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Re: Seen Here Recently - Now Part of CAHSR Opponents Lawsuits
Author: mook
Date: 10-14-2014 - 17:38
You also might remember that my preference has been stated several times for HIGHER speed rail not necessarily HIGH speed. IOW trunk line trains (fed by lesser rail transit and buses, and cars and long-distance air travel) that top out at 150-180, allowing express schedules (with limited stops) averaging around 100-120, and "locals" (50 mi. or so between stations) that average at least 70. That would be ample to compete with driving and would be close to gross flight time between LA and the Bay Area (including all the incidentals): roughly 4 hours city center-center. Those speeds would also make things like getting over (or through) the mountains easier because you wouldn't have to build huge tunnels and bridges to handle a 200 mph alignment (merely large ones). Such a system would still need mostly separate tracks, because those speeds are too high to share with freight. So the total cost would probably still exceed $50B for a starter (SF-LA) line.
Of course, CAHSR, with its many faults (not just geological...), is what we have right now. If I ran the world, I might prefer to, say, take the money and LOAN (not give) it to XpressWest to build something along the lines of what they proposed to Vegas - a more practical approach to design and location, sharing space with major freeways. But I don't run the world (thank Heaven!), and as the Prop. was written that would be illegal, so we have to work with what we have.
I *do* think that the CA population will grow to something near what's projected, water woes or not - humans will do that, complaining all the way about how bad things are. If they are modern conservative Americans (go look up what the GOP was like in CA before the 1930s), they will complain but do nothing useful about it. To make such a population even remotely feasible to support, we'll need a lot more roads AND better rail transportation, and government involvement to some degree will be necessary to accomplish that.
Jerry Pournelle used to say: Better is the enemy of Good Enough. But Better has to be fundable, which sometimes results in Good Enough with ability to expand. IMO, CAHSR is trying for World Class (Way Better) before we're ready, but again that's what we have so let's try to do something useful (Better than Good Enough) with it.
Of course, CAHSR, with its many faults (not just geological...), is what we have right now. If I ran the world, I might prefer to, say, take the money and LOAN (not give) it to XpressWest to build something along the lines of what they proposed to Vegas - a more practical approach to design and location, sharing space with major freeways. But I don't run the world (thank Heaven!), and as the Prop. was written that would be illegal, so we have to work with what we have.
I *do* think that the CA population will grow to something near what's projected, water woes or not - humans will do that, complaining all the way about how bad things are. If they are modern conservative Americans (go look up what the GOP was like in CA before the 1930s), they will complain but do nothing useful about it. To make such a population even remotely feasible to support, we'll need a lot more roads AND better rail transportation, and government involvement to some degree will be necessary to accomplish that.
Jerry Pournelle used to say: Better is the enemy of Good Enough. But Better has to be fundable, which sometimes results in Good Enough with ability to expand. IMO, CAHSR is trying for World Class (Way Better) before we're ready, but again that's what we have so let's try to do something useful (Better than Good Enough) with it.
