Maybe we can send Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on this high speed rail to meet Ma Chalmers. They can both be stranded together.

They should have contacted Dagny Taggart, She'd have gotten it done right!

Governor Newsome kind of backtracked today, saying the state will complete the first element, from Merced to Bakersfield. I think he's doing that just to hang onto the Federal money, because that route makes absolutely zero sense as a mass transit corridor. The reason they chose that route to start was to avoid lots of court time fighting property owners over a Los Angeles to San Francisco line.

A better route would have been a Los Angeles to Las Vegas line, and I have no doubt the casino crowd would have invested.

Me dino thought these United States would be crisscrossed with bulleting zoom zoom solar-paneled choo-choos by the time we got rid of airplanes and tore down every last building to build it back up again in accordance to environmental specs just 12 years from now to keep the world from ending then.
Me dino will turn 72 next month and was hoping to live to see all that miraculous stuff. Why? Because we were once able to go zoom zoom to the moon, that's why.
Now I'll see the world end instead! Hey, that's not fair!
How can I be buried if the world ends before everyone is too dead to provide me a decent funeral?
And if I do get buried, who is gonna be around to mow the lawn at the pretty cemetery I've already picked out?

Looks like California would’ve bankrupted itself before the “end of the world” as predicted in less than 12 years.

So Californians recognize something as costing too much?!

It is high time the plug was pulled.

Moonbeam did not do it out of sheer stubbornness, since it was his baby.

$ 77 billion! Boy! It started at $8 billion years ago then quickly went up to $16 the same year. I did not follow the avalanche but I see it reached a respectful amount.

And the left is denying $5.7 billion for the wall!

This scheme has never worked without massive subsidies which is always a good indication that it will never work. The only people capable of pulling off such an incredible scam is the government who can use violence to make you participate whether you want to or not. I doubt if enough investors could have been dredged up to get this boondockle off the drawing boards.

Just guessing here, in lieu of the non-existance of a truthful California Balance Sheet. My guess is that CA would have to sell every asset on the books to cover its liabilities....including state parks and the city of Sacramento.

For the record. I am (overall) for a high speed rail system crossing our country.

Most people don't realize that the Auto Industry took controlling interest of the rails, BEGGED the government to regulate them to death, an made sure that we went with individual vehicles.

I am shocked when I visit Russia and see how few people have cars. they have no place to park them. They walk. KIOSKS show up close to them. Society finds a way. But NOW they are building a High Speed rail all the way through to China, with China. Imagine if they built the nuclear power plants to power them CHEAPLY, and what happens next?

IMO Russia and China are going to eat our lunch. If they ALLY against us, we can be squeezed out of Europe. Russia has the nukes, China has the sheer numbers.

Well, its time for Captain AOC to come to the rescue. Maybe she can blame using STEEL instead of plastic straws (she has a source of them just floating in the oceans, the size of Texas, which, cannot be seen by any satellites).

Of course it was a success. We put 1,100 people to work for 12 minutes...
...oh, but gave all the profit to Germany...

They could've gone half the way to a 355 ship Navy with than money.

I think that the Federal Government should sue California for the 3+Billion given for program be returned and all future work should be only state funds. It is certainly a waste of money and would require federal and state subsidies forever.

They are still finishing the link between Merced and Bakersfield. This will cost 1.6 billion and they are finishing it to keep 3.5 billion in federal money for the project.

It's currently a 3 hour train trip that costs $27. I'm not sure how much time they'll cut off that and exactly how many passengers will be flowing between Merced and Bakersfield.