Hadn't heard of that one about the coast line using "italian" trains of the 1930's vintage, that piece of information probably needs a little more evidence, as US technology of that era was vastly superior to Il Duce's trains......and it was called the Daylight.

Yes, there have been a number of such proposals since at least the 80's. And, I got to make several cab rides, and "field trips" down the Coast, on Talgo's and Danish DMU's with great interior design, when my old pal "Steel Neil" Peterson, tried to get people to take Phil Anschutz up on his offer to sell the entire Coast Line to the State for only $500 million in the early 90's. What a mistake......that we didn't do that, when we had a willing seller, at a very reasonable price.......

Steel Neil, had developed a very doable plan for such service, which would, with a number of still necessary operation improvement and the use of tilt train technology, achieve a six and one half hour through trip from LAUPT to SF, while still stopping to serve the existing "major" intermediate stops in Ventura Co, SB, SLO, Monterey Co, and San Jose.