Did some one say "pay for itself", "make a profit", "not need tax support"? What the heck have they been smoking anyway? Not even France's TGV brings anything down to net, and every single dime of capital was supplied by the French national government, from taxes - where else. The same is true all over the world - even in England, with its supposedly privatized rail services (Concession Contracts provide a generous operating subsidy, paid from taxes).

I too, thought of holding my nose as I voted for prop 1A. But holding my nose became just plain impossible. I was already gasping for breath as it was - being a very long-time resident of California. ALL of my children have already had to leave the state for economic reasons. Enough already!

Then I read the fine print in the proposition. I shouldn't 've done that I guess; because I choked on it! It clearly mandated appropriations from the general fund to pay for it all! - every dime of the HSR project. In fact it made the appropriations for the legislature - all on its own. The idea that this was to be a self-sufficient enterprise that would not raise taxes was an outright lie; as the general fund is our tax dollars!

Worse yet, I went back and looked at several other previous bond issue propositions of various sorts, and found the same or similar wording in the back pages of each one.

Given the spate of special interest propositions directly appropriating fixed percentages for this or that good cause; and the dozens of multi-billion bond issues in recent years also directly appropriating the general fund; it would seem the the people of California have already directly appropriated most of general fund already. No wonder the legislature can't balance the budget - the sovereign citizens of California, in their infinite intelligence and wisdom, have already spent it all - and seem to expect the legislature to spend it twice over again.

Besides, as it turns out, the state is finding it near impossible to sell the damn bonds anyway - and their never was even the slimmest of slim chances of private money. These CHSR people believing that were and are deluding themselves.

The only way this thing will get built is to get the hacks (like Q. Kopp and this Diridon guy) the h--- out of there. Then expect to use tax dollars for capital and operating costs. If that doesn't work because the state is just plain broke; or voters won't go for it with that plain unvarnished truth, then it ain't gonna happen - period.



But on a brighter note; the 2.5 billion in stimulus would go along way towards building a direct high speed Bakersfield to LA connection (single track at first, connecting somewhere near Santa Clarita and just east of Bakersfield). The canyons just a few (5-10) miles east of the grapevine appear to be aligned about right so that only two 8-12 mile base tunnels would be needed.

Then we upgrade existing trackage to 110mph standards as fast as we can, adding capacity where needed. At 110mph, it would be about 3.5 hours to LA. Of course that's a non-stop, which I can't see being useful for most runs - but still. So lets see, how many riders would a 3.5 to 4.5 hour schedule, every hour or two, attract? Enough to justify this minimalist approach, I would guess.

After such a network such as this has been running a while - then and only then will true high-speed be a viable proposition for California's future. Californians need to simply accept what they can get, and take their hand out of the proverbial cookie jar, with something doable and practical now; rather than trying to grab it all now - thus getting nuttin at all.

This "Get it all right now" approach is doomed - no matter who runs it, or how much money they have. They'll never have enough! Brute force financing has never worked anywhere in the real world - despite what our moronic politicians keep telling us!

OPB