Today’s San Francisco Chronicle has a big section on high speed rail. Some of the articles are up online, some won’t be until 3AM on Monday. Included are:

Jim Wunderman, president and CEO of the Bay Area Council, writes about HSR as The Test of Our Generation:

Today, our generation faces its test. Three years ago, voters approved bonds to help build the largest public works project in the state’s history: a system of high-speed, electric passenger trains. The project is under assault with almost the same words flung at the Golden Gate Bridge – it’s too expensive, it’s impractical and it will ruin the neighborhood. Some leaders, sensing shifting political winds, are working to find a way to get to “no.” The business community of our region disagrees. We want to find a way to get to “yes.”

This discussion takes place against the backdrop of a state population projected to reach 50 million by 2050. If we do not build high-speed rail at a current price tag of between $40 billion and $60 billion, we will instead be forced to build an estimated $100 billion worth of new highways, airport runways and departure gates.

This is exactly the right kind of vision for California, the one voters endorsed and embraced in November 2008. When HSR opponents said we couldn’t afford it, voters rejected their claims and realized we should build new infrastructure just as we did during the Depression. Jim Wunderman, who represents the Bay Area’s largest employers, is in no position or mood to be profligate or wasteful with the public’s funds. Those businesses wouldn’t allow it. And they understand very well that California needs HSR in its future if the state is to prosper.

And like good businessmen, they know a good deal when they see one. If HSR’s price tag is as high as $60 billion, it’s still a $40 billion savings to the state. These businesses are also well aware of the cost of oil, and do not share the blind ignorance of most HSR critics to the serious problems that our dependence on fossil fuels creates.

Bob Doty’s article isn’t online yet, but CHSRA board chairman Tom Umberg’s article is, emphasizing the better travel that HSR will inaugurate (and that’s a serious consideration given how digital devices and the growing inconvenience of air travel, along with the soaring cost of oil, are making existing forms of travel less ideal).

One important article is by Frederick Jordan and Darlene Mar, two advocates for minority contractors in the state. Ignore the bizarre title the article was given – their complaint is substantive, that the CHSRA has been excluding women- and minority-owned contractors. Their recommendations include:

That’s why small and minority business groups are calling on the state and federal government to:

– Demand transparency and accountability in the High-Speed Rail Authority’s distribution of funds;

– Insist that all potential contracting opportunities be opened up to all interested firms through broad public outreach and selection; and

– Put a stop to the Rail Authority’s practice of simply funneling contracting dollars to large international firms.

We also are calling upon the Obama administration to stop all federal funds to the project until the Rail Authority overhauls its restrictive procurement system and reassigns components of the mega-contracts already awarded to businesses that reflect the full diversity of our state.

It’s certainly worth looking into. And I’ve never been a fan of sending contracting dollars to large international firms if there are locally owned contractors that can do the same work. Of course, since the US has ignored HSR for the last 30 years, we don’t have a strong base of domestic expertise in the matter. But where local contracting can happen, it should happen.

The most important of the SF Chronicle articles is by Assemblymember Jerry Hill, who represents the 19th district based in the north Peninsula. In the article, Hill outs himself as an HSR denier – someone who refuses to accept the facts about the HSR project, its success in the US and around the world, and instead peddles often-debunked claims that he should know better than to repeat. It’s a sad thing to watch:

I voted for Proposition 1A because it seemed to be good public policy. Done right, high-speed rail has the potential to meet the future transportation demands of California’s growing population by providing a green alternative to new freeway lanes and airport runways.

But much has changed in the past three years, including the reliability and accuracy of the cost and ridership projections on which Proposition 1A was based, and ballooning costs and uncertain revenue potential.

Actually, the cost and ridership projections remain reliable and accurate. As the project proceeds in its engineering, the details become known more clearly, and the cost estimates become more reliable, not less. As to the ridership projections, we’ll deal with those in a moment, but the key is that their reliability has never been disproven, and the evidence from around the globe and the US is clear that HSR will have high ridership and high revenue. Hill appears to ignore that evidence, as most deniers do. The costs are rising, yes, but as Jim Wunderman pointed out it’s still a good deal.

Hill’s argument rests, as do those of most HSR critics, on a complete misunderstanding of the evidence. He doesn’t do himself any favors by completely misreading the situation in Washington DC:

California faces many challenges that are certain to be exacerbated by the gridlock in Washington and upheaval on Wall Street. Despite success in securing stimulus dollars, future federal funding will be reduced significantly in the coming years. Control of the House of Representatives has also changed, increasing the likelihood that funding for high-speed rail will be on the chopping block.

So too will funding for schools, libraries, public safety, old people, young people, middle-aged people, health care, pollution cleanup, scientific research, the arts, and so on. But what Hill doesn’t realize is that this is a temporary situation. Democrats lead the polling for the House of Representatives 51-44, which is about where they were at in 2006 when they retook the House and made Nancy Pelosi speaker. Speaker Pelosi is strongly committed to HSR, and she’d find a way to get the California project the funding it needs.

Hill is basically using the Tea Party reign of terror to justify killing HSR in California. That will look particularly stupid in January 2013 with Pelosi again wielding the speaker’s gavel, with Democratic control of the Senate and Obama still in the White House. (Of course, if Obama loses, saving HSR will be the least of our worries.)

Hill continues:

In Sacramento, the Legislature is evaluating state programs as we struggle to balance revenues and expenditures. California has had to cut more than $30 billion from its budget in the last three years. The state has important needs, including more than $20 billion owed to its schools and colleges.

