CALIFORNIA | LOCAL
November 1, 2011 | By Ralph Vartabedian, Los Angeles Times
California's bullet train will cost an estimated $98.5 billion to build over the next 22 years, a price nearly double any previous projection and one likely to trigger political sticker shock, according to a business plan scheduled to be unveiled Tuesday. In a key change, the state has decided to stretch out the construction schedule by 13 years, completing the Southern California-to-Bay Area high speed rail in 2033 rather than 2020. The delay allows inflation to drive up the price over the additional years of construction.
OPINION
November 6, 2011 | By Richard White
So, the California High-Speed Rail Authority was wrong. The bullet trains from Anaheim and Los Angeles to San Francisco will not cost $34 billion as originally estimated, or $43 billion as the authority insisted just two years ago, but closer to $100 billion. Critics say the agency's new $98.5-billion estimate is low, and the authority admits it might go as high as $117.6 billion, but for sake of argument call the cost $100 billion. The authority is offering us less for more.
CALIFORNIA | LOCAL
May 6, 2011 | By Rich Connell and Dan Weikel, Los Angeles Times
In a surprising and controversial move, California bullet train planners on Thursday revived a long-discarded route option following Interstate 5 over the Grapevine that could save billions of dollars and eliminate a sweeping dogleg through Los Angeles County's high desert towns. The sudden reversal comes after years of planning focused on a circuitous path south of Bakersfield crossing the Tehachapi Mountains to serve Palmdale and Lancaster. Reopening what had been a settled issue highlights a critical tension in one of the nation's costliest transportation projects: As officials rush to start building, they still have not resolved an array of political, financing and engineering challenges.
CALIFORNIA | LOCAL
March 8, 2012 | By Ralph Vartabedian, Los Angeles Times
The bullet trains that would someday streak through California at 220 mph are, in the vision of their most ardent supporters, more than just a transportation system. They are also a means to alter the state's social, residential and economic fabric. But those broader ambitions are triggering an increasingly strident ideological backlash to the massive project. The fast trains connecting Los Angeles and San Francisco would create new communities of high-density apartments and small homes around stations, reducing the suburbanization of California, rail advocates say. That new lifestyle would mean fewer cars and less gasoline consumption, lowering California's contribution to global warming.
OPINION
October 4, 2009
The "cash for clunkers" program is over, so if you weren't in the market for a car during its summer run, tough luck. But for Californians, all is not lost. Thanks to the foresight of voters, we're poised to receive a big portion of federal transportation dollars being doled out under another stimulus program, this one for bullet trains. Last November, voters passed a bond measure(2008) approving $9.95 billion to fund a high-speed train line from San Diego to Sacramento. They couldn't have known it then, but the timing was fortuitous.
OPINION
November 4, 2011
It's easy to see why many Californians are losing patience with the bullet train. Voters who were asked in 2008 to approve $9.95 billion in bonds to build a high-speed rail line from Los Angeles to San Francisco were told the project would cost $33 billion and be completed by 2020, yet a more realistic business plan released Tuesday by the rail authority placed the price tag at — whoops — $98 billion and the completion date at 2033....