CALPIRG Blog

We couldn't be more thrilled that California voters committed to high-speed rail by passing Prop 1A. Although there's still a long road ahead to getting the train on tracks, I'd be a lot more nervous if we didn't have such strong support from state and national leaders. Here's what President-Elect Barack Obama, Vice-President Elect Joseph Biden, and other California leaders have said about high-speed rail.

President-Elect Barack Obama in August 2008:

"If you think about the Midwest, think about right here, what we've got is all kind of towns that we could connect," Obama said. "All of these cities are, they basically take in the air about 45 minutes to an hour to fly."

"But by the time you get to the airport," Obama continued, "take off your shoes, get to the terminal, realize that your flight's been delayed two hours, go pay $10 for a cup of coffee, and a sandwich for another $10, come back, you get on the plane, you're sitting on the tarmac for another 25 minutes, you finally take off, you're circling above the city for another half hour, when you land they can't find your luggage, and then you get to where you're going -- by the time it's all done it's a five-hour trip! …So the time is right now for us to start thinking about high-speed rail as an alternative to air transportation, connecting all these cities and think about what a great project that would be in terms of rebuilding America."

President-Elect Barack Obama in May 2008:

“The irony is with the gas prices what they are, we should be expanding rail service. One of the things I have been talking bout for awhile is high speed rail connecting all of these Midwest cities -- Indianapolis, Chicago, Milwaukee, Detroit, St. Louis. They are not that far away from each other. Because of how big of a hassle airlines are now. There are a lot of people if they had the choice, it takes you just about as much time if you had high speed rail to go the airport, park, take your shoes off.

This is something that we should be talking about a lot more. We are going to be having a lot of conversations this summer about gas prices. And it is a perfect time to start talk about why we don't have better rail service. We are the only advanced country in the world that doesn't have high speed rail. We just don't have it. And it works on the Northeast corridor. They would rather go from New York to Washington by train than they would by plane. It is a lot more reliable and it is a good way for us to start reducing how much gas we are using. It is a good story to tell.”

Vice-President Elect Joseph Biden in February 2001:

“Every advanced economy in the world invests more than the United States in high-speed inter-city service. We like to think of ourselves as the most advanced country in the world, and I believe we are, but for years we have nickel-and-dimed passenger rail service in this country.”

Vice-President Elect Joseph Biden's comments from the campaign trail in 2007:

“I commute 250 miles a day on high-speed rail,” Biden said. “I'm Mr. Amtrak. One mile of one lane of I-80 costs $22 million. One mile of I-95 (on the East Coast) holds more traffic and costs $41 million. One mile of high-speed rail costs $1 million. You can fit more people on a rail car and you'll be taking 50 automobiles off the road. Rail uses 1/50th of the cost (of a car) in terms of energy consumption.”

Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger in October 2008:

“We need high-speed rail. Our rail system in America is so old. We're driving the same speed as we did 100 years ago, the same system as 100 years ago. If we want to have mass transportation, we should modernize those things, we should do what other countries do. All over the world you see high speed rail that goes 200 to 300 miles an hour. We should do the same in this country. Especially in this state. We should start here. Show leadership. Show rest of the country how to do it. So, I think we should go ahead with all of those projects.”

U.S. Senator Dianne Feinstein in November 2008:

“On my honeymoon with my husband in the early 1960s, we rode the bullet train from Tokyo to Osaka,” Senator Feinstein recalled.  “We traveled 341 miles in roughly three hours – no lines, no hassles, train on time. I will never forget it, and I came to believe that this was possible for California. High-speed rail became part of my platform when I ran for governor in 1990, and I took the dream of a bullet train up and down the state on that campaign. I believe we now have the chance to finally make that dream a reality.”

Speaker Nancy Pelosi in November 2008:

“Proposition 1A is right on time in California. This high speed rail project is a critical investment in our future.  At a time when our economy is in crisis, investments like the High Speed Rail bond measure are even more critical.  Californians are poised to lead the way by approving this project that will create more than 450,000 permanent jobs while helping to protect our environment and reduce our dependence on foreign oil.”