or not - it doesn't make any vital changes to the project; the original Prop 1 is a good plan; and the core arguments for HSR aren't affected by the fate of AB 3034. But it would be bad for HSR if there are two measures on the fall ballot - confused voters are No voters.

Of course this is probably all moot, since it's highly unlikely that there will be a state budget agreement by Sunday - and without a budget, Arnold won't sign any bills. The budget impasse is as deep as ever - for more read my overview from Calitics this morning. Republicans have backed themselves into a corner with their "no taxes" pledge, and would risk their own seats at the next primary by breaking it. A government shutdown is a possibility, although some ways off.

Unless something unexpected happens, AB 3034 looks to be dead. And that leads me to wonder whether the push to change Prop 1 had any use, or whether it was a waste of time and effort that should have instead gone to HSR advocacy. This blog started focusing on AB 3034 rather late in the game, even though it was the subject of the first post here, and even when we did discuss it, my view was mostly skeptical and wary. Only when Leland Yee moved to secure the "spine" back in June were my own concerns eased, and from that point on it was mostly a drawn-out legislative battle exhibiting some of the reasons why our state legislature is becoming a failed institution.

AB 3034 wasn't a total waste though - its ups and downs, especially in the last two weeks, did draw some attention from the traditional media to the high speed rail project, mostly favorable coverage. That always has value. As we move into the general election campaign in earnest, we can certainly use as much coverage as we can get. If there's a lesson here it's that California legislators need to pay more attention to high speed rail, take it more seriously, and show some leadership on it. And perhaps the AB 3034 debate helped accomplish that as well.

Looking back over this post it reads like an obituary. But I don't think rumors of its demise are exaggerated, although we won't know for certain until Sunday. Getting the high speed rail bonds are what matter now, no matter what the proposition's number on the fall ballot.

AB 3034 Delayed

***See Updates Below***

So after a weekend of frenzied activism to get Arnold to sign AB 3034...the Assembly adjourned for the day without taking action on the bill:

With a veto threat looming, lawmakers on Monday missed a deadline to replace November's $9.9 billion high-speed rail bond ballot measure with a better version.

Or did they?

Rail supporters believe the clock hasn't run out yet.

"We can still get it on the ballot," said Jo Linda Thompson, a lobbyist for the Association for California High Speed Trains. "We are pursuing it with all the energy we can."...

Lawmakers still have until Saturday to add a measure to the ballot, in this case Prop. 1a. The question is whether they could still remove Prop. 1, which will be included on guides mailed to voters that are scheduled to go to print soon.

The Assembly believes that they *do* have that ability, hence the delay. The Secretary of State's office will likely make the final determination, based on their reading of election law.

If it turns out the deadline to replace Prop 1 has passed, the Assembly should kill AB 3034 and go with Prop 1 as it currently exists, rather than add Prop 1A alongside Prop 1. I'm not exactly enthused about telling voters "No on 1, Yes on 1A!" because it's just not going to work.

Still, it's a shame this uncertainty even exists. AB 3034 was proposed months and months ago; it was the topic of the very first post on this blog way back in March. The Legislature had plenty of time to act on it, but the delay - especially in the Senate, by Republicans such as Roy Ashburn - put its proponents up against the wall. Arnold's temper tantrum doesn't help matters.

AB 3034 isn't necessary to high speed rail, of course. Prop 1 is a very good proposal and we strongly support it no matter what happens to AB 3034. It's another depressing reminder of the lack of urgency in our state on not just HSR, but mass transit and dealing with our dependence on expensive oil. I am confident Prop 1 will pass, but it will pass without very many politicians having shown leadership on HSR. Arnold wanted AB 3034 but prefers to throw a tantrum instead of getting it through the Legislature. Our two US Senators have been missing in action while their Nevada colleague gets $45 million to study a maglev system that'll never get built. Their leadership isn't necessary, but it would help reduce annoying problems like this.

So we'll see what happens to AB 3034. The activism we engaged in over the weekend was valuable, and if anything needs to be ramped up to ensure Arnold does support HSR, whether it's through signing AB 3034 or strongly endorsing and campaigning for Prop 1(A). Look for more activism as the general election draws near.

Finally, Speaker Karen Bass' office put out this video about high speed rail. It has some excellent quotes from Assemblymember Cathleen Galgiani, author of AB 3034, and it's especially gratifying to see her pushing the the cost of doing nothing is not zero frame I have been articulating since May.



UPDATE 1 - the AP reports Speaker Karen Bass called off the vote because of budget negotiations:

A spokesman for Assembly Speaker Karen Bass, D-Los Angeles, said the session was called off because of budget negotiations.

"The speaker is focused exclusively on the budget today," said Bass spokesman Steve Maviglio. ...

The deadline for listing initiatives in the supplemental voter ballot is Aug. 16, but lawmakers have extended that deadline in the past.

"The governor will continue to work with the Legislature to get the improved high-speed rail language on the ballot," Schwarzenegger spokesman Aaron McLear said. "There will be one high-speed rail initiative on the ballot, and the governor will be out campaigning for that."

So that clarifies things somewhat. As I explained over at Calitics this morning, the state budget itself is running up against the same ballot deadline we are - and since the budget solution is likely to include a few ballot measures, Speaker Bass chose to prioritize that over AB 3034 - especially if the legislature can itself extend its own deadline.

The quotes in the article, especially the one from Arnold's press flack, are also encouraging. Arnold seems to understand the issue and the need to ensure there's just one HSR prop. And of course it's very encouraging that Arnold will be campaigning for it - I think his term as governor is a failure, but let's face it, it's better to have him arguing for HSR rather than against it.

