CHSRA Staff Report Recommends Keeping Palmdale Alignment
Last year, as costs began to rise on the Palmdale to Sylmar section of the high speed rail route (due to Army Corps of Engineers requirements that the route hew more closely to State Route 14), the California High Speed Rail Authority announced it would take another look at a Grapevine/Interstate 5 alignment, although it had already rejected that alignment as too costly in 2005.
Reaction was swift, and split. Some HSR critics, who believe that trains should bypass major population centers, welcomed the move. Palmdale didn’t, filing suit to block a Grapevine alignment. They claimed, accurately, that Prop 1A listed Palmdale as a stop. And LA County Metro came out for preserving the Palmdale alignment, arguing that it would serve more riders and make the most economic sense.
Well, the CHSRA report is out, and Palmdale will be pleased – the report concludes the Grapevine/I-5 alignment isn’t a good one and that the choice of Palmdale should stand:
Overall, most of the factors that led the Authority and FRA to select the Antelope Valley corridor in the 2005 Program EIR/EIS to be carried forward are not substantially changed. The Study confirms that the Antelope Valley alignments have fewer potential environmental impacts, enhanced by the selection of alignments more closely following SR 14 and avoiding the Santa Clara River. The advantage of the Antelope Valley alignments with regard to seismic risk is similar, but the advantage on the amount of tunneling and constructability issues are much reduced and the I-5 alternative could be somewhat less costly. The Antelope Valley alignments still offer greater connectivity and accessibility. The Antelope Valley alignments also have greater opportunities for alignment variations through the mountains to avoid impacts to environmental resources reducing risk, have less growth inducing impacts on urbanized land and farmland conversion, would provide service to the fastest growing area of Los Angeles County, and have strong stakeholder support. Taken together these findings reinforce the Authority and FRA decision of the 2005 Program EIR/EIS selecting the Antelope Valley alignment for further study.
Some specifics on the above:
Tunnel Length – In the 2005 Program EIR/EIS, the Antelope Valley corridor had 13 miles of tunnel while the I‐5 corridor had 33 miles. After project‐level preliminary engineering the Antelope Valley alignments now have 29 miles of tunnel and the conceptual engineering developed in the Study for the I‐5 corridor has 31 miles. The length of tunnel is now comparable for both corridors….
Alignment Length and Travel Time – The 2005 Program EIR/EIS concluded an I‐5 alignment would be 33 to 36 miles shorter in length and provide travel time savings of 10 to 12 minutes compared to an Antelope Valley alignment. The Antelope Valley alignments are now up to five miles shorter than envisaged at the Program stage while the Study I‐5 alignments are now longer, diverging from the Antelope valley alignments east of Bakersfield. The Study finds that the I‐5 alignment would now only be 23 to 25 miles shorter. The analysis of the current Antelope Valley alignments and the I‐5 alignments shows that, because of this additional length, the longer steep gradients and the sharp curves needed in Santa Clarita and Tejon Pass, the travel time saving is on average likely to be only three to five minutes. This is substantially less than the anticipated length and travel time advantage in 2005 and confirms the decision to drop the I‐5 corridor from further consideration….
Seismic – The 2005 Program EIR/EIS concluded that the I‐5 corridor would have considerably higher seismic issues than the Antelope Valley corridor. Project‐level studies for the Antelope Valley have resulted in alignments that cross the San Gabriel fault (which has a low probability of rupture and a small predicted movement) in tunnel. However, the I‐5 corridor remains more seismically active than the Antelope Valley corridor, paralleling the San Gabriel fault for 20 miles, and passing through the intersection of the Garlock and San Andreas faults. The topography of the Tehachapi Mountains restricts the feasible alignments to the Tejon Pass. This restriction results in a potentially feasible alignments crossing through the intersection of the San Andreas and Garlock faults. The Study has confirmed that the seismic risk for the I‐5 alignment is still greater than for the Antelope Valley alignments.
These are all significant factors and they make clear that the Antelope Valley route, through Palmdale, is comparable to or superior to the Grapevine alignment. The Palmdale route is safer, with similar tunnel lengths and with a travel time penalty that is much less significant than initially thought.
But it’s the capital cost and ridership analyses that are going to grab the most attention:
Capital Cost – In the 2005 Program EIR/EIS, the cost for the I‐5 corridor was estimated at $6.58B, while the cost of the Antelope Valley corridor was estimated at $6.46B. During preliminary engineering, the relative cost of the Antelope Valley alignments has increased in part to avoid and reduce impacts. The Draft 2012 Business Plan cost estimate for the Antelope Valley alignment (between Bakersfield and Sylmar) is between $15.0 billion and $15.5 billion. A risk adjusted capital cost estimate for the I‐5 alignment allows for mitigation, avoidance and contingency amounts, and reflects the differing levels of design development between the I‐5 and Antelope Valley corridors. The risk adjusted cost estimate is $15.1 billion. Like the 2005 Program EIR/EIS, the Study concludes that the cost of an I‐5 alignment would be of a similar magnitude to the Antelope Valley alternatives….
The Study also evaluated operational aspects, including ridership, operating costs and maintenance costs that were not compared qualitatively in the 2005 Program EIR/EIS. The Study’s ridership analysis has shown that the loss of Antelope Valley commuters for an I‐5 alignment reduces the anticipated number of riders by approximately two million annually (5%) and ridership revenue by about $50 million per year (2%). The shorter I‐5 route length is expected to reduce operations and maintenance costs, also by about $50 million per year. As a result, the net cash flow for the I‐5 and the Antelope Valley alternatives would be similar.
So they argue that the costs are basically a wash. That’s a big difference from the claims last summer that the Grapevine alignment could save up to $4 billion over a Palmdale route.
Some critics have charged that the risk adjustment that staff used was somehow illegitimate. The base cost estimate for the Grapevine route is $13.5 billion, and the risk adjusted estimate is $15.1 billion. The nearly $2 billion difference is accounted for by determining the impact of community feedback:
The risk adjusted cost for the I-5 alignment accounts for the potential increase in costs of construction methods in Santa Clarita based on future community involvement. For example, wherever the representative alignment is elevated above existing ground levels in developed areas, the risk adjusted cost estimate assumes a viaduct will be required, rather than an embankment.
This is a reasonable thing to assume, and the Authority’s experience on the Peninsula shows the importance of including such risk assessments. After all, the I-5 route actually has greater impacts on future as well as existing development than the Palmdale route.
Significantly, and perhaps because of those impacts, most communities and stakeholders along the Grapevine/I-5 route were either opposed to or lukewarm at best about that option – whereas communities and stakeholders along the Palmdale route backed that choice:
During outreach on this Study, most of the stakeholders consulted expressed a preference for the Antelope Valley alignments in order to meet the community needs of the residents in Palmdale and Lancaster. Local residents, businesses, elected officials and regional organizations have emphasized the importance of the high-speed rail system serving the Antelope Valley. Stakeholders that have confirmed their support for the Antelope Valley alignment and urged that the I-5 alignment not be considered further include Los Angeles County Supervisor Michael Antonovich and Kern County, the cities of Arvin, Tehachapi, Lancaster and Palmdale, and the community of Rosamond. The Tejon Ranch Company oppose the I-5 alignment. The Center for Biological Diversity oppose the I-5 alignment due to the potential impacts on the Wind Wolves preserve. There has been very little support for an I-5 alignment by stakeholders in the Antelope Valley and Santa Clarita. The City of Santa Clarita has concerns that the potential impacts of an I-5 alignment on the city would be much greater than the impacts from an alignment via Palmdale, although they recognize the opportunity that the I-5 alignment provides for a possible station location in Santa Clarita and the benefits this would bring. The Los Angeles Metropolitan Transportation Authority (Metro) recognizes the opportunity for connectivity and increased mobility through the Antelope Valley.
