>>1060396CAHSR costs a lot of money because:
1. CHSRA has to build completely new trackage between Santa Clara and Anahiem
2. CHSRA has to build two new tunnels underneath Pacheco and Tehachapi
3. CHSRA has to go all the way into downtown San Francisco, up the 55-mile Caltrain corridor. This is hardcore NIMBY country, only San Mateo County really wants the train to go all the way up (SF voters hate trains, SJ voters obviously want to cut SF off).
4. In phase II, CHSRA has to blow another tunnel underneath Altamont, perhaps also rebuilding the Dumbarton rail bridge. This is also where conversations about a San Rafael rail bridge or Carquinez Tube begin.
So yes the quoted $70-80 billion pricetag is real, $100 billion if you count another transbay tube. This is perhaps the biggest construction project in California since the Alameda Rail Corridor (1991), or the Interstate freeway system itself (1957). The full buildout is nothing short of unfucking Northern California's mass transit, which has been extremely lacking since the 1960s when BART replaced the private sector.
>Billions in bonds, I might add, so more debt. What a joke. Who knows, maybe the major metropolises of Bakersfield and Fresno will manage to make this shit-show turn a profit once it's already built.First of all 4/5ths of California's debt comes from Calpers, so cutting out as many bus drivers as possible by using trains is a net benefit. And all Californians will see CAHSR benefit them, because it'll increase the carrying capacity of the state. CV and high desert residents benefit the most though, you'd be a fool not to by buying land out there right now.