UPDATE 2 (Tuesday 12:40 PM): Cathleen Galgiani has announced that she will hold AB 3034 and NOT send it to Arnold for signature until a budget is passed. From a press release she sent me:

"I respect the Governor's desire to finalize the budget and urge my colleagues in the Legislature to work out a compromise immediately so we can all move forward on the important issues facing California," stated Galgiani.

"The Assembly is set to take up AB 3034 today and I expect it to pass with resounding support. AB 3034 is essential to Proposition 1 because it implements fiscal controls to ensure that the state bond funds are utilized in the most cost effective and efficient way. However, once it passes, I intend to hold the bill from Governor Schwarzenegger until the budget is finalized to ensure that Proposition 1 remains as strong as possible. With rising gas prices, congested highways and a rising population, Californians need more transportation options than ever."

If AB 3034 is signed by the Governor and sent to the Secretary of State before Saturday, August 16th, (the last day for new measures to be added to the supplemental ballot on November 4th) Proposition 1A - and not Proposition 1 - would appear on the ballot. Proposition 1A's title and summary, legislative analysis and ballot arguments would be in a supplemental ballot pamphlet, and there would also be language included to alert voters.

The short version: Saturday is the new deadline. I am doubtful there'll be a budget by then. But the sooner this is over the better, because it's time to start rolling out public activism for Prop 1(A).

Fantastic AB 3034 News

The Senate Transportation Committee today approved AB 3034 by an 8-4 vote. But as our friend Erik Nelson reports it included some great amendments, including Sen. Leland Yee's plan to restore the primacy of LA-SF:

The committee, at the urging of Sen. Leland Yee, D-San Francisco, restored language that restricted use of the $9.95 billion in bond proceeds to the "spine" of the 800-mile system, which is now slated to run from Anaheim to Los Angeles to San Jose and San Francisco through the Antelope and San Joaquin valleys.

Cathleen Galgiani was not aware of that change before entering the hearing room, which may cause some problems in reconciling the bills between the Senate and the Assembly. But the Senate's version is superior. LA-SF is necessary to be the spine of the project and the notion of building it in pieces was always a poor approach to the project's politics and efficiency. The original plan was sound: LA-SF first, then the extensions to SD and Sacto as a guaranteed Phase II. Rome wasn't built in a day, neither will HSR.

Nelson also reports that a rule change giving project design work to Caltrans is causing controversy:

One change that caused Republicans to bristle along with representatives of private contractors was one that says the High-Speed Rail Authority "shall utilize" the engineering and project design services of Caltrans, the state's transportation department.

Republicans, of course, are bent on privatizing all aspects of state government, even the good ones, regardless of whether it's actually cost-effective to do so - see a earlier post of mine on Calitics about the matter. Caltrans' record is excellent (the issues with the east span of the Bay Bridge were due to external political meddling), but there are apparently Constitutional questions surrounding this aspect of the amended bill, and the committee has not committed itself to that language.

Other aspects of the Senate Transportation Committee's amended AB 3034:

Among the bill's 33 provisions are limiting bond money from paying more than half of any track or station construction cost so that federal, private or local funds would have to pay for the remainder, and allowing only 10 percent of that money for planning and engineering costs.

The bill also would establish an eight-member independent review committee appointed by state financial and legislative leaders.

Both changes should help address the concerns with financial risk of the system, although the HSR deniers will surely not be appeased. The committee also directed the CHSRA to come up with a revised business plan by October.

Republicans opposed the proposal, unsurprisingly. Although some Republicans like Curt Pringle strongly support HSR others remain opposed to any action that will help the state address its energy and environmental crisis. Senate Republicans want to shackle the state to oil and cars and eliminate alternative transportation. Thankfully Senate Democrats have come around and understood the value of high speed rail and provided some necessary fixes to AB 3034.

We will now work to ensure the bill passes the Senate and that these changes are accepted by the Assembly, so that we can move forward with the Yes on Prop 1 campaign for November. High speed rail's time has come, and the California legislature is showing some welcome if overdue leadership on this.

Close But Not Quite in Modesto

It's HSR editorial season, it seems, and the latest entry comes from the Modesto Bee. It's certainly not the sad joke of an editorial the Contra Costa Times put out, but it still demonstrates many of the common flaws the state media uses to assess the project - particularly an inability to examine the project in context. The Modesto Bee at least opens the editorial mentioning $4.50 gas, but unfortunately they don't consistently apply that all-important point in their commentary. A quick examination follows.

the Senate Transportation Committee conducted hearings on the rail concept in December and January, and recently released a report with six recommendations -- none of which are yet addressed in Galgiani's bill. Perhaps the most important is to require the commission to produce a business plan "consistent with a standard financial prospectus." We also agree with the committee that construction needs to take place on regional segments before the long-distance rail is built.

I've consistently been arguing against using that report as a guide for assessing the HSR project - the report is very deeply flawed, especially in its total failure to assess HSR in the context of permanently high fuel costs and the financial risk that poses to the state. I also have argued against lowering the priority of the long-distance segments unless there are ironclad guarantees that those WILL be built after the regional segments. Without such guarantees there is no point to approving the bond.

Quit low-balling. The cost for this all-new railroad has been set at $33 billion, with $7 billion more needed to add service from Merced to Sacramento and from Anaheim to San Diego. These estimates haven't changed in six years -- and no one believes them. A 2005 World Bank policy study shows that major rail projects usually cost 44 percent more than budgeted.

This is not a useful statement. What did the World Bank study point to as the cause for the increased costs? Rail projects in California such as the Metro Gold Line are being delivered on-time and on-budget. Without an understanding of the mechanisms behind those cost increases it is dishonest to use that study to predict the HSR project will go over budget.