Some comments to yesterday’s post on the blog, discussing this report, expressed frustration that the Authority would not simply blast through Tejon Ranch or find some way to buy them out. Others were frustrated that the Authority staff designed the proposed alignment assuming the route would run east-west through Bakersfield, rather than passing on the western edge of the city.
Those comments seem more focused on justifying the Grapevine alignment by any means necessary. The east-west alignment through Bakersfield is already decided. More significantly, what the Authority is saying here is that community stakeholders prefer the Palmdale to the Grapevine alignment, and that should play a factor in the decision.
This is in keeping with recent Authority decisions, such as proposing a West Hanford route or agreeing to a blended proposal on the Peninsula. The Authority may have had a reputation, fueled largely by project opponents, in 2009 of being obstinate and unwilling to listen to public feedback. After having undergone a change in both staff leadership and board leadership, the new Authority is much more responsive to community concerns, as well as focusing on finding ways to save money without compromising the system’s safety or usefulness.
Of course, “responsive” to community concerns does not always mean “doing whatever some in the community want.” And that will continue rankle some people from wealthy Palo Alto NIMBYs to Kings County farmers. But the Authority is working hard to find ways to address potential impacts, and that’s a very good thing to encourage, even if it doesn’t please every critic.
Ultimately, the Palmdale alignment remains the better choice. It is much less risky than the Grapevine alignment, and Californians know to not downplay the risks of earthquakes. It also offers more potential for connectivity, allowing a connection to the DesertXpress project via a quick and easy to build link across the desert between Palmdale and Victorville. And it does offer the ability to carry two million more riders a year. After all, that’s the entire point of building high speed rail – to carry passengers.
Well, at least DesertXpress will have an easy connection… all hail the gambling high speed train.
ComradeFrana Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 6:26 am
As if it was a bad thing…
Tim Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 1:33 pm
Hence “all hail the gambling train”… I’d ride it
ComradeFrana Reply:
January 11th, 2012 at 2:11 am
Well, looks like I’ll need to get my sarcasm detector re-calibrated, it’s making false alarms.
Oh Good. Then we should expect to see a risk adjustment for Pacheco due to ‘impact of community involvement’ in the next EIR…
Peter Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 3:30 am
What ‘community’ would be involved? Bypassed Los Banos? Bypassed Madera? Gilroy? They’re all already heavily involved.
This is good news that the Palmdale stop is still on track. Now we have to wait for a decision between now and May 2013 if the next segment they will build will be Bakersfield to San Fernando Valley which could be constructed by 2020 with ridership in 2021.
Emma Reply:
January 9th, 2012 at 10:55 pm
The way you write it, it sounds like you are totally fine with the current plan. That’s $15 billion to nowhere. There is no demand for an SJ-LA connection that could justify such a price tag. Airlines are much better to bridge the gap. Only tourists are going to want to travel from SF to LA and back. The average Californian couldn’t care less.
The most important sections with the highest demand are SF-SJ and LA-SD, as well as LA – San Bernadino which isn’t even on the table. Those areas have the highest population density. This is where you have to build. We could bridge the gap between LA and SJ with revenues from the other sections. 90% of all cost increases in the new Business Plan are due to the section with the lowest ridership, that is the section between San Jose and Los Angeles, yet CHSRA as well as other high speed rail supporters here continue to fight for their prestige bridge connecting famous cities such as “nowhere” to other cities with great public transit in the Central Valley such as “nowhere”.
But I guess it’s worth it because of DesertXPress. Well while we’re at it, why don’t we spend another $2 billion to build a detour to Victorville? Oh, my bad, what a silly thing to say. It would probably cost another $7 billion.
/rant over
Tony d. Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 3:06 am
I like this!
ComradeFrana Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 7:08 am
“90% of all cost increases in the new Business Plan are due to the section with the lowest ridership, that is the section between San Jose and Los Angeles, …”
According to my sources it’s 67.7%.
Nathanael Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 6:12 pm
Cost increases in the Business Plan are larger for sections which are closer to actual completion. That is all. *Sigh*.
ComradeFrana Reply:
January 11th, 2012 at 2:58 am
If I’m reading things right and my math is not off, then that is not generally true. Taking figures from the 2009 Business Plan Report to the Legislature and from the “Cost Changes from 2009 Report to 2012 Business Plan” document I arrived at these (costs are 2010$):
segment , initial cost , cost increase , relative cost increase
SF-SJ 5.43 8.2 151.01%
SJ-Merced 5.82 7.4 127.15%
Merced-Bakersfield 6.954 3.6 51.77%
Bakersfield-Palmdale 4.2 3.3 78.57%
Palmdale-LA 6.45 5.2 80.62%
LA-Anaheim 4.75 0.9 18.95%
ComradeFrana Reply:
January 11th, 2012 at 3:10 am
… continued (I submitted by accident):
So, with the exception of LA-Anaheim, the section closest to completion Merced-Bakersfield has the lowest relative cost increase.
PS: the costs are in $ billions
VBobier Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 9:15 am
Palmdale is a part of Prop1a, Tejon isn’t. Cities in the CV would benefit from tourists and from people setting up small businesses and buying houses, all cause of HSR going where the riders are at and not going through just empty farmland, but then vegetables don’t ride trains, people ride trains.
VBobier Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 9:17 am
That should be: Vegetables don’t ride HSR Passenger trains, People ride HSR Passenger trains.
David Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 9:18 am
Californians can’t be tourists? I understand that this is a rant, but you aren’t making any sense. CA HSR isn’t about revenue maximization, it’s about tying far-flung parts of the state together.
Nathanael Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 6:11 pm
Emma, you’re simply wrong. Interconnecting North to South is the key part, and trying to build the all-urban-all-the-time SF-SJ and LA-SD sections first would be an unbelievable failure.
Look at your rail history, as I’ve pointed Alon to.
Alon Levy Reply:
January 11th, 2012 at 2:49 am
Not sure about first-generation (i.e. steam, low-speed*) rail history, but second-generation rail history is more complicated. We all know about how the LGV Sud-Est opened in stages, but a) the slowest and worst-to-upgrade segment (around Dijon) was bypassed first, and b) there was through-service from the start. Alas, LA-Bako is getting the shaft, and all hope of value engineering will be dashed if the Tejon option (which can be made better by plowing through the Ranch) is dropped completely in favor of the Tehachapis (which have too much unavoidable tunneling).
* I mean this descriptively, not derisively.
Emma Reply:
January 9th, 2012 at 10:55 pm
Whoops, not all of the post is directed to you.
Robert, treat these issues – Tejon Ranch, embankment vs. viaduct – the same way you treated the Peninsula NIMBYs’ demand for a tunnel. Do that and the convoluted Tejon alignment is already $2 billion cheaper than Tehachapis, even after swerving around the ranch.
Richard Mlynarik Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 2:19 am
He is treating them exactly the same way: “Rah rah rah! Rah rah rah! PB! PB! Number one!”
And remember that Pacheco is a good $10 billion more expensive than Altamont all told, so there’s no way he’s going to go to bat for a saving just a piffling couple billion taxpayer dollars here.
Tony d. Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 3:11 am
Not that it probably matters at this point, but could you explain in detail (facts) how Pacheco would cost $10 billion more than Altamont? Thank you.
Paulus Magnus Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 8:02 am
Including the additional costs incurred in the Sacramento line thanks to Pacheco I imagine.
Richard Mlynarik Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 3:43 pm
BART Fremont-SJ-Santa Clara is $10 billion of completely avoidable redundant waste alone. Not avoiding this waste was of course the sole and overriding and controlling motivation behind the Los Banos routing and PB’s alternatives “analysis”. (Remind me again which limitless corrupt and fraud-abetting engineering firm is behind the BART extension, will you?)
Dumbarton rail crossing. For free.
Altamont “overlay”. For free.
Fresno-Stockton. For free.
Useful and competitive SF-Sacramento and SJ-Sacramento service. For free.
