Point #1: High-speed rail continues to be a wise investment for California.
The same factors that led California voters to support investing in high-speed rail still hold true to this day.
Our population continues to grow. In July of last year the PPIC projected that between 2008 and 2025, California’s population is projected to increase from 38.1 million to 46.7 million, adding approximately 500,000 people to the state’s population each year.
Our health is greatly compromised by air pollution from current transportation systems. It will be difficult, if not downright impossible, to meet and keep the state’s commitment to reducing global warming pollution without better alternatives to driving and flying.
California’s biggest cities suffer from some of the worst traffic congestion in the country. The Texas Transportation Institute’s most recent Urban Mobility study ranked the Los Angeles/Orange County region the most congested in the country, and the Bay Area and San Diego regions also ranked in the top ten for wasted time and gas stuck in traffic.
For millions of inter-city trips, high-speed rail will be a faster, cleaner, more efficient way to travel across the state than driving or flying.
Not only that, the high-speed rail will still cost less to build than the highway and airport expansions we’ll need without it.
Point #2: We need to keep this project on time, and on budget.
While there are a lot of unknowns about the future, one thing that’s certain is that the project will be more difficult and more expensive to build the longer we wait.
Additionally, as I’m sure I don’t need to tell you, high-speed rail construction will provide jobs throughout the state, jobs that California workers need now. The Authority estimates that 600,000 job-years will be needed to construct Phase I of the high-speed rail project, and that the train’s operation will employ 6,000 Californians.
That’s why it’s critical that we move the project through the environmental review process over the next few years, make needed decisions about the exact placement of the tracks and stations, and start construction promptly.
Point #3: We also need to make sure the project is done well.
In the coming months and years, CALPIRG will focus in particular on two components that are critical to