Who will pay? Proponents say the federal government will be an important partner, but Wednesday the House of Representatives approved only $1.75 billion -- $350 million a year over five years -- for all the nation's high-speed rail projects. The rest, say backers, will come from private investors. But large banks and hedge-fund investors are reeling from the mortgage crisis. That leaves taxpayers and riders.

This is deeply misleading - and I'm putting that generously. The House bill was an Amtrak bill. The HSR money was gravy, unexpected and unplanned. It was thanks to the work of Jim Costa, Fiona Ma and Nancy Pelosi that the money is there at all - but it is NOT intended to be the final amount of funding Congress will give HSR. In April we reported that Congress is anticipating $60 billion for HSR in the 2009 transportation bill. Barack Obama is a vocal supporter of HSR and would likely support and help pass such an investment. There is NOTHING to suggest $1.75 billion is all Congress will give to HSR. The Modesto Bee surely knows this, or they should have done their research before publishing that part of the editorial.

As to the banks and large investors, the credit crisis won't help. But neither is it crippling. There is a lot of overseas capital looking for long-term stable investments, and CAHSR would be a natural site for them to park their money. And if they don't then we can and should sink more money into it. Of course the Modesto Bee, like every other media outlet that has pontificated on HSR, has refused to ask what the cost of doing nothing is - it is certainly higher than the cost of building HSR.

Get real about ridership. Proponents say that by 2030, they expect to generate $1 billion in profit based on 100 million riders a year. That means every Californian would have to ride the train three times a year. When asked about the validity of such numbers, a person familiar with the details whispered, "crazy." Another called them "black box" figures.

This is more of the anonymous sourcing and vague reporting that the media is way too often passing off as journalism. Who claimed the numbers were "crazy"? How is the public to assess the validity of such a statement? The Modesto Bee is irresponsible in not sourcing or explaining that claim.

Further, who says HSR will only be used by Californians? We do still get a lot of tourists, many of whom will use the system. Business travelers will use it far more often than three times a year.

But the most important aspect of the ridership question is fuel costs. The Modesto Bee led off the editorial mentioning high gas prices - so why ignore it here? Ridership may not hit exactly 100 million by 2030 - though I am certain that it will, as ALL HSR lines around the world have rapidly hit their ridership expectations - but with permanently high fuel prices and the resulting airline crisis it strains credibility to not expect ridership to be sufficient and high.

Be careful where you dig. The commission has hired Parsons Brinkerhoff to manage the program. Earlier this year, the company was forced to pay $458 million for problems with its "Big Dig" project in Massachusetts, whose final cost ($14.6 billion) doubled original estimates.

I was not under the impression Parsons Brinkerhoff had been given any permanent contracts. We plan to watch this aspect of things quite carefully.

The Modesto Bee concludes "High-speed rail is a good idea that should be pursued." We strongly agree. But we wish the Modesto Bee would take a more informed approach to assessing the project - and stop trafficking in unsourced, unverified, specious claims in order to raise doubts about the project.

Answering the Sac Bee's HSR Questions

Yesterday the Sacramento Bee said "answers are needed before November" on high speed rail. Let's see what we can do, shall we?

But the authority's preferred route for high-speed rail between the Central Valley and the Bay Area has always been the Pacheco Pass. To win over environmentalist opponents who worry that a new rail corridor through sparsely populated Pacheco Pass will induce sprawl, the authority wants to add Altamont as a potential recipient for funding. Thus the Galgiani bill. Because it's closer to Sacramento, Altamont has the added advantage that it would likely bring high-speed rail to the capital city earlier.

The sprawl opponents' main concern was addressed when a station at Los Banos was deleted. I've not encountered any environmentalist or enviro group that believes Altamont would be better from a sprawl perspective. If that belief is out there it's not driving the effort to revisit Altamont - that instead is being done by Central Valley lobbying organizations and of course, Cathleen Galgiani herself, whose district lies along the Altamont corridor.

While the Galgiani bill may improve high-speed rail bonds' chances at the polls, it does not resolve all the issues surrounding it. As Sen. Alan Lowenthal, the chairman of the Senate Transportation and Housing Committee recently observed, the high-speed bond act is not "a conventional public works project" – a dam or road, for example, built with borrowed money to be repaid with taxes or fees on the users or beneficiaries. Voters are being offered a "business proposition" – and a highly speculative one.

Alan Lowenthal is wrong. There is not much difference between a dam, a new freeway, and high speed rail. HSR is a commonplace public works project. It's only "not conventional" if you deny the existence of the rest of the world. Yes, it's new for California, but that does not make it some sort of totally crazy and unpredictable new idea. It's been perfected over the decades into a rather humdrum and normal project.

The High Speed Rail Authority assumes that the $9.95 billion in state bond money when combined with an unknown and uncertain amount of federal and local funding will attract enough private investors to finance the full $33 billion cost of the first phase of the project, between San Francisco, Los Angeles and Anaheim.

The private investment issue is uncertain, that I will grant. But who really believes federal funding is uncertain? Veto-proof majorities just supported $14 billion for Amtrak in the US Congress including some for HSR. Yes, it would be smart of Barbara Boxer, Dianne Feinstein, Nancy Pelosi, or some other California leader in Washington DC would direct some funds to the CA HSR project as a down payment on federal support, but given the broad support for passenger rail in the Congress, and Barack Obama's outspoken support for high speed rail the chances look very good for federal funding.

And as the Sac Bee editorial board surely knows, the feds aren't going to commit funding until California does. Someone has to make the first move here, otherwise we all just stare at each other.

The authority also assumes that high-speed rail operated by a private consortium will generate enough revenue to repay investors, cover annual costs and provide a profit. And, the authority says, high-speed rail won't need operating subsidies from the state.