No need for redundant Fourth & Townsend terminal at which Caltrain riders will be dumped short of their destination in SF, making available almost two entire developable urban city blocks while improving Caltrain service immensely and improving regional transit market share.
Your turn.
Nathanael Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 6:10 pm
Seriously, you seem confused. What are you advocating now? The only alternative which doesn’t need the “redundant Fourth and Townsend terminal” is the Second Transbay Tube.
And yes, I supported that. It has the best cost-benefit ratio. It was originally rejected by the CHSRA consultants on the grounds, essentially, of “sticker shock” (really, you can read the report). Which is a stupid grounds.
Joey Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 7:23 pm
It’s a question of efficiency. Six platform tracks should be enough to terminate all of CalTrain and HSR under ideal conditions. What makes conditions less than ideal is that the station throat is designed such that conflicts are probable, there is no operational flexibility in terms of routing any train to any track, trains are scheduled to dwell in the station for 40 minutes or more with no passengers on them, and full length trains must approach very slowly because of the lack of tail tracks. Most of these issues are resolvable.
Nathanael Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 6:15 pm
Also, Altamont overlay — NOT for free. (Two extra tracks would be demanded, by someone. Handling commuter and intercity rail on two tracks is a problem if you want decent levels of service, you know. Even the Swiss have lots and lots of quad-track sections and separate local and intercity lines.)
Also, Dumbarton rail crossing — nobody’s priced out that massive mega-tunnel yet, have they?
I don’t take advocates of that seriously.
Joey Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 7:31 pm
The cost of additional tracks at some point in the Tri-Valley or South Bay regions is still much cheaper than building a completely new alignment, and, if they are placed efficiently, could in fact be quite small.
As for Dumbarton, we do have one cost estimate to go on, the Authority’s. This predicted that Altamont with SF and SJ termini and a deep tunnel under the bay would be $700m more than the base case for Pacheco. It’s impossible to say what that number would be in the present day, but it seems unlikely that the cost of the tunnel would have inflated more than the cost of any other elements in either alignment. Also note that much of the cost of tunneling is risk management owing to unpredictable geological conditions. But the Dumbarton water tunnel project produced detailed geological data of that particular crossing, meaning that there is much less risk (and cost) involved in boring new tunnels.
egk Reply:
January 11th, 2012 at 3:30 pm
Really? Check out: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M%C3%BCnchen-N%C3%BCrnberg-Express
More than twice hourly HSR intercity and twice hourly commuter rail. That is excellent service.
Tom McNamara Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 12:46 pm
In the mind of Robert, the tunnel request for PAMPA is just a way to slow the project down, then kill it.
Tejon is a situation where, for a few dollars more, we get far greater utility. The Ranch isn’t a going to turn into a bedroom community for Los Angeles:
All the water it needs is tied up in the Kern Valley Water Bank and being used for agricultural exports. Unlike Palmdale, which is en route to both the California and Los Angeles Aqueducts, Tejon is surrounded by…nothing…
In the end, the goal is to make Tejon Ranch look as valuable as possible so that when the state or other entity buys it for preservation the Chandlers get their money back. It’s not that different than a deal negotiated in Florida to buy old sugar land courtesy of Charlie Crist.
Alon Levy Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 4:07 pm
The Tejon Ranch is similar. There are NIMBYs who are torpedoing one alternative in favor of another. (Yes, Altamont is technically better than Pacheco, but the PAMPA NIMBYs aren’t supporting Altamont for technical reasons.) In order to avoid a fight, the HSRA is proposing to spend much more and reduce the project’s utility in order to swerve around the Ranch. The hope is that, as in the CV, eventually it could come to its senses and spend pennies on takings to avoid spending dollars on tunnels and viaducts. The problem is that ruling out Tejon means that this can’t be done easily, whereas modifying the CV route to avoid unserved cities could be done within existing scope.
We should build them both, and that way everyone is happy!
(except emma, elizabteh, morris, etc)
Roger Christensen Reply:
January 9th, 2012 at 11:50 pm
It’s time to Stop Worrying and Love Palmsale.
Roger Christensen Reply:
January 9th, 2012 at 11:51 pm
Dale. (sorry)
Nathanael Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 6:07 pm
That’s what Switzerland did for its North-South Base Tunnel across the Alps — it built *two*!
Of course, Switzerland is run by people with an appreciation of the value of infrastructure, and a willingness to spend tens of billions extra just to make people happy. Sigh.
Since so many here object to what appears in the Wall Street Journal, I wonder if they will appreciate any more this from the Washington Post.
The first two paragraphs really tell the whole story:
In announcing the appointment of a new economic adviser last summer, President Obama emphasized his commitment to fact-based policymaking. It’s “more important than ever,” he said, to get “recommendations not based on politics, not based on narrow interests, but based on the best evidence, based on what’s going to do the most good for the most people in this country.”
If only the president and his political ally, California Gov. Jerry Brown (D), would follow that advice regarding their pet project for the Golden State: high-speed rail. No matter how many times they tout the mega-project as the job-creating wave of the future, they can’t change the mountain of evidence that high-speed rail is, in fact, a boondoggle
California’s high-speed rail to nowhere
By Charles Lan
http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/californias-high-speed-rail-to-nowhere/2012/01/09/gIQAZQDamP_story.html
J. Wong Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 7:33 am
Same old tired arguments: America is not suited for trains, autos and airlines are fine, in the future business people will tele-conference (little evidence for this) basically the same old “Americans don’t ride trains”.
D. P. Lubic Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 7:55 am
A sampling of rail supporter comments:
lelliot4 (satire)
You are quite right. It makes much more sense to add a couple of lanes to the freeways every few years. Airports can be enlarged allowing more and bigger planes. Besides who would want to go from downtown LA to San Francisco in 2 or 3 hours by train when you can fly the distance in an hour. The hour or two early arrival at the airport, the TSA security circus, the 30 minutes to find your baggage is just part of the joy of flying. And who doesn’t enjoy 5 or 6 hours of bumper to bumper traffic needed for the trip. Far better than some silly high speed train. Yes lets not think of this crazy idea again. We’re car people, we drive or we fly. Europeans have trains, and just for that reason alone we simply can’t do that. We’re Americans, we’re not going let some silly liberal to take away to pleasure of a good TSA pat down.
kgblankinship1
Technologically, it’s actually a good idea if the rail is run on electricity. It’s not the TSA delay, but the promise of lower cost, scenic transport.
Being American doesn’t mean being the Ugly American. The Ugly American dresses tastelessly, is imperious and ethnocentric toward foreigners, drives a pickup or Hummer, loves guns, and loves Big Oil. I would much rather we be the shrewd, prudent Americans that we used to be and plan smartly for the future.
yvondupuis
Torronto has added highways and they have a stretch of over 16 lanes and still the city grows and there are hours of traffic jam, highways are NOT the solution.
JNelson
I just love the notion that America’s roads, automobile industry and petroleum industry do not receive annual public subsidies. Nothing like a misinformed public.
James44
JNelson4:
You know what’s even better than a misinformed public? Misinformed, know-it-all Beltway dwellers like Charles Lane.
The more I read his columns, the more respect I lose for him.
VBobier Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 9:05 am
That’s when most knew that they were the sons/daughters of immigrants, today people don’t know of their roots or if told don’t want to believe it…
D. P. Lubic Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 7:56 am
Morris, while we are here, I asked a couple of times in the past what your alternative ideas would be. I’m still curious. Care to share?
David Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 9:28 am
Sorry, I don’t actually have any more respect for the Post than I do for WSJ.
D. P. Lubic Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 10:01 am
The Post used to have a very knowledgeable reporter on transportation, named Don Phillips. He also writes for Trains, and is currently with the International Herald Tribune (French paper).
