One way to introduce a little reality to the whole HSR affair might be to have people who are not "promoters" look at it. I suspect that with regard to what this group (previously US DOT) is promoting wouldn't stand up to either economic or transportation planning analysis - though some pieces of it might, with modifications. IMO, for instance, HSR or at least Higher-Speed Rail (over 125 mph) can make sense in certain corridors, or between certain city pairs, even with air and highway competition. But a National System? Give me a break - talk about some corridor-level Amtrak/state-operated upgrades & settling on what a basic long-distance (low-speed, essentially a Z train) social service system should look like, and it might make sense. Let the states put operation out to bid with Amtrak just one of the bidders - I'd kind of like that too. But little of that involves true High Speed Rail; it's just sensible transportation planning.

Also, let's get real here: any train that travels more than 80 (OK, maybe 90) mph is "high speed rail" in the US, mainly because 1) there are so few of them, and 2) in most cases there's not even a remote economic need for it. The latter can be massaged, though. For instance, I suspect that those guys promoting (there's that word again) the TX affair (see [www.altamontpress.com] ) might be able to pull it off with enough luck and tweaks, though to be useful as part of the general transportation system a few features may need to be added (access to the airports?) after they go bust and sell it to the state. But something like CAHSR in its present incarnation is a dead duck - nothing can meet all of the conflicting restrictions in the bond act (was that deliberate?), and there are too many expensive obstacles in CA for any private organization to be interested in building it without government backing.

In other words, as I said in my first note, this is a bunch of promoters. Ignore them, or at least parse their flack pieces for the few items that do make sense. Then find a way to do those, without the HSR consultants' involvement. Is there anybody out there that can lobby for rational passenger rail rather than these either-or extreme schemes (HSR or highways? - we need BOTH).