That assumes operating subsidies are a bad thing. But even if we said they were, HSR lines around the world show operating profits. None require subsidies. SNCF, the French government train operator, is going to pay the government a €131 million dividend. As ridership is soaring on all rail lines in California surely there is cause to believe California HSR will be as successful as lines around the world.

Those are a lot of questionable assumptions. While there are obvious benefits to a modern high-speed rail network, particularly with fuel prices soaring, the Senate Transportation and Housing Committee outlined a number of potential risks and unknowns associated with this project. It raised doubts about the authority's ability to gain access to rights-of-way necessary to build a new rail corridor, especially through parts of Southern California already heavily congested with conventional passenger and freight rail networks. It noted that the financing plan relies on outdated estimates of construction costs.

But as a commenter explained a few days back these concerns are overblown:

It is quite surprising and upsetting that the media and nay-sayers are portraying this right-of-way issue as a deal killer when the CHSRA is already aware of these obstacles and trying to address them.

The CHSRA is not as of yet absolutely counting on using the freight rights of way. They acknowledge that doing so will minimize impacts and probably reduce, but according to the Bay Area to Central Valley EIR/EIS, they are not planning to try to seek agreements until the high-speed rail project has been given a go ahead by the state and the voters.

Doesn't this make sense? Why would we have this state agency make agreements that it can't back up? Hopefully there will be a successful negotiation between UPRR and CHSRA, but if not there is nowhere in the studies that indicated this will irrevocably hamper the project.

Well said. The Bee continues:

In the face of the state's big deficit, Lowenthal asks the key question: "What assurance can the authority provide that California taxpayers will not be stuck with a massive bill in the future if they approve the bond measure on the November ballot?"

It's a question high-speed rail advocates must answer for this measure to have a chance of passage.

Here the SacBee has shown it does not understand this issue at all. The key question is NOT what the financial cost of HSR will be - but instead what is the cost of not building HSR? The Bee's implicit assumption is that either we take a supposed risk on HSR or we save money by not building it.

Nothing could be further from the truth. Not building HSR consigns Californians and their economy to reliance on methods of travel that are undergoing major stress from high fuel prices - prices that are not expected to come down anytime soon, if ever. The SacBee should answer that question: what are they prepared to pay if we do not build HSR? Have they considered that not building HSR might in fact be the more costly and risky option?

Probably not. But then that's why we're here. To ask the questions our state's media won't. And to provide the leadership few else seem interested in providing. California's high speed rail project won't just be a boost for sustainable, affordable transit here, but will open the doors to high speed rail across the country. It's time for Californians to act like leaders again - and not fall prey to obsolete and disproved assumptions phrased in the form of a question.

The Growing Concern over AB 3034

AB 3034, the bill that makes some changes to the November HSR bond, sailed through the Assembly today on a 57-0 60-3 vote. Apparently Mike Villines got the message. The bill heads toward the Senate, where I am told it will be taken up in about two to three weeks.

But there is growing concern among HSR supporters about this bill - specifically, the provision that eliminates the rule that LA-SF had to be built first and replacing it with a nebulous "competitive bidding" process where HSR bond funds will instead go to those portions of the proposed route that can leverage the most funding. Although it's not clear how this might work in practice, it runs a very high risk of leaving us with an HSR system that is built with a missing link in the Central Valley, defeating the main purpose and selling point of the system - that it will connect the state's two largest metro areas, providing an alternative to the collapsing airlines system and the impact of soaring fuel prices.

This blog advocates a clearly planned phase approach, where LA-SF is the first route constructed and opened, but where extensions to SD and Sacramento are guaranteed, not merely promised, as Phase II. This would give Californians the confidence that the system will not only be built as planned, but built to its fullest potential. The ridership projections, and therefore the financial promises, all hinge upon a system that completely connects LA and SF. To compromise that connection, to sever the LA-SF link, is to compromise the entire project.

Unfortunately there is a risk of that happening. For example, this is from today's Fresno Bee:

As envisioned, the rail line would eventually run from San Diego to as far north as Sacramento, with trains reaching top speeds of more than 200 mph. Under the bill, route segments that draw the most financial support from local governments and private and federal sources would get top priority.

The provision could potentially delay some Valley segments -- if nonstate financial support does not materialize. But Mehdi Morshed, executive director of the High Speed Rail Authority, said the Valley remains a top priority because the wide-open region is the only place where trains can reach top speeds.

"We cannot do 220-mile [an hour] service or test the 220-mile-an-hour train .... without building a significant section in the Central Valley," he said.

Galgiani's bill drew support from San Joaquin Valley leaders because it increases the likelihood that a Valley-to-Sacramento route will be included in the first phase.

Since few "local governments" can front the necessary money for this, especially in the Valley, that term seems to me to refer to mass transit agencies, such as Caltrain, VTA, Metrolink, LACMTA, and others.

Nobody can argue that this blog hasn't been aware of this problem - it was in fact the subject of the very first post back in March - but at the same time we missed a chance to amend the bill in the Assembly. We will now need to focus on getting the Senate to fix the bill and ensure that HSR is not built in pieces - and we will also focus on getting some information out of the CHSRA and legislative leaders about their commitment to building true HSR and not glorified commuter rail in a few unconnected parts of the state.

Friday afternoon is a bad time to try and get info out of Sacramento - but it also gives us two wide-open days to organize. Anyone interested in helping put some activism together to help ensure the integrity of the HSR system, send an email to my last name at gmail dot com.