Supposedly he no longer works for the Post because he had an editor who told him to only cover air and cars, that no one wanted to read “that crap” about trains and trucks (he also wrote about freight issues). That wording in quotes, by the way, is from Phillips himself, quoting his editor.
Nathanael Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 6:05 pm
None of the national dailies in the US is worth a quarter any more. The LA Times, the St. Petersburg Times, and the NYT occasionally have good reporting, and occasionally a good editorial, but basically every paper in the country is fishwrap right now.
I read foreign papers online. *shrug*.
Alon Levy Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 9:10 pm
Sure, but the quality of fish that you’d wrap with the newspaper that carries Krugman is higher than that of the fish that you’d wrap with the newspaper that carries Krauthammer and Dionne.
wu ming Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 10:50 am
that’s by charles lane, not lan. editor of the new republic, who oversaw and printed stephen glass’ fabricated articles, before he moved to the wapo, where he works the SCOTUS beat (not infrastructure or rail). to get an idea of his politics (if being an editor of the new republic isn’t already a tip-off):
“In 2011, Lane wrote that he hoped that Democratic Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, who was unable to speak as a result of having been shot in the head a few weeks earlier, would speak out against union workers in Wisconsin if she “could speak normally” (from <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Lane_(journalist)"?wikipedia, lane’s original “tyranny in wisconsin” column here.
this is just more “post-partisan” centrist mad lib boilerplate reporting attacking any democratic deviation from the status quo as “partisan politics.”
wu ming Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 10:50 am
apologies for the botched link.
It’s a BOONDOGGLE! LOL. Time to update the attack language?
Does anyone here actually believe that it will cost the same for two routes, when one is 30 miles shorter? Even if you gold plate the longer one, it should still cost billions less.
Brsk Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 8:38 am
Do you know what a tunnel with a seismic chamber is? Do understand how much more it costs than running through the tumbleweed of the high desert?
VBobier Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 9:03 am
Heck I googled seismic chamber & I couldn’t find anything about It, so If You know what It is, how about enlightening us? Please?
Brsk Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 9:19 am
Well see the Bakersfield Californian: http://www.bakersfield.com/news/business/economy/x504581553/The-Grapevine-Back-in-play-as-a-bullet-train-route
It is basically a big room underground so when the tunnel moves 20 to 40 feet in an earthquake you can reconnect the two pieces.
Roger Christensen Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 11:11 am
There is a section of the Red Line between Hollywood and Universal that crosses
a fault and is surrounded by a massive seismic chamber.
Andre Peretti Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 9:28 am
I don’t know for tunnels. Some bridges have anti-seismic chambers used as shock absorbers. You have sets of two chambers filled with silicon grease communicating with each other through valves.
Donk Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 12:30 pm
Ok, so how many $B extra will this seismic chamber cost? They are already going to tunnel roughly the same amount for both routes. So are you implying that the seismic chamber alone is equivalent to the cost of 30 miles of non-tunneled, mostly elevated track?
Tom McNamara Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 1:02 pm
Here’s my blatantly obscured understanding:
Tejon is where two fault lines converge, but they are not parallel to one another. Given that in 1857 the San Andreas ripped here, you could have some serious collateral action on neighboring faults.
The solution was to have the train cross one of the faults at grade so that they would not have to deal with a Poseidon Adventure scenario with a train or people trapped between the two seismic chambers.
However, if we do that…then because of the incline on the north side of the Grapevine, you would need artificial (read stilts) measures to keep the grade consistent for high speed rail trains. (Basically you just need to calculate what length of track is needed to go from sea level to almost a mile up at a 2% grade. )
Clem Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 1:07 pm
3.5% grade.
adirondacker12800 Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 1:42 pm
how many places in the world do they have miles of 3.5% grade?
Peter Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 1:50 pm
DesertXpress is planning even steeper grades. 4% or greater, I believe. For a few miles at a time.
Tom McNamara Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 2:32 pm
So your ten mile train to the sky becomes seven miles. Doesn’t matter. It’s going to require a #$%@ of steel and concrete, and if it breaks there’s no easy way to restore service.
Moreover, if a cataclysmic event does happen…do you really want to put all the state’s eggs in one basket in the event the I-5 is also severed?
Alon Levy Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 4:59 pm
If a cataclysmic event happens, California will have bigger problems than high-capacity ground transportation across the Grapevine.
Tom McNamara Reply:
January 11th, 2012 at 8:33 am
8.0 earthquakes are not cataclysmic events in California. They are a certainty. What I would be worried about is that the if the plates shift north toward the Grapevine you could have a situation where supplies could use the high speed rail cars in a pinch.
(You know, sort of like the French cab drivers taking soldiers to the Marne and stopping the German invasion in WWI…)
The Train to the Sky in Tejon ™ will take a long time to repair or clear for use… in Palmdale the San Andreas fault should be crossed at grade and would be much easier IMHO to fix in an emergency.
Paulus Magnus Reply:
January 11th, 2012 at 8:40 am
Yeah, no, that’s not going to happen. Anything critical will be airlifted, everything else will go by truck or freight rail. Relocating hospital patients and those injured in the quake is also going to be via airlift. HSR will simply take too long to verify the system is still safe to use and takes too long without sufficient litter capacity to be worthwhile.
Clem Reply:
January 11th, 2012 at 1:13 pm
All the faults are crossed at grade via Tejon, so I’m not sure what you’re going on about. The train to the sky doesn’t go any higher via Tejon than elsewhere… a mere 1000 m above sea level. You make it sound like the Himalayas.
Richard Mlynarik Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 2:17 pm
Ahh …. except … you have it exactly backwards. (As usual…)
The PB Boys’ own report features the word “chamber” twice: once as “Bakersfield Chamber of Commerce”, the second in Table 7.3-2 “Other Comparisons” on page 37 of the report (p 49 of the PDF file) where “San Gabriel fault crossing” is described as “Tunnel with fault chamber” for the Antelope Valley route and “At Grade” for the I-5 route. (All other listed fault crossings are “At Grade” for both alternatives.)
To say that this study reeks to high heaven is, well, just to re-re-re-re-confirm its authorship. (And once again, I never had any huge objection, or any well-informed opinion about Palmdale.) It’s like the PB Boys know they don’t even have to even give the appearance of trying to lie convincingly — instead they seem to actively enjoy relish everybody’s noses in big conspicuous mounds of unmissable filth.
Nathanael Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 6:47 pm
The study looks pretty solid, actually, despite your usual hysterical attacks. It basically says the two routes are a wash, when adjusted for the fact that Palmdale has had more detail work put in (detail work always raises the price when NIMBYs are around).
The key section is the paragraph listing the governments which want the Palmdale route. The most important one on the list is *Los Angeles County*. I think that is politically decisive.
Clem Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 9:03 pm
You’re right about the key section, but why was this political decision wrapped in what pretends to be a technical assessment? As a piece of engineering, it is unmitigated bullshit.
Alon Levy Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 9:09 pm
Meh. The study bends over backward to accommodate Tejon Ranch. If the studies for the Peninsula had accommodated the hysterics of PAMPA, Belmont, and Burlingame, they’d conclude it’s best to stop in San Jose or just go to Oakland.
Clem Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 9:29 pm
It’s even more f’ed up. Did you see the 120 mph speed restriction through the other development near Santa Clarita? Another blatant distortion of the time difference between Tejon and the Palmdale detour…
Feinstein calls for CHSRA to be moved “to Caltrans” (or maybe just to the proposed Transportation Agency: http://blogs.sacbee.com/capitolalertlatest/2012/01/feinstein-urges-moving-high-speed-rail-to-caltrans.html
The blog article is not clear whether Feinstein is actually calling for the project to be put into Caltrans, or just into the proposed agency.
Link to Feinstein’s letter: http://www.feinstein.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/press-releases?ID=e2265894-22a0-4fff-abc8-a151fc583aec
David Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 9:40 am
Since the Governor already proposed that, it looks like she is just giving the Senate’s support for the move. She said it would be moved to the new Transportation Agency, where it would be able to draw on the resources of Caltrans.
