Transportation these days isn’t about getting from here to there, but about creating government-funded jobs and pursuing big-vision projects that have little correlation to how we actually live.
Americans suffer under the delusion that transportation systems are just that – systems for transporting people from one destination to another. What most of us fail to recognize is that the politicians, activists and planners who play the greatest roles in creating those systems have far different goals.
To today’s transportation movers and shakers, such systems are giant jobs-creation programs designed to boost economies and provide high wages to members of influential unions – and are key to remaking society in a way that is nicer to the environment and leads to a changed citizenry that is less likely to rely on automobiles. Think of transportation these days less as civil engineering and more as social engineering.
Grasping those points is crucial to understanding the debate in California over a proposed high-speed-rail system, a project defined by inexplicable route selections, massive cost overruns, predicted travel times that will never be realized even under the most optimistic scenarios, and fantasy-land funding promises.
None of those realities stops the political locomotives promoting “high-speed” rail from chugging along. At a news conference last month, a coalition of construction unions and business leaders championed the project. “We need jobs, and we need jobs now,” one union official said at the rally, according to a Palo Alto publication.
But government cannot create economic growth by shaking down taxpayers and running up debt, even if those dollars are used to benefit one particular interest group in one segment of the economy.
At least we know where the unions are coming from. But consider the big picture, as pitched by President Barack Obama: “What we’re talking about is a vision for high-speed rail in America. … Imagine whisking through towns at speeds over 100 miles an hour, walking only a few steps to public transportation, and ending up just blocks from your destination.”
Actually, it’s hard to know what he is talking about. Riders still need to get from home to the center of a city, and there’s no way that any rail system is going to take most riders to within walking distance of their destinations. Train rides are far slower than plane flights. I have pipe dreams, too, but at least I don’t have the ability to fund them with your money.
The only way trains will ever come close to profitable is if you heard the American working public on to them at the point of a gun.
Politicians haven’t figured out how to steal
from the treasury directly, so they launder
tax payer money through the unions on
public works projects. The larger the better.
Hence, “massive cost overruns” are not a
negative, but are desirable.
I see the social engineering talk as a prop
to get taxpayers to accept the huge
payout/payoff.
Just another example how unions (who will benefit from the forced union membership by workers hired to build the rail road) control California through their “hired hands” in the legislature.
I’m afraid that there’s little hope for California, and I am planning my escape and will move to another state.
After you have created the high speed rail its fares will be rather prohibitively priced and it will need to be subsidized to be at least partially used by the public, or alternatively, car traffic needs to be taxed prohibitively. The very existence of the high speed passenger rail will force you to continue this reward/punishment scheme to kingdom come. Overall, you end up reallocating capital to where it creates less value. The Greens will constantly cry for more of this scheme like a junky cries for heroin. Of course, when it’s politically more useful for them, they will also demonstrate against felling trees for a rail-related project. That’s how we do things in Germany. It’s very entertaining.
High-speed rail is the Holy Grail of enviro-loonies everywhere.
The business case does not stack up, and it is a lunatic vision of subsidised construction and subsidised operation. Yes, I would love to step into a train in the centre of my city, and travel 1,000 km to the centre of the next major city down south in 3 or 4 hours, as opposed to a 1.5 hour flight, 45 mins for pre-flight at the airport, and 30 minutes minimum for travel to and from the CBD (1 hour mnimum).
It would be great, but the cost would be astronomical, and would have to compete with flying (in roughly the same time span) at say $200. Utterly impossible.
Idiots.