"Air Quality is the Key" to the Central Valley's Future

The Central Valley has long been the forgotten region of California - as Southern California and the Bay Area dominate the state's media and politics, the Central Valley's needs often appear to go unmet. Yet this region is one of the fastest-growing parts of our state, and will make up the bulk of the high speed rail route. The Central Valley needs economic development assistance, major transportation infrastructure development, and a program of smart transit-oriented development to replace the growing reliance on sprawl. And as rail advocate Alan Kandel reminds us, the high speed rail project will help with another core need of that region - cleaning up the notoriously polluted air of the San Joaquin Valley:

Here’s what’s puzzling. With as bad as the air in the Central San Joaquin Valley is alleged or purported to be, there isn’t a single Central Valley based municipality that has even a semblance of passenger rail service above and beyond what’s provided by Amtrak California, except maybe in Stockton and Tracy which are served by the hugely successful Altamont Commuter Express to and from the south Bay Area. To those folks, that must be a godsend.

What’s amazing is, over the years patronage numbers on Amtrak’s “San Joaquin” trains – right up there with their “Pacific Surfliner” and “Capitol Corridor” train counterparts – have soared! These three services are ranked in the top six in the national Amtrak system. These didn’t attain these noteworthy spots by accident either. And, I’ll bet an even greater number of Valley (and state) residents will be traveling via Amtrak in the days, weeks, months and years ahead even, given gas prices going up the way they are. Yet, understanding this and with as much as people embrace and use the passenger train service, why, it seems, the thinking isn’t directed to electrified light- and/or heavy-rail intracity services in Central California boggles the mind.

In fact, a 2006 Fresno Bee article explained that lung problems have soared among residents in recent years, and the San Joaquin Valley Air Pollution Control District estimated that to counter this trend, the region needed to eliminate 400 tons of pollution per day by 2011. High speed rail would help accomplish that task.

High speed rail is going to be a godsend for the Central Valley. It will link Sacramento, Stockton, Modesto, Fresno, Visalia and Bakersfield to the rest of the state, bringing jobs and economic opportunity to its residents. It will make travel much easier for them - and cheaper as well. Most importantly, it will help clean up the region's worsening, polluted air.

Instead Arnold Schwarzenegger and freeway advocates propose to drop $6 billion on modernizing and upgrading Highway 99 between Stockton and Bakersfield. With soaring gas prices - and diesel nearing $5 a gallon - is this the best use of money for upgrading Central Valley transportation?

In contrast to Southern California and Bay Area HSR critics like Martin Engel, the Central Valley is very strongly supportive of the project. Central Valley politicians like Cathleen Galgiani have helped provide leadership at the state level, and Rep. Jim Costa (D-Fresno) has been a strong advocate of HSR, helping create the project when he was in the state legislature and helping build support for it in Congress. Virtually all of the chambers of commerce up and down the Valley support the project, and local governments in towns like Fresno and Visalia are already beginning to plan their downtown developments and transportation strategies around high speed rail.

But it may have been a comment on Alan Kandel's post that said it best:

Being concerned about what you breath is the ultimate quality of life issue, and people who can leave some times do. I left due to the lack of any meaningful effort to address the issue. The Great Valley Center was talking about new towns of 80,000 to 100,000 people on the far western side of the valley and I knew AQI was only going to get worse.

You can defend yourself or at least take some action to limit your exposure to crime, or blight or school quality, or any number of issues in the community, but you can't take a break from breathing the air.

I said it at the time to my classmates in Leadership Fresno and here it is again; air quality is the key to nearly every issue in Fresno and the SJV.

AB 3034

Over at the Facebook group I've been seeing some questions about what exactly AB 3034 is and what it would do for HSR. It's a good question and so I thought I'd provide a brief overview here.

AB 3034 is Assemblywoman Cathleen Galgiani's bill to make some changes to the bond proposal that will go before voters in November. If AB 3034 fails the HSR vote will still take place but will likely lack support from the Sierra Club and Arnold Schwarzenegger, for reasons discussed below. In fact, AB 3034 is designed to win their support, as well as the support of folks along the ACE corridor (which Galgiani represents).

Some of the specific things AB 3034 will do:

• Prevent construction of a station between Gilroy and Merced - i.e. no Los Banos station, appeasing the Sierra Club which did not want to open that region up to further sprawl. Of course, no Los Banos station was ever proposed by the CHSRA. Actually, one was - see comments.



• Makes the HSR bond money and possible federal funds available to any portion of the line, and would eliminate the requirement to build LA-SF first. In the very first post on this blog I was deeply critical of eliminating the LA-SF first requirement, and it is my hope this can be stripped in an amendment. Galgiani's goal here is to appease folks along the Altamont corridor, as well as in Sacramento and San Diego, by holding out the possibility that they might get funded sooner than intended.



• In determining which sections will get funded first, the CHSRA is to "give priority to those segments requiring the smallest amount of bond funds as a percentage of the total construction cost and consider the utility of that segment for other passenger rail services." I still worry about this undermining the connectivity of LA-SF, which is really the reason for building HSR.

I get the sense that this bill is Galgiani's way of giving the Altamont alignment people an opportunity to get funding and service upgrades that they believe they missed out on when the CHSRA chose the Pacheco alignment. I'm all for upgrading the Altamont corridor, and I never much cared which alignment was chosen. But I think it would be an extremely bad idea to help Altamont at the cost of the LA-SF portion, which really does need to be prioritized first in construction of the system.

So is AB 3034 a good idea? That all depends on the politics. If this is the only way we can get the HSR bonds passed this fall, then I might be able to swallow it and fight another day to get LA-SF built first. But if this isn't necessary to get the HSR bonds done, or if we can firmly eliminate the Los Banos station another way (and therefore keep the Sierra Club happy) without risking the core of the system, then AB 3034 may not be such a great idea.