Much ado about nothing.
Rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.
Because Calif High-Speed Rail is DOA.
I say that as someone who has supported rail for 40 years.
I have worked to increase state-supported services.
I have worked to preserve and reuse historic rail structures.
But CHSRA has been a disaster from the starting gate.
The primary concern in California was and is the distance between LA and SF.
The distance is about the same as DC to Boston in the Northeast Corridor –
But the NEC has the majority of its population between the two endpoints.
Palmdale, Bakersfield, and Fresno in no way meet those conditions.
The roundabout routing, absurd average speeds, and fairytale ridership projections –
Only insured that the entire edifice would come crashing down under scrutiny.
And it has.
Last week the CHSR Peer Review Group recommended defunding.
http://www.cahsrprg.com/files/CommentsonCHSRA2010FundingPlan.pdf
The Peer Review Group’s chair is Will Kempton – a person with decades of Calif transportation experience.
The report to the California Legislature outlines a litany of mismanagement and misplanning.
CHSRA tried to be all things to all people – transportation, urban renewal, environmental, jobs, etc.
Had it have concentrated, instead, on its primary goal of a direct high-speed LA to SF link –
It would have had a far greater chance of success.
This is not the first time the California rail initiatives have failed.
Similarly, other state high-speed initiatives have largely failed.
It will take another generation to revisit high-speed rail.
And THAT is the largest failure of CHSRA.
Nathanael Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 6:03 pm
Try looking up the populations of Fresno and Bakersfield. You clearly don’t know how large they are.
The ridership projections by the CHSRA are low.
Jamawani Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 8:06 pm
Lemme see – -
Bakersfield and Fresno –
Vs New York Metro and Philly Metro.
Hmmm – - seems about equal to me.
Yeah, I do know their populations.
And they are not sufficient to drive HSR.
Especially if they increase route length
And decrease avg speeds between endpoints.
You demonstrate the kind of thinking that has killed CHSRA –
It wants to be all things to all people and all places.
And, of course, Palmdale is the most extreme example.
ComradeFrana Reply:
January 11th, 2012 at 3:47 am
“Bakersfield and Fresno –
Vs New York Metro and Philly Metro.”
try vs. Valladolid and Malaga just for fun
Jamawani Reply:
January 13th, 2012 at 6:56 am
Actually, the Spanish HSR is quite different than the California design.
In the case of Spain, it is a hub-and-spoke with Madrid at the center.
As, I said earlier – Calif is looking at pop centers at the extreme ends.
Also, Malaga is a spur of the Madrid-Seville line – which proves my point.
Just FYI for the geographically challenged.
jimsf Reply:
January 12th, 2012 at 8:11 am
The primary concern is the distance between sf and la? No it isn’t. The primary concern is managaing the transport of future population growth, 50-60+ million californians. The primary concern is to provide service to as many of them as possible. The primary concern is that the largets growth areas will be the high desert, the inland empire and the central valley. ( the same areas that are severly lacking in options now, and which suffer economically because if this)
If the only thing you care about is getting from sf to la quickly, you can fly easily.
la sj sf sd have a total population of 7 million our of the current 37 million. The bulk of californians do not live in those cities, they live in the suburbs and in adjacent regions. thats why the system is designed the way it is. It offers competitive express travel times between the big 4. but more importantly it brings the other 30 million folks within reach of each other. ( you know.. the ones who will be paying for the system…)
Jamawani Reply:
January 13th, 2012 at 7:01 am
For ridership models to work – (Not the numerology of the CHSRA) –
The vast majority of passengers must come from the LA and SF metro areas.
Intermediate cities just do not have sufficient population to justify the system –
Not to mention that anyone who has been to Bakersfield knows how automotive it is.
The distance between LA and SF makes even the most ambitious HSR difficult.
(And trust me, CHSRA’s speed/time estimates are HIGHLY optimistic.)
When you are already at the outer edge of viability for your primary ridership -
You don’t want to be adding distance and time.
Your position simply reflects the fairyland view that has permeated CHSRA from the beginning.
jimsf Reply:
January 13th, 2012 at 8:23 am
If the only thing that mattered is la to sf, and Im from sf, then there’s no need for the system because you can already get from la to sf by flying. If the in between points don’t matter then planes work. its the fact that train can pick up and drop off people at all tthe places on the edges and in the middle that makes them useful. Of all the trips within cali that I took in a lifetime, living in sf, the majority of them were not to los angeles but to hundreds of destinations covering a vast area from the valley to the ie to greater socal.
While la and sf stations would likely have the highest total ridership numbers, not every trip will be an la-sf ticket. the total tickets la to all other points and sf to all other points, combined will be higer than the total tickets la-sf AND, all the counties who’s residents voted for hsr service and who will have to foot the be, deserve that service. 1A would never have passed had the system been desinged as an la sf express. that would truly have been, if not the train to nowhere, then the train for no one. There are 800,000 people in SF and 3.7m in LA. Thats 4.5 m out out of 37 million californians, hardly the majority. And most of the other 32 million…live in all those other places that current plan serves.
Ben Pease Reply:
January 13th, 2012 at 10:21 am
JimSF’s comment about travel to greater LA and in-between places is good. Likewise the greater Bay Area. It bugs me still that the single route ending in San Francisco makes HSR a bit of a dead end. If every time an East Bay resident wants to take HSR they have to take the extra step of transferring to BART (or ferry, or a drive across the Bay Bridge, versus hopping on a train in Oakland, Fremont, or Livermore, that’s not helpful toward getting people to use HSR. (Also for those of us with a compass in our heads, it’s heading west to go southeast). Nice that it serves the Peninsula but it doesn’t do so much to get people off the ugly stretches of Hwy 880. (If I were in Hayward, my nearest stop would be long haul via crowded roads or non-express BART to SF, Palo Alto, San Jose, etc.; a long haul by road. There is always the temptation to complete the trip by car.
adirondacker12800 Reply:
January 13th, 2012 at 10:54 am
That’s what happens when you decide to live in Hayward.
Richard Mlynarik Reply:
January 13th, 2012 at 12:04 pm
How do these poor souls manage to locate airports today? And accomplish those trump-all-other-considerations no-transfer rides? (767 pick-up and drop-off at home?) And starting by going some distance east to go a larger distance west? That sets my little head all a-tizzy, it right does.
Jamawani Reply:
January 13th, 2012 at 3:52 pm
Actually – the Bay area terminal should have been in Oakland with a suburban stop in Pleasanton.
The peninsula routing was a no-go. (actually all of CHSR is now kaput)
Any Trans-Bay crossing would have been ridiculously expensive.
Dedicated Market St/Embarcadero to Oakland HSR trainside BART would have been effective.
Another example of CHSRA trying to be all things for all people.
Richard Mlynarik Reply:
January 13th, 2012 at 4:46 pm
If service to SF were technically or economically infeasible (ie if PBQD were in charge of “designing” and “specifying” the system) you might have a point, but given an access route (Altamont-Fremont-Redwood City-SF CBD) that is straightforward and (should, if PBQD were not screwing the planet) presents no major obstacles, there is no reason whatsoever not to plan to serve by far &mdash by far, nothing else is even close &mdash the largest market in northern California.
Siting and constructing a 400m x 50m station in Oakland is more challenging than you appear to understand, also. (SF had a good site, but the cretins at TJPA are destroying it. Hey, nothing that can’t be fixed with controlled demolition … eventually.)
I’ve advocated a Stage 0 service to Livermore for years, but that’s a matter of funding and phasing and getting something useful running ASAP, not of imaging that the SF Peninsula and the tip of the SF Peninsula shouldn’t be the end of the line, and sooner rather than later.
The sort of people who are actually building such a crossing as we speak believe (and are proving) otherwise.
