Bullet-train advocates push for federal dollars
By: Ken Garcia
Examiner Staff Writer
December 5, 2008
 |
| The California High Speed Rail Authority may seek as much as $15 billion in federal funding over the next 10 years. (Courtesy Photo) |
SAN FRANCISCO — Think a weakened economy, credit crisis and volatile stock market could derail the state’s plan for high-speed trains? Backers of the big wheel project don’t, which is why they’re pushing ahead with plans for the 800-mile network of bullet trains that would link Northern and Southern California. After all, what’s $45 billion in this hell-freezing climate?
Buoyed by voter approval of a $10 billion bond last month to get the trains moving, high-speed rail advocates are hoping to be recipients of some of the funds for big public works projects being considered by Congress to help rescue the economy. A bill recently introduced in the U.S. Senate would authorize more than $20 billion for high-speed rail projects around the country and California, and officials are counting on getting a sizable chunk.
The state High Speed Rail Authority said it hopes to have engineering and environmental studies done within the next three years, and forecasts completion of the San Francisco to Los Angeles route by 2020. Of course, in recent years a lot of big construction plans have gone by the wayside here in the Golden State, so let’s just call that prediction rosy.
But, it does appear the time for massive public works projects may be upon us, now that President-elect Barack Obama and his colleagues in Congress are mulling economic stimulus ideas that will involve hundreds of billions of dollars in new spending.
It should be quite a ride.
