I’m surprised it took them this long to think of this, but led by a newspaper that should know better than to print inaccuracies, the Palo Alto NIMBYs are going to try and mount an effort at repealing Prop 1A and blocking job creation in California. This nascent effort is being launched by a Palo Alto newspaper, the Daily Post, which announced this Don Quixote campaign today. They don’t really have anything more than a single op-ed, but this is worth pushing back against quickly, so I’ll do that here.

On Dec. 18, the Daily Post editorial page came out against the high-speed rail project. (Actually, back in October 2008, we urged local voters to reject it.) Today’s editorial suggests the next steps the community could take to stop this project.

Right there you have to wonder about them – if the Daily Post urged voters to reject Prop 1A, they failed utterly. 60.4% of Santa Clara County voters and 61.1% of San Mateo County voters voted for Prop 1A. But public dismissal hasn’t stopped the Daily Post from trying to kill the project that local and statewide voters approved.

It’s disappointing to talk to our local elected officials about the proposed California High Speed Rail project. Nearly all of them were cheerleaders for the project when it was on the ballot in November 2008, and they’re still supporters despite massive public opposition.

Define “massive.” I want to see this quantified. How does the Daily Post know there is “massive” opposition?

As to elected officials, perhaps they read the results of the Prop 1A vote and realize their constituents want this train? That they want the jobs it will provide? The grade separations that will save lives? The electrification that will keep Caltrain alive? The quieter and cleaner trains? The ability to quickly go to San Jose or San Francisco or LA affordably and without worsening global warming?

Sure, they qualify their support. State Sen. Joe Simitian, D-Palo Alto, says he favors it if “done right.”

But by not directly fighting it, they give the unelected board of the high-speed rail authority room to continue their plans, which will greatly damage the quality of life we enjoy here on the Peninsula.

Ooo, the board is unelected. It is, however, appointed by elected officials. It cannot spend money without legislative authorization. This is another silly line of attack, since most transit planning is done by appointed officials and reviewed and approved by elected officials.

After the November 2008 election, the public turned against this project when it heard that this new railroad would cut a swath three to four times wider than Caltrain through the heart of most of the Peninsula’s communities. During much of its course along the Peninsula, it’s possible that this new bullet train will be elevated on 15-foot-high berms.

I am continuously stunned at how journalists believe that the usual rules of evidence and proof do not apply to the editorial page. The public certainly has NOT turned against this project; the opposition merely whined louder. Caltrain already owns most of the ROW so it won’t be “three or four times wider” in most places. And so what if it’s elevated on a 15-foot berm?

Politicians then said we shouldn’t worry because the train could be put in a tunnel, and all of our problems would go away. Well, the rail authority’s new business plan has no money for a tunnel. A tunnel is not going to happen.

Any politician who said that was a fool. But I’m not sure any of them actually did. The Daily Post merely hears what it wants to hear. Of course, I predicted long ago that the push for a tunnel on the part of people like Martin Engel was a cynical strategy to try and turn Palo Alto and neighboring cities against HSR by getting them to think it had to be a tunnel or nothing – and then when a tunnel became too expensive, they’d have a basis to try and kill the project.

If the Daily Post wants a tunnel, why not organize around funding it? Their knee-jerk “kill HSR” stance shows they were never serious about a tunnel to begin with.

Another problem is that California, with a $20 billion budget deficit, simply cannot afford the rail project, which currently has a price tag of $42 billion, and will probably be much larger when completed if cost overruns on other mass transit projects are any indication.

Californians rejected this argument too, one that was made frequently during the 2008 campaign. Voters understood that we can’t afford NOT to build HSR, that the cost of oil dependence, global warming, and the lack of jobs in this state was too much to bear, and that HSR was a cheaper option.

So we — the citizens of the Peninsula — need to rise up and stop this disaster. Here’s our four-point plan.

1. We need a leader who is unequivocally committed to stopping high-speed rail. Not somebody who was a supporter last year but is an opponent now.

Oh, I’m sure Martin Engel or Morris Brown are available.

2. Let’s put high-speed rail back on the state ballot. It will take close to half a million signatures, which means we need money to pay signature gatherers.

Do you have $2 million lying around?

Paying for signatures is an extremely expensive proposition. The going rate for signature gathering rises the closer you get to qualification date – I’ve seen figures of $4 or $5 per signature. If they don’t get started right now, they won’t make the November 2010 ballot. The soonest they could get it to voters would be 2012, by which point the state would have already sold bonds and accepted federal funding. If voters repealed Prop 1A then, California’s credit rating would instantly become junk status and we’d be facing a truly dire financial crisis.

Our argument to California voters: This is a boondoggle our state government cannot afford. The cost per California resident will be $1,167. Is this project really worth that?

Amortize that cost out over the 30 year life of the bond, since nobody would be paying $1,167 all at once. That comes out to $38.90 per year, or just over 10 cents per day. A dime a day for 30 years for high speed rail. That’s too expensive?! Really?

3. More of our city governments need to fight this through litigation. The Atherton-Menlo Park suit was partially successful, but other cities such as Palo Alto, San Mateo, Burlingame and Redwood City need to file their own suits, attacking this project for different reasons.

I’m sure a judge will love hearing that these suits are filed merely to attack the project without any specific legal merit. The Atherton-Menlo Park case lost on virtually all of its claims, and got lucky that the CHSRA hadn’t squared away the UPRR route issue.

4. The rail authority will probably use eminent domain to seize the hundreds (if not thousands) of homes and businesses along the path of this new railroad. Most property owners don’t have the millions it will take to fight the rail authority in court. So city governments should start developing a legal defense program for their residents. If we make it hard for the railroad to grab land, we might be able to derail this thing.

This is just fascinating. First, the Daily Post is lying to readers; there are no plans at all to seize hundreds or thousands of homes. Only a small handful of property will need to be taken and it’s unclear if anyone will actually lose their home over it. Even so, this is revealing of the NIMBY mentality, that government exists to protect their property values. Why the hell should other Palo Alto residents waste their money on propping up someone else’s land value? These NIMBYs are basically asking their neighbors for a bailout. It’s ridiculous.

There’s more we can do. Demonstrations, more educational seminars and voting against politicians who either support the project or who try to ride the fence. We should make high-speed rail the dominant issue in every city council, county supervisor and state Legislature race. Let’s start a revolution. We’re talking about the quality of our lives, the seizure of hundreds if not thousands of homes, and a rip-off of our state government.

Does anybody hear Paul Revere out there?

All I hear is a train whistle.

This is the most cockamamie scheme I’ve seen in some time. It’s a bizarre mish-mash of teabaggers and NIMBYs, doomed to go precisely nowhere.

The notion that they can get a repeal on the ballot is absurd. If they somehow did, they’d be massively outspent by large corporations (including many of those in the Palo Alto area who employ many local residents and keep the economy humming) and labor unions. Politicians who are forced to choose between jobs and NIMBYs are not going to be scared of a few well-off folks when the public still supports the project and demands the jobs and improved train service the project will bring.

As to quality of life, what the NIMBYs refuse to accept is that the 2008 election showed that most people on the Peninsula have a different vision of “quality of life.” Theirs includes fast passenger trains, grade separated to reunite the community safely and gracefully. They don’t believe that a good quality of life means being shackled to their cars and to rising oil prices merely to subsidize a few whiny NIMBYs.

If the Daily Post wants to tilt at windmills, I guess there’s nothing we can do to stop them. But Californians aren’t going to sit quietly by while their HSR project is attacked like this. The groundswell to defend and promote HSR is growing, and ultimately, this op-ed will merely strengthen HSR and public support for it.