Anaheim-SF by 2014, and more Altamont-Pacheco

Today's Modesto Bee reports on efforts by Asm. Cathleen Galgiani to address the Altamont corridor and generate more support in the Stockton-Modesto region for the fall high speed rail bond vote. It's got a ton of information in it, but before I get to the Altamont vs. Pacheco nitty gritty, there's this rather stunning item:

High-speed rail supporters say eventually they'll run tracks north from Merced to Sacramento, passing through Modesto. That could happen by 2020, assuming the Bay Area-Anaheim line is done by 2014, Galgiani said.

That's a game-changing statement. Most public statements on HSR - my own included - have anticipated 2018 to 2020 as the opening date for the system. Galgiani is instead saying just six years out - 2014 isn't that far away. It's much easier for voters to envision a system that opens in five or six years, instead of ten to twelve years. Assuming this is accurate, it could be the deal-clincher with California voters. We should certainly begin playing it up, if we can get some further confirmation (not that I don't trust you, Asm. Galgiani, I just want to be certain).

Once you're done absorbing that, the bulk of the article focuses on the ongoing fight over Altamont vs. Pacheco. Personally I see this like Obama vs. Hillary - the decision has been made so let's move on to the big fight in November instead of dragging this out any further. Unfortunately not everyone sees it that way:

The $950 million carrot "was in the bond from the start," said David Schonbrunn, president of Transportation Solutions Defense and Education Fund. He said his group will sue to force reconsideration of the Altamont route, which was rejected, he said, because land along the Pacheco alignment is much cheaper.

"This is a real estate deal," Schonbrunn said, "not transportation. We think high-speed rail is the future of California, we think it's crucial and we think they're screwing it up badly."

I'm sorry, but if you consider yourself an environmentalist, or that HSR is the future of California, suing over the alignment runs directly against both goals. It will be immeasurably more difficult to win funds and a public vote for HSR if we have already rejected it - does anyone see Texas and Florida hard at work on an HSR system after they canceled their projects? Didn't think so.

The TRANSDEF arguments on HSR are disingenuous at best. On their site they claim that:

The Pacheco alignment (blue on the map below) would provide no additional public benefits for our region, doing nothing for congested corridors. In controversial (and we suspect corrupt) actions, the Pacheco alignment has nonetheless been recommended by both MTC and the High Speed Rail Authority staff. The only substantial beneficiaries of Pacheco we can see are speculators, who would open up vast areas of undisturbed wetlands habitat for sprawl development (the dark areas in the map below). For these people, public investment in High Speed Rail in the Pacheco Corridor would shower windfall profits on their holdings.

This is bunk. The Pacheco alignment provides service for the Monterey Bay region and provides faster travel times between SF and LA. Moreover, the map on their HSR page falsely implies that an extension to Stockton and Sacramento isn't planned, when instead it will be in the second phase and remains an integral part of the overall proposal.

But the claims of corruption are really too much. I have no reason to defend the CHSRA staff and board but there is no evidence to suggest land speculation. Galgiani's bill will prevent a station from being built at Los Banos, and anyone who bought land around that region expecting an HSR windfall is going to be very disappointed. Of course, as I have argued before, sprawl is an endangered concept thanks to the end of cheap oil. The fears TRANSDEF is trying to stoke here are not supported by any available evidence.

Further, other California environmental groups, like the Sierra Club, appear to have come around and are working constructively with the CHSRA to ensure the best, most environmentally friendly system possible:

Some environmentalists, however, are appeased by the amendment to Galgiani's bill prohibiting stops from Merced to Gilroy, to protect expansive waterfowl habitat. The Sierra Club of California continues to negotiate for resources to help valley agencies plan for transit-oriented development, or growth focused around depots to reduce vehicle trips.

"The role high-speed rail will play will push the valley either toward being more sustainable or less sustainable," Sierra Club advocate Tim Frank said.

Credit where it's due: I was critical of the Sierra Club for not being fully on board, but if their statements in this article are representative, they've made the right choice in working to improve the plan. TRANSDEF should follow suit.

Asm. Galgiani is working instead to improve service along the ACE Altamont corridor to build political support in the Stockton-Modesto region for the fall HSR vote:

Democratic Assemblywoman Cathleen Galgiani is pushing a bill that could win about one-tenth of the bond money, or $950 million, to upgrade Altamont Commuter Express trains taken by some valley workers to the East Bay. Bullet trains could use improved ACE rails to zip from the valley to the Bay Area in a fraction of the time required by cars, Galgiani said....

Galgiani notes that a recent bill amendment "elevates the focus" of Altamont trains. She envisions ACE adding tracks and grade separations, or running rails over or under roads where vehicles now wait for trains to pass.

"Essentially, we're preparing the ACE system so that it could share tracks with high-speed trains," she said.

ACE trains carry about 3,500 riders daily, including about 350 from Stanislaus County, spokesman Thomas Reeves said. Delay complaints because of conflicts with Union Pacific freight trains could be reduced if ACE had money to build more and longer "sidings," or turn-out spurs, used to let other trains pass, he said.

Galgiani's bill is AB 3034, mentioned in yesterday's post and is coauthored by Fiona Ma of San Francisco. AB 3034 deserves our support. CALPIRG has a online tool to lobby the Assembly to pass AB 3034. Look for this site to step up its activism around this bill, which should help get the bonds passed this fall.

And remember: Anaheim-SF by 2014. Wow.

SF Chronicle Kinda, Sorta Gets it on HSR

The San Francisco Chronicle weighs in today on the HSR proposal with an editorial that makes some very good points as well as some real headscratchers. Given how important this project is to San Francisco, the Chronicle's support is welcome, but it would be nice if they showed a better grasp of the project.

