Miles of needless "bridges" over open space account for some of these phantasmagoric cost estimates.

The CHSRA "mega" project is on its last legs, the days of wine and roses for the contractor driven bloat are ending, and it appears that some of the worst of the political rats, responsible for this mess, are starting to desert the ship.

Yes, Michael, those lower speeds (and no needless miles of "bridges") could substantially reduce these costs. Yes, there are numerous professional engineering and economic studies and comparisons of speed/cost/travel demand trade offs. But clearly, no one at the CHSRA really cares about costs. Using such professional and responsible cost tradeoffs, cost benefit, value engineering, credible demand studies assumes that responsible folks are in charge of this project. We have no evidence of that, thus far.

Unfortunately all of the evidence continues to reveal that this has been a bloated mess without any meaningful signs of fiscal sanity or responsibility by those serving on the incompetent CHSRA Board, or those mismanaging the CHSRA programs. It is a bloated fiasco, almost appearing to be a racket run by scamsters to milk the taxpayers, without anyone at CHSRA accountable or responsible to the taxpayers.

It's really too bad, that these blatantly incompetent fools at CHSRA have chosen to ruin what could have been a great opportunity for expanding on our successful regional and intercity rail passenger systems.