That's the difference between real life and nostalgia. Do I spendanother twelve or fourteem billion dollars to widen the i-5, or do I build a first world intercity passenger service for half that much for the equivailent travel mileswe expect to generate in a corridor lieddke LOSSAN?

Don't get me wrong,I continue to keep the current San Clemente service on the coastal line for as long as one meter of sea level rise permits. Intermediate improvements and the siding extension are good short term investments. And local "flipper" OCTA intra county services to San Clemement couls actually increase.

But the construction of the San Clemente bypasss pencils out for the same reasons the the Del Mar bypass and the San Clemente bypasss penciled out ot the American High Speed Rail proposal back in 1980. The ability to provide a 110-140 capable double tracked main line saving over 2o minties of runnning time between LA and San Diego on the secone busisiest rail corridorm abd most congested intercity interstate highway corridor in the Unnited States of Anerica.