Years ago when citizens of Houston were contemplating a light rail system in the city a friend explained that some people were really wowed by the idea because they played with electric trains when they were children and never grew out of it.
That love of trains is playing out again as we see with Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez's Green New Deal. From NPR:
"Overhauling transportation systems" to reduce emissions — including expanding electric car manufacturing, building "charging stations everywhere," and expanding high-speed rail to "a scale where air travel stops becoming necessary"...
As children, our electric trains probably came from Santa Claus. And to many, Uncle Sam is Santa Claus.
But bringing the real world of high speed rail dreams grinding down to school zone speed, the other day California Gov. Gavin Newsom announced a shift in priorities that would de-emphasize the $77 billion rail plan in California which has been going on for the past decade with hardly anything to show for it:
“Let’s be real. The project, as currently planned, would cost too much and take too long,” Newsom said about the train, which is under construction in the Central Valley. “There’s been too little oversight and not enough transparency. Right now, there simply isn’t a path to get from Sacramento to San Diego, let alone from San Francisco to L.A. I wish there were.”
Reality set in. A cross country high speed system in the U.S. would be incredibly expensive. Maybe taxpayers should take up a collection and buy model trains for members of congress to try to satiate their train fantasies.
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2:36 PM 2/13/2019
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