The problems are not technical or economic, they are political and politicised cartel anti-competitive.
You can’t have ridden BART any time in the last couple decades anywhere on its critical and saturated Oakland-SF-Daly City section if you believe this.
adirondacker12800 Reply:
January 13th, 2012 at 5:32 pm
You can’t have ridden BART any time in the last couple decades anywhere on its critical and saturated Oakland-SF-Daly City section if you believe this.
Putting the station in Livermore it going to make it less saturated?
Richard Mlynarik Reply:
January 13th, 2012 at 5:47 pm
Suggestion: Stick to what you know anything about, like, Finger Lakes Transit or something.
adirondacker12800 Reply:
January 13th, 2012 at 6:46 pm
The Finger Lakes are hundreds of miles from here.
Go ahead, explain to us how some one in LA who wants to be at a 9 AM meeting on Market Street gets off the HSR train in Livermore and makes BART less crowded.
Jonathan Reply:
January 13th, 2012 at 7:01 pm
@jim:
Limiting the SF Bay Area population to SF city is a very, very strange thing to do.
US Census data puts the populatoin of the Bay Area at 7.15 million. Many of those are a long way away from _either_ Pacheco or Altamont routes; some are a fair way away from both. But 0.8 miillion is the wrong order of magnitude.
I find it strange to read sensible supporters of shared infrastructure (read: Altamont supporters) piping up in favor of a Grapevine alignment, when the only way to serve the (ca. 20 million annual trip) CA-Las Vegas travel market using shared infrastructure is via the Palmdale alignment. (You may be morally or aesthetically opposed to Las Vegas, but people really like to go there).
Las Vegas-bound Californians should have a rail option. It is almost willful ignorance that there is not a single mention of Las Vegas — a more popular destination for California intercity travelers than most cities in CA — in the CAHSR business report. How can we be planning for 2030 and beyond without considering Las Vegas? There are more than 2.5 million annual CA-Las Vegas air passengers today.
With a Palmdale alignment rail passengers to Las Vegas will be using CAHSR infrastructure for much of their trip. That is a good thing — and certainly worth a 5-minute detour (and even a $2 billion extra cost, if it comes to that).
Prediction: as soon as the CV is connected to DesertXpress we will see a huge jump in trips from Merced, Fresno, and Bakersfield to Las Vegas.
Alon Levy Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 4:56 pm
My standard answer is that it’s pointless to connect to what is now unfunded vaporware. If DX were under construction, let alone complete, Palmdale would be a different proposition.
The other thing is that it’s a 10-minute detour, not a 5-minute detour. The only reason it looks like a 5-minute detour is the Tejon Ranch issue.
Jonathan Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 6:05 pm
… “what is now unfunded vaporware”…
I bet that’s why BART didn’t think about HSR when building Millbrae ;)
Alon Levy Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 9:08 pm
HSR is pretty much irrelevant to BART to Millbrae. The problem with the alignment choice was that it was about trying to take imperial control over Caltrain while going through an inferior alignment (i.e. around the San Bruno Mountain, instead of through the Bayshore Cutoff). Forget HSR; BART could’ve connected to Caltrain in San Bruno, and served SFO but not Millbrae.
And conversely, the choice to go to Millbrae is not really a problem for HSR. The tunnel is stupid. HSR could try to compel BART to give up one of the three tracks and then do everything at-grade; it’s not any operational constraint on BART even given the way it currently runs.
jimsf Reply:
January 12th, 2012 at 7:59 am
BArt waqs already in DalyCity, how would you propose getting from from DC to SFO via Bayshore?
Jonathan Reply:
January 13th, 2012 at 7:04 pm
Alon,
I wasn’t talking about BART _to_ Millbrae, but about the Millbrae BART station and its needless incursion into the Caltrain right-of-way, and how that station severely limits alignments for HSR.
(Well, for quad-tracking of any kind).
And for this, we pay the Caltrain CEO (and his other hats) $400,000/yr. Bah.
egk Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 9:08 pm
But that is a bad answer, because whether or not the DesertXpress project itself is funded, rail planning for California should pay attention to the Las Vegas market. It is a huge travel market, well suited to HSR and most of the track will be in California. Ignoring this when planning a HSR system for CA seems … yes, willfully ignorant.
(BTW don’t ignore the NorCal-LV HSR market: travel to Las Vegas is particularly suited to long distance HSR. LV trips are mostly multi-day leisure trips [not there-and-back business trips] and an extra hour in the bar car on Friday evening is probably just fine for anybody traveling to to LV for the weekend.)
StevieB Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 11:48 pm
High Speed Rail to the resort of Las Vegas does not provide the economic benefits to California that connecting California cities does.
adirondacker12800 Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 11:57 pm
Except when some of the two million people who live in Metro Las Vegas decide to go to California.
StevieB Reply:
January 11th, 2012 at 12:40 am
The cost benefit ratio would not justify the expense for California.
Alon Levy Reply:
January 11th, 2012 at 3:59 am
The reason I’m mentioning DX specifically is that if HSR to Vegas is delayed, then there’s time to evaluate the merits of Cajon. It’s not as good for travel from the Bay Area to Vegas – even the optimal connector for NorCal, Mojave-Barstow, offers at best 3:30 trip time from San Francisco, let alone a detour through the LA Basin – but it’s much better for San Diego and the Inland Empire. If Phoenix ever gets an HSR line, then it’d also provide a Phoenix-Vegas line automatically.
The other issue is that if Nevada interests want California to modify its HSR line to suit Nevada’s needs, then Nevada should chip in to pay some of the extra cost of Palmdale. Personally, I’m not too worried about the 10 minutes of travel time – I consider the savings to be the equivalent of the Vegas connection, perhaps slightly more important but only as a tie-breaker in case the costs are identical. But the significant difference in construction cost matters.
adirondacker12800 Reply:
January 11th, 2012 at 9:44 am
then it’d also provide a Phoenix-Vegas line automatically.
If San Francisco to Las Vegas via Barstow is too long for HSR Phoenix to Las Vegas via San Bernandino is too long. Driving distance is the same give or take 20 miles.
Palmdale is Los Angeles’ Altamont, you get all sorts of gooey goodness – like a cheap connection to Las Vegas out of it.
egk Reply:
January 11th, 2012 at 3:34 pm
And why care about Las Vegas?
Because more Southern Californians go to LV every year than go to the Bay Area, the Central Valey and Sacramento COMBINED. And BY FAR.
Annual trips (1995; million)
From: Los Angeles/Long Beach
To:
Las Vegas 5.59
San Diego 3.73
Riverside 1.35
Santa Barb. 1.22
San Fran. 1.06
Oakland 0.55
Bakersfield 0.52
New York 0.50
Phoenix 0.45
Honolulu 0.42
Just saying…if you going to provide awesome green sustainable etc etc transportation you probably should provide said transportation to places that people want to go….
ComradeFrana Reply:
January 12th, 2012 at 11:51 am
“If San Francisco to Las Vegas via Barstow is too long for HSR Phoenix to Las Vegas via San Bernandino is too long.”
This, plus the route LV-SB-Phoenix is about twice as long as LV-Phoenix by air.
Robert, you just linked to my comment on yesterday’s thread and made the observation “Those comments seem more focused on justifying the Grapevine alignment by any means necessary.” That is not my motivation at all. I have no real preference for either route, except to prefer whichever one has the best cost/benefit trade off.
However, I can recognize politicized bullshit masquerading as an engineering document when I see it, and that’s precisely what this document is. It is not possible to make an informed decision on the cost/benefit of a Tejon route vs. a Palmdale route from this document because the cheapest and fastest Tejon route was not taken forward to detailed analysis. The fact that they acknowledge that the route through Lebec is ‘considerably more expensive and slower’ than the route through the Tejon Ranch indicates that they did a preliminary cost and travel time analysis on both routes. Why can’t we see the numbers for the Tejon Ranch route?
