• evol@lemmy.today
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    5 days ago

    California is such a inefficiently run state I hope this passes, the state suffers from a resource curse where it has the most profitable companies in the world that it can waste time building a fucking high speed railway from Bakersfield to Merced. It needs something that fundamentally breaks the fabric of the state so it can realign into something functional. Main thing I would hope for zoning to happen at the state level, and prop 13 being repealed.

    • CombatWombatEsq@lemmy.world
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      5 days ago

      I want to take high speed rail from Seattle to LA. That means passing through Central California. Why not through Merced and Bakersfield?

      • evol@lemmy.today
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        5 days ago

        Originally their was the option of the coastal route, so you could just then move along the coast up Oregon. But my point is after 25 years all we have to show for it is a train that goes from nowhere to nowhere. The connection to LA and SF is still unfunded from the last time I checked

        • CombatWombatEsq@lemmy.world
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          5 days ago

          You’re dropping service to Bakersfield and Fresno and tranversing the Santa Lucias to pick up… San Luis Obispo and Morro Bay??? California should build the cheapest high speed rail that services the most Californians and that means you go through the heart of the Central Valley. Just build it. Today.

          • evol@lemmy.today
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            5 days ago

            I’m not stating its better, but that after 20 years we still do not have anything to show for it, and in 6 years all we will have is a line of Bakersfield to Merced. I’m all for HSR, but it shows how horribly incompetent the state is.

            India is expected to have its first HSR segment by 2028-2029

            The SNCF (French railway company) was initially interested in getting a contract for the high speed rail, they left to go make a HSR in morocco which opened in 2018.

            “SNCF was very angry. They told the state they were leaving for North Africa, which was less politically dysfunctional. They went to Morocco and helped them build a rail system.” https://www.nytimes.com/2022/10/09/us/california-high-speed-rail-politics.html

            • CombatWombatEsq@lemmy.world
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              5 days ago

              Asserting that the state of California would have built more rail if it had served fewer people and cost more money is a counter factual that I concede I cannot disprove, but I find it a rather unlikely proposition.