The question we need to ask is: “Does high-speed rail make fiscal sense – and is now the time?” In 2008 we were told that federal funding would make up nearly half of the money needed to complete the first phase of the $33 billion project, with the private sector contributing 25 percent, and the rest to be picked up by state and local governments.

Jerry, let me introduce you to the concept of investment. It is a simple and effective concept. You spend some money up front and you get more than that in return. This is the same concept that led California voters to approve bonds to build the Golden Gate Bridge in November 1930 during the depths of the Depression. Hill apparently believes the Golden Gate Bridge shouldn’t have been built. That bridge, and the Bay Bridge, and Shasta Dam, and other projects put people to work in the near term building infrastructure that has lasted for nearly 80 years. That’s a good investment.

So too is HSR. I am sure that Hill would love to have new revenue for the state budget. He’s in luck. HSR will have a green dividend of at least $10 billion a year (for LA alone) and a lot of that money will show up in Sacramento via taxes. That more than covers the cost of building the HSR system. And in an era of rising gas prices (which Hill never once mentions) it will help individuals and businesses save a lot of money.

Hill continues down the road of delusion:

Information released this week indicates that the cost of constructing just the first phase of high-speed rail from San Francisco to Anaheim has swelled to more than $60 billion. Federal, state and local funds committed to date make up less than a quarter of the actual cost.

The Legislative Analyst’s Office reported that the “availability of the funding necessary for the new system is highly uncertain.” Were California to borrow money to fund the remaining 75 percent of the project costs without funding from other sources, opponents estimate it would create an annual obligation of more than $4 billion on our general fund for 30 years.

This would raise the state’s annual debt service payment to a dangerous level and siphon funding from other programs and infrastructure projects.

It certainly would, which is why it’s not likely to happen. If neither the federal government nor the private sector contribute another dime, we build what we can in the Central Valley, put people to work on building infrastructure that has independent utility, and wait for the Tea Party madness to pass so we can pick up where we left off. Hill’s nightmare scenario isn’t going to materialize, as much as he wants us to believe it will.

The anticipated operating costs for the system also appear improbable in light of the fact that under Proposition 1A, the project cannot have an operating subsidy.

The High-Speed Rail Authority’s 2009 Business Plan estimated that a ticket from San Francisco to Los Angeles would cost $105, which amounts to about 24 cents per mile for the 432-mile trip. However, in Europe and Japan, which successfully operate high-speed rail systems, the charge averages 44 cents per mile, according to research by the Community Coalition on High Speed Rail. The authority’s 2009 business plan was not realistic.

Ah, now Hill is quoting research by known anti-HSR folks. What CC-HSR didn’t tell Hill is that all those HSR systems have high ridership and cover their own operating costs. That includes the Amtrak Acela. But hey, it’s good to know that Hill just believes whatever bullshit people tell him without actually pausing to do his own research.

Ridership projections from the authority have been called into question. Studies conducted by UC Berkeley and the Federal Railroad Administration found the authority’s ridership projections may be highly inflated.

They said that the ridership numbers may be right, they may be too high, and they may be too low. But the notion that the numbers would be inflated is absurd to anyone who has actually looked at the performance of HSR around the globe. The Acela is packed. So is the Russian Sapsan high speed train between Moscow and St. Petersburg. So too is Spain’s AVE between Madrid and Barcelona. So too is Taiwan’s HSR. And so too are California’s own slower intercity trains.

Obviously the exact ridership projections matter, but only for figuring out the details of the financing. There is no reason at all to believe that HSR ridership claims have been wildly inflated. There is more than enough evidence from around the world to prove that won’t happen. Only a denier – someone who still refuses to believe something even after having been shown the evidence – would still claim HSR ridership could be low.

Hill goes on to dig his hole deeper:

Voters like myself were under the impression that if we approved the $9.95 billion in Prop. 1A, the rest of the money to complete the project would pour in. Now it remains unclear whether the private sector is willing to finance the project due to cost increases and other uncertainties.

If you were under that impression then you probably aren’t fit to serve in a state legislature. Money never “pours in” for any project, especially a big one. These days, getting funding for anything is tough. But the private sector is NOT yet saying no. They just want to see a strong federal commitment. In Florida the private sector agreed to cover cost overruns. They were that confident HSR was a good deal. A Tea Party governor, Rick Scott, rejected it anyway. Should we send Jerry Hill an application for membership in his local Tea Party organization?

Where do we go from here? The answer will come soon. The authority’s newest business plan – its third – is scheduled to be released in October. It will tell us if cost estimates have been modified and if the funding and passenger projections are sound.

I hope that this project can proceed for many reasons, including job creation, modernizing our transportation system and reducing our reliance on energy imports. We should explore combining existing rail infrastructure throughout the state with the high-speed rail system to help defray project costs.

But if the numbers in the business plan are unrealistic, the project should be put on hold to allow Californians to vote on whether they are willing to absorb the additional costs or want to pull the plug.

Nowhere in here did Hill acknowledge that the cost of new freeways and airport gates is at least $100 billion – and it wouldn’t help relieve traffic, reduce dependence on oil, or create a green dividend. Nowhere did he discuss the global and American success of HSR. He only tossed in job creation and energy independence as sops at the end to try and convince people he’s not really against HSR, despite his flawed and evidence-free attacks.

No, he appears to have instead been cowed by a few of his NIMBY constituents who have convinced him that HSR is a bad idea. That’s a shame. It’s up to us as HSR organizers to ensure that more legislators don’t get swayed by bad evidence and that Sacramento, like the people of California as a whole, remains strongly behind the HSR project.