Someone noted yesterday that CAHSR could buy out the Tejon Ranch for $500m at the most. (I don’t know if that number is accurate but let’s assume for the moment that it is.) If the Tejon Ranch route is cheaper than the Lebec route by the amount that it would cost to buy out Tejon Ranch, then it’s a good deal and should be used as the preferred Tejon route for comparison with the Palmdale route.
Even aside from the transportation benefits, I for one think that avoiding impacts to the actually existing community of Lebec is more important than avoiding impacts to the proposed Tejon Mountain Village, which currently exists only on paper. And I don’t think a private landowner wanting to build a sprawling gated community should be able to hold to ransom such an important transportation project. They are far more deserving of attack than the peninsula NIMBYs, who after all will have to live with the results of the project, and yet you give them a free pass. What gives?
Tom McNamara Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 12:30 pm
Four words: Kern Valley Water Bank
Jon Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 1:51 pm
Care to elaborate on what relevance that has to Tejon Ranch?
Richard Mlynarik Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 2:01 pm
Three words: Klaatu Barada Nikto.
thatbruce Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 3:46 pm
And if you mess it up, either a large giant cooperation rises up and stomps over your interests, or the
NIMBYs start rising.
VBobier Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 4:13 pm
And when the state wins in court what will the poor little nimbys do? Nothing I’d hope.
Tom McNamara Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 2:44 pm
Semper ubi sub ubi….
http://www.insidebayarea.com/trivalleyherald/localnews/ci_12443070
Nathanael Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 6:52 pm
Good grief water politics are complicated.
I wonder how long the unsustainable Kern County water hogs are going to last. The droughts are going to come more and more often. Before full-scale conservation kicks in statewide, LA is going to seize any water it can get its hands on, by means legal or illegal…
Jonathan Reply:
January 13th, 2012 at 7:26 pm
LA’s water needs are piffling. Agriculture consumes 80% of the water in CA, and they get it at dirt-cheap prices compared to consumers of city water supply.
Donk Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 12:39 pm
Plus, if CA buys the Tejon Ranch area and preserves it as a State park, this will make lots of environmentalists happy – even we dig two huge tunnels underneath it.
Jon Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 1:51 pm
Agreed. This land should not be in private hands to begin with.
Tom McNamara Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 2:47 pm
Note what I posted above:
Jon Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 3:18 pm
So your point is that Tejon Ranch are making their property look more valuable than it is in order to extract the maximum amount of cash from the state if/when they buy it?
Still not seeing the relevance. Every landowner liable to ED will be doing the same thing, albeit on a smaller scale.
Tom McNamara Reply:
January 11th, 2012 at 8:39 am
No…
The City of Los Angeles doesn’t want Tejon competing with its supply of water. That’s the point of the Kern Valley Water Bank. It’s a way for the Metropolitan Water District to disguise how much water it uses and needs. Water is a requirement for new development, which is the lifeblood of all economic activity in Southern California.
Also, since KVWB is really water from the Delta it makes much more sense to bank it then to use it like surface water. In the end, unless we authorize and build the Peripheral Canal (another 10 beellion bond measure) the Delta will die or Southern California will run out of water (at least on paper).
Jon Reply:
January 11th, 2012 at 2:07 pm
You’re still not explaining your argument. What does the Kern Valley Water Bank have to do with CAHSR not being able to purchase Tejon Ranch?
Tom McNamara Reply:
January 11th, 2012 at 3:55 pm
Because the last thing the Authority needs to do is overpay for worthless real estate… Gold-plating, union kickbacks, sweetheart deals are one thing… but bad land deals is a whole ‘nother level of incompetence.
Jon Reply:
January 12th, 2012 at 10:30 am
So you’d rather spend billions extra on a longer and slower route on the principle that the taxpayer shouldn’t have to spend million to purchase private land that would enable a quicker and cheaper route, as well as giving us a nice state park and guaranteed environmental conservation of the land to boot?
Sounds like bending over backwards to defend Palmdale, if you ask me.
How often do you visit Vegas? Once your friends all get married and the bachelor party barrage is over with, you might go once/year, if that. Travel within CA is much more important, both for business and personal travel. Vegas should be considered in this whole thing, but should be near the bottom of the list.
The most important thing is to actually get something built. If it costs $15B to get from Bako-Sylmar, then I don’t know if this ever will get built. The only thing I care about is getting the costs down so that we can get this built. If that means using the Antelope Valley Metrolink Line as a separate spur to connect to Palmdale, that is what it means.
Donk Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 12:36 pm
That was in response to egk
egk Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 3:09 pm
*I* never visit Vegas. But upwards of 20 million people take trips there from CA every year. The point is the get THEM to pay for some of that expensive tunnel connecting SoCal to the Central Valley.
Remember HSR makes a profit. So having CAHSR also serve Las Vegas (well, Victorville) means that some of the profit for those CA-LV trips (and, more importantly, the potential to borrow against it) can go to build out the rest of the CAHSR system.
Ask yourself which is a better proposition: $15 billion to connect Bakersfield to Sylmar with no connection to Las Vegas or $20 billion to connect Sylmar, Bakersfield, and Victorville (-Las Vegas). For (say) $5 billion you have now added a huge travel market – (DesertXpress estimates revenues nearing $1 billion annually WITHOUT a rail connection to Victorville)
I suppose that if/when DesertXpress gets its federal loan SOMEBODY will do an estimate of what the combined CAHSR+DesertXpress system will generate in revenue. It is disheartening that we don’t have those numbers today, however, because I’d think that the IOS-South+DesertXpress+Palmdale-Victorville would be a pretty good business proposition and make the CAHSR project itself look more financially appealing.
VBobier Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 4:24 pm
The Eir said both routes cost about the same, Tejon is too risky cause of 3 fault lines and would only save 3-5 minutes(big whoop, higher speed, like 225mph will fix that), so Palmdale here We come, like It or not, Pa,dale is safer and has the added benefit to the state of more riders and that means more money coming in to the states coffers too.
Donk Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 8:18 pm
If it costs much less and is much faster to build Tejon, I will put all of my support behind that. If the costs actually are comparable, then I am happy with Palmdale. If building it thru Palmdale means that we get the support of Harry Reid et al and are able to get it built even faster, then great. I just don’t believe that Tejon got a fair shake in this whole thing.
Peter Baldo Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 8:19 pm
Not to mention 2 Senators – Harry Reid and Dean Heller, who’s on the surface transportation subcommittee. If California’s 53 House members will pull together, the high-speed train project will be in good shape. Having 2 Nevada Senators and 3 Nevada Reps on board will help as well. Then, on to Utah!
jim Reply:
January 11th, 2012 at 9:08 am
But then, if my grandmother had wheels …
I really wish the CHSRA hadn’t been forced (by some very stupid and deliberately obnoxious law) to quote numbers in meaningless “year of expenditure dollars” (requiring them to predict future inflation rates).
It means I can’t make any comparison of costs between the new and the old numbers.
Does anyone know what is meant by “less growth-inducing impacts on urbanized land”? If the line goes through Palmdale, won’t Palmdale grow like Topsy? If HSRA says it expects to carry large numbers of commuters, isn’t this saying that the city where the commuters live will grow? On the other hand, if the line simply goes over Tejon without any stations there will be zero commuters and zero growth.
StevieB Reply:
January 11th, 2012 at 12:22 am
From page Executive Summary‐ii
Elizabeth Reply:
January 11th, 2012 at 9:18 am
The logic of which would no longer hold of course if the time savings is only 2 minutes.
Another thing to point out: the CHSRA *listens to city governments*. Perhaps excessively. If Santa Clarita says it doesn’t want an I-5 alignment, while Sylmar wants an Antelope Valley alignment, it happens.
It’s only if you’re a jackass and refuse all possible options (like Kings County…) that the CHSRA starts ignoring you.
