As for the slide vs the freeway, you are correct, but is the railroad carrying 300K passengers (not counting the trucks) at that point *per day*? Even per year? The second-biggest corridor operated by Amtrak frankly barely reaches the operating usage of a good-sized country road. Plus, of course, the slide fix had to be made in a restrictive environment with a limited budget, rather than in the middle of town with easy access and not environmental concerns. And the freeway had access to a practically unlimited budget. Yeah, life's a b****, but there's no way the two projects can be fairly compared.

Given the needs and travel desires, that fact that the railroad's not carrying 100's of thousands of passengers/day there is a failure on many levels.

That said, if the railroad slides had been on the PCH, there would have been no thought about the details; the money tap would have turned on, and if some historic building needed demolition to make space for s long-term fix there are plenty of consultants who could have done a HABS over the weekend, letting the place be torn down and regraded, and fixing the road. Railroads and Amtrak simply don't have access to those resources.