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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Two other bills are less welcome:

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

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

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

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

• Bart Reed of the Transit Coalition was on LA CityView earlier this week defending the pro side on Prop 1A against Joel Fox, former head of the Howard Jarvis Association and predictable train hater. Click “Roundtable 48″ to see the video. Reed made an excellent case for Prop 1A. Definitely worth watching. I’ll have more detailed responses to Joel Fox’s claims in a post later this week.
• Cathleen Galgiani was the subject of a positive piece in the Stockton Record about her work in getting AB 3034 shepherded through the legislature. This bill was originally going to be carried by Fiona Ma, probably the best HSR advocate we have in Sacramento, but when Ma’s legislative calendar got too full she handed it off to Galgiani, whose persistence helped get the bill passed. This blog hasn’t been totally supportive of Galgiani’s approach to HSR, as we disagreed with her efforts to weaken the LA-SF “spine,” but she has become a key HSR figure in the state and deserves to have her fine work recognized.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Or did they?

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Well said. The Bee continues:

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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