FYI, the NIMBYs along the Altamont corridor were a lot worse than the ones on the Pacheco corridor… and Gilroy actually wanted a train… result? You see the results.
“Critics”: Pay attention to that before you make any claims that CHSRA doesn’t listen to locals. It does.
Jonathan Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 6:49 pm
Especially if the local’s name is Ron Diridon!!!
in Richar’ds pipe-dream world, the Dumbarton crossing is “for free”. He even said so. Presumably that means the old SP bridge. Never mind that it’s partly destroyed by arson. Never mind that it’s an old steam-railroad behemoth not designed or built for high-speed rail. Never mind that it’s *single track*, and the footings won’t take double-tracking. I honestly don’t know if anyone has studied where to mount catenary masts on that antique. Definitely not free.
And if the Usual Suspects get to bid on a tunnel — *definitely* not “free”.
It’s a bit ike the Altamont religion: those in favor of Altamont seem unwilling or unable to concede the downsides of Altamont. Not as vituperously as Richard, of course.
Joey Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 7:17 pm
There are plenty of downsides to Altamont. They just happen to be lesser than the downsides of Pacheco.
As far as the crossing goes, it really doesn’t make sense to consider the cost of any particular element of either alignment when comparing the alignments as a whole. The CHSRA’s own data said that Altamont would be only $400m more than Pacheco (with Dumbarton high bridge and branch to SJ), or $700m replacing the high bridge with a bored tunnel. Now, that was not a very accurate estimate, but we have no way of telling if Pacheco or Altamont would have incurred more cost inflation at this point in time. Let’s assume for a second that Altamont did turn out to be more expensive. That difference would almost certainly be recouped by having less track to build between Chowchilla and Manteca in Phase 2 ($2.5 billion at reasonable costs, more like $4 billion at CHSRA costs). And that’s ignoring the Altamont “overlay” and of course BART to SJ.
Emma Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 9:33 pm
I think he used free in a different way than you interpreted it. Basically any proposal that provides more HSR for less than $98 billion is “free”.
how on *earth* do you pull BART to SJ into that picture-frame???
Joey Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 7:51 pm
There would be sufficient capacity on new HSR infrastructure between Fremont and SJ that regional trains could use it as well with minimal additional infrastructure. Hence no need to extend BART.
adirondacker12800 Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 7:53 pm
Or they could say “BART to Fremont is good enough, no need for HSR to go to San Jose”
That saves a lot of money.
Joey Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 8:04 pm
Depends on how quickly things could be turned around. Note, however, that standard-gauge rail to SJ is almost certainly considerably cheaper than BART to SJ, probably owing to the lack of tunnels.
adirondacker12800 Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 8:27 pm
at the rate California is building HSR you’ll be able to take BART to Stockton and change to HSR there…..
Joey Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 8:59 pm
The future is admittedly bleak. BART to SJ hasn’t started any real construction beyond Warm Springs, but it’s going to soon, and with regional leaders sticking to the Pacheco+BART plan, that’s probably not going to change. As Richard notes, SJ-Fremont-Livermore-Tracy (or some part thereof) would make a solid ICS in lieu of BART, but of course the environmental work couldn’t be completed anywhere near on time.
All I can say is that we’re going to be spending a lot of money fixing these mistakes in the future.
Clem Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 9:25 pm
Spending a lot of money, for certain key people (and corporations who are people too), is the entire point. Why do things right when you can do them over and over?
jimsf Reply:
January 12th, 2012 at 7:53 am
The bay area has been waiting 40 years for bart to go to san jose. I don’t see anything bleak about it.
Joey Reply:
January 13th, 2012 at 12:06 am
It’s much more expensive than the alternatives and severely limits interconnectivity.
adirondacker12800 Reply:
January 13th, 2012 at 12:15 am
But why would anyone want to go someplace that is BARTless?
Alon Levy Reply:
January 13th, 2012 at 12:26 am
Why would anyone want to go to San Jose, with or without BART?
Alon Levy Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 9:03 pm
Yeah, but BART to SJ is a foregone conclusion at this point.
I don’t want to snark, but saying something is cheaper than BART to SJ is different from retro-fantasizing about standard-gauge BART in degree more than in kind.
Tom McNamara Reply:
January 11th, 2012 at 3:56 pm
More like retro-fantasizing about what air travel would be like if we still used zeppelins…
Clem Reply:
January 10th, 2012 at 9:20 pm
Why is this not obvious
Politically Skewed Grapevine Alignment “Selection” Excludes Shorter Bear Trap Canyon Route
I have the strong suspicion that the “selection” of the Tejon Pass Route is politically motivated to play favor to the Palmdale politicians. On pages 14 of the Conceptual I-5 Corridor Study just released it states: “Bear Trap Canyon (which is within the Study area) is the only location which might present a feasible alternative to Tejon Pass to cross the Garlock fault at grade, other than the Tehachapi Pass which the Antelope Valley alignments currently follow.”
Actually looking at the Canyon elevation on page 13 (Figure 4.3-1), it appears that it is even LOWER than the elevation of both Tejon Pass and Tehachapi Pass (on the favored Palmdale route). On the plan view of the alternatives on page 22 (Figure 5.4-1, Potentially Feasible Alignments with Fault Hazard Zones), it is by far the shortest route, has the least tunnels, AND intersects the two faults at right angle. Note that the study does not provide additional insight, why the Bear Trap Canyon route was not followed further. I really wonder why.
StevieB Reply:
January 13th, 2012 at 1:09 am
At the board presentation Bear Canyon was mentioned to be undesirable due to lack of roads. In CONCEPTUAL I-5 CORRIDOR STUDY BAKERSFIELD TO SAN FERNANDO VALLEY (SYLMAR) JANUARY 2012, REV 0 it says Tejon Ranch objects on page 24.
synonymouse Reply:
January 13th, 2012 at 11:33 am
If you grant veto power to the Tejon Ranch crowd, especially over the far and away the optimum alignment, how can you deny the right to any other stakeholder to resist CHSRA incursion with every resource at their disposal. This makes the Chandlers NIMBY’s of the first order. Curious the foamers defend them while reviling PAMPA.
What the Chandlers are extorting out of the Brown regime is blatantly unconstitutional, namely an embargo over a unique natural transport corridor.
This is good news. I knew they were going to stay with palmdale because its just the right way to do it. I still support the route as shown on the website. The one we voted for. The one that hits all the population centers, and highest future population growth areas. the central valley cities, the antelope valley cities, and the Inland Empire cities. A system that not only connects sf to la but also puts the most people within 30 minutes of a station as possible and connects the largest number of city pairs. The success will depend on bringing the trains as close as possible to as many destinations as possible much more than it will depend solely on a fast la-sf travel time. That will be the end result. Just watch and see. The train has to serve all the places and people who are paying for it and who voted for it. The more people with easy access the more successful ridership.
H. Donahue Reply:
January 11th, 2012 at 10:16 pm
This is hard to believe. Are you paid by the city of Palmdale and its cronies? The more direct route is the faster and better alternative. Who cares about Palmdale, if 90+% of the riders will sit 10 minutes longer so you can get your fancy train station. I though you are getting a Desert Express or something instead. I think the previous post has similar arguments.
jimsf Reply:
January 12th, 2012 at 11:49 pm
Where you absent when they taught reading comprehension? You completely missed, or ignored, the point of my post. And who aer Palmdales “cronies” and do other cities have them or is it just Palmdale? I live in Merced but I guess if Palmdale sent me a check I’d cash it. Can you give them a call?
synonymouse Reply:
January 13th, 2012 at 11:59 am
It is not Palmdale that is the muscle behind the detour – they are just a front. It is LA, which doesn’t really have a clue as to what its best interests are in the long run. But totally in line with a long history of self-destruction. Look at the sad story of the PE and LARy.
Tejon will prove a boon to LA, much better than Tehachapi. Efficiency always pays real rewards.