Desert Xpress spent real money and did a real EIS, and actually got real right of way agreements with US DOT, BLM, and Caltrans. What they didn't get, for political reasons, was a loan from FRA - needed because the commercial payback terms (short-term loans only) at the time on the amount of money they needed were too high. The loan request was well within the FRA program's capabilities, but Congress killed it.

THIS "project" definitely looks like a scam. In the olde dayze, there were all sorts of paper railroads, many of them issued stock, and practically none of them ever returned anything on the "investment." Crowdfunding is even worse - you don't even get a piece of paper that resembles a real, registered stock certificate that has some collector value after the company vanished with all your money.