Legislators were waiting for the perfect storm of budget solvency and economic growth, thinking that this might help the bond pass. Apparently they've realized that California's budget woes aren't going to get better before gas prices and global warming get worse: The bond measure should finally be on the ballot this November.

It's good that the Chronicle agrees the bond measure should be on the ballot, but let's be clear why it wasn't on the ballot in 2004 or 2006 - Arnold Schwarzenegger didn't want it there, as it would have competed with his other bond priorities. If the governor had shown better leadership perhaps HSR bonds could have been enfolded within the 2006 infrastructure bonds - few seem to have batted an eye at $42 billion in bonds then, so what's another $10 billion going to hurt?

Our skepticism about the rail measure remains. It's going to be an extraordinarily expensive project, with costs projected to be at least $40 billion. If it's not done right, it could be both environmentally degrading (it will pass through ecologically sensitive areas) and financially crippling (cost overruns seem inevitable) for the state of California. There have been successful examples of government-run high-speed rail projects (France), but there have been unsuccessful examples too (Japan).

Unfortunately the Chronicle editorial doesn't note the far larger expense of doing nothing. $80 billion in airport and freeway expansion to handle the expected demand isn't exactly a better use of money than a $10 billion bond. The environmental damage from HSR construction is likely overstated (especially if the ROW hews close to Highway 152 in the Los Banos region, by far the most tricky part of the line). And while the Japanese Shinkansen system has gone through some reorganizations, it has been successfully operating HSR for over 40 years. Moreover, there are MANY more government-run HSR success stories - Spain, Germany, and Taiwan all have extremely successful government-run systems.

The high stakes probably account for a great deal of the legislators' hesitation: No one wants to be responsible for a boondoggle. Still, with a troubled national airline system, $4-a-gallon gas, and even President Bush offering goals to combat climate change, the rail system is a risk we can't afford to not take.

All of this is dead-on. While I do not believe HSR is nearly as risky as the Chronicle editors do, they are absolutely right that we cannot afford to not build this system. They do understand that rising gas prices are calling into question our state's reliance on freeways and airlines for intrastate travel - and the airlines are becoming more and more troubled (they're now skimping on fuel). And the Chronicle, unlike nearly every other media outlet that has recently assessed HSR, mentions climate change as a reason to build HSR. I have begun to wonder if HSR's critics even believe in global warming, so it's welcome to see one of the state's leading newspapers making the obvious link between HSR and action on the climate.

The editorial goes on to discuss Cathleen Galgani's bill that would enable more public-private partnerships, something the editorial authors believe is necessary to mitigate high costs:

Forty billion dollars would be a lot to ask from California taxpayers in good times; in a recession it doesn't seem politically feasible.

Except that nobody is asking California taxpayers for $40 billion. Instead the bond plan is for $10 billion, and most of the remaining balance will likely be coming from the federal government, with private investors helping to finish out the overall project cost. Cost overruns are inevitable, especially in this era of rampant inflation and a collapsing dollar - but California voters are only being asked to pony up a quarter of the overall cost. Seems like a good deal to me.

The editorial closes on this excellent note:

And California has already spent enough time hesitating over the rail system - we urge the governor to work with the Legislature to make the current proposal the best that it can be for the environment, the taxpayers, and those who will ride the rail in the future.

I could not agree more strongly. The more we delay, the higher the cost will become, and the longer our state will be shackled to an obsolete and economically ruinous oil-based transportation system.

Feds Ready to Drop Big Money on HSR - But Will the Sierra Club Block It?

The current issue of Capitol Weekly is full of HSR material, including columns from Quentin Kopp and US Rep. Jim Costa in favor of the project. We'll get to those tomorrow, but of more immediate interest is this article by Anthony York on recent political developments surrounding our HSR plan.

One of the most welcome pieces of news is that Congress is looking to throw down some serious money on HSR next year:

A delegation of state high-speed rail board members recently went back to Washington D.C. seeking an answer to that very question. And the answers, according to Crane, were encouraging.

State officials say they have received indications from members of Congress that there will be roughly $60 billion set aside for high-speed rail projects nationwide in next year's federal transportation bill. And they are further encouraged that California, which is further along than any other state in its high-speed rail development, is well positioned to capture some of that money.

But, said Crane, "it will require a strongly unified and aggressive California Congressional Delegation" to capture some of those funds for the state high-speed rail program.

$60 billion is a pretty stunning number. The CHSRA has been aggressive in pursuing it - a major reason for having chosen the Pacheco alignment was that California members of Congress pressured the Authority to choose it. And given that no other HSR project in the country is anywhere close to being as developed as ours, it bodes well for the project finances. Of course, this is dependent on a Democrat winning the White House, as John McCain is a noted train hater.

It's also dependent on the California environmentalist community. Their support for HSR would seem to be a no-brainer - it would get millions of Californians out of their cars and planes, would provide dramatic carbon emissions reductions, and would kick off a national trend of moving toward sustainable, renewable, environmentally friendly transportation solutions. Reversing the American dependence on pollution-spewing transport would seem to be a holy grail for environmental activists - it sure is for me.

But not so much for the Sierra Club:

Meanwhile, some environmental opposition remains. The Sierra Club's Tim Frank said that while his group is encouraged by the decision not to build a rail station in those protected grasslands between Gilroy and Merced, his group still has concerns with the project.

"High-speed rail will be growth-inducing in the Central Valley," said Frank. "The question is, will it be good growth or bad growth?"
Frank said he wants to give the High-Speed Rail Authority some say over land use decisions as the Central Valley continues to grow.

"Now is the time when we have some leverage," Frank said.

