It's his typical trains suck gainsay and spin, and the usual nimby pandering horsecrap about "noisy" "Evil Thomas". Same line of fearmongering and horsecrap some of the Nimby's use to try to "stop" the "noisy" "evil" Gold Line, back when I dealt with this Nimby nonsense in Pasadena in the mid nineties.

All of your points are right and completely wasted on the simple minded who bleat this kind of Nimby drivel, not because it is some unsolvable show stopper, but to spread fear and ignorance, and promote opposition to the project by spreading disinformation which panders to the fear, in hopes of stirring emotional opposition to the project. Those appeals to fear work, because fear is a much stronger motivator of human behavior than are appeals to reason.

I've reviewed and approved sound mitigation for LRT projects and freeway sound wall projects, So, like you and many others on Altamont, I know that this is something that can be and is successfully mitigated all over the world, with proper track and vehicle design, and proper sound barriers, or even specific sound dampening technologies. And, I know from some experience that it's way easier and far cheaper than retrofitting houses under LAX and Burbank's flight paths.

I'm not exactly known as a real fan of the current CAHSRA fiasco. I have more fundamental problems with things like the transportation "purpose and needs" this project is supposed to purportedly serve, and the incredible incompetence from the earliest planning to the day to day execution, and the unbelievable waste of taxpayer resources for what we are getting. But, this "noisy" "evil Thomas" spin is just another typical bowel full of Nimby dingleberry's, being predictably served up to us "little people" by this particular source.