I am as strong an anti-sprawl advocate as you are likely to find on the internets. But the Sierra Club is barking up the wrong tree here. They are defining themselves as an exclusively anti-growth organization, even at the expense of transformative action on global warming and pollution.

Sprawl needs to be ended in the Central Valley. But we also have to realize that sprawl is NOT a force of nature. It is instead a product of three major factors: cheap oil, cheap credit, and favorable land use laws. The first is disappearing for good, thanks to peak oil. The second doesn't exist now, and may never return. As a result the Central Valley is now the world leader in foreclosures. Certainly land use policies will need to change there, as they must statewide. But why should HSR alone carry that burden? AB 32 carbon reduction goals should be applied to new housing developments, and ultimately, localities will have to change their ways.

The loss of cheap oil and the shortage of cheap credit together will lessen sprawl dramatically in the coming decades. I fully support land use changes to further kill off sprawl, but it's not worth holding HSR hostage to produce the changes that need to happen anyway at the state and local level.

Unfortunately the Sierra Club has been attacking electric rail transportation more and more of late. In Seattle, where I lived from 2001 to 2007, the Sierra Club joined with right-wingers to successfully kill a ballot measure to provide a 70-mile expansion of the region's light rail system. The plan was unfortunately linked to an expansion of local roads, but the Sierra Club's opposition included the flawed charges that the light rail stations would have induced sprawl in suburban Seattle (flawed because Washington State's Growth Management Act would have prevented most sprawl). The Sierra Club promised to support a rail-only ballot measure in Seattle in 2008, but so far that support has so far been withheld.

Cathleen Galgani has addressed some of the Sierra Club's concerns in a new bill, written about in the Capitol Weekly article:

The bill makes one major concession to environmentalists, explicitly stating that there will be no rail station in Los Banos. Environmental groups including the Sierra Club opposed the Los Banos station, saying it would damage protected grasslands in the Central Valley.

I agree that there was no compelling need for a Los Banos station. And the Sierra Club can play a valuable role in ensuring that the Pacheco Pass route is designed and built with maximum respect for the surrounding landscape. But especially with the Los Banos change, the Sierra Club would be well-advised to declare victory and join us in supporting one of the most environmentally necessary and useful projects this state has ever considered.

Especially when there is up to $60 billion waiting for us in DC.

Will High Speed Rail be Built in Pieces?

Ever since the California High Speed Rail plan was published in 2002, the proposed bond funding plan has always insisted that the first section to be opened would be the link between LA and SF. Although the full buildout would include lines to Sacramento and San Diego, LA-SF was rightly seen as the backbone of the system, providing a sustainable, reliable, and rapid transportation option linking the state's two main centers. As with European HSR lines, a successful first line generates political support, public enthusiasm, and financial resources to expand the network.

With that in mind I am a bit hesitant to embrace a proposal from Fiona Ma and Cathleen Galgani that would, according to an AP report:

allow the bonds to be used for all segments of the proposed 700-mile rail system. The bond's current language dedicates the money only for the proposed segment between the Los Angeles and San Francisco areas.

I think this is a bad idea, but first, some background.

Significantly, the bill not only has Arnold's backing, but was drafted by the administration's advisers and the California High Speed Rail Authority board of directors. Quentin Kopp, chair of the board, "said he had been told by Schwarzenegger's chief of staff, Susan Kennedy, that the Republican governor supports the bond proposal." Which is certainly welcome news after years of delayed votes (the plan was originally to have been voted on in 2004, and then in 2006).

Ma and CHSRA director Mehdi Morshed explained the new bill this way:

Ma and Mehdi Morshed, the rail board's executive director, said the bill could broaden public support for the bonds by allowing all areas served by the project to compete for money.

The bill would require the board to give top priority for bond funding to segments of the project that could attract the most federal, local government or private financing and that also could be used by other passenger trains.

What is happening here is the resolution to a months-old conflict between the rail board and the governor's office. Arnold had been trying to undermine the project by, as I explained at Calitics in June 2007, insisting that federal and private funding be secured first, *before* going to the ballot - even though that is ass-backward, as a state funding commitment is necessary for the feds and investors to commit. The Ma-Galgani proposal seems to satisfy Arnold's insistence on leveraged funding by privileging those portions of the route that can find it.

Further, it may satisfy a political need. Back in May 2007 I wrote about concerns that the LA-SF priority was going to lose votes in other parts of the state. I didn't buy that thinking then, or now, but it does appear to have combined with the desire to buy Arnold's support at whatever cost to produce this proposal.

And it's not a good proposal. The core selling point - the "killer app" if you will - of the high speed rail plan is that it offers an alternative to flying and driving between the Bay Area and Southern California. Instead of a hassle-filled, expensive, environmentally ruinous flight, or a long, expensive, unsustainable drive, Californians could hop a train in downtown SF and be in downtown LA in 2 1/2 hours.

As we enter the age of peak oil and global warming, perhaps our greatest transportation need as a state will be long-distance intercity service. We will not be able to fly and drive between the two great metropoles of our state for much longer.

But with this plan, it is precisely that portion - LA-SF - that is *least* likely to get bond funding. There are no other local services that can be leveraged, and federal funding is still uncertain (especially if noted train-hater John McCain wins the White House). What this proposal will produce is HSR along the Caltrain line from SF to San Jose, HSR along the Metrolink line from Santa Clarita to LA and Anaheim, and leave an enormous gap in between. A missing link that will hurt ridership and limit political support for the project, while the costs of filling the link continue to soar.

The Ma-Galgani plan is well-intentioned - but wrong. We need to instead make the case to Californians that our state cannot survive without HSR. Emphasize the environmental and sustainability benefits, as well as the convenience. A winning coalition is built not through gimmicks, but through showing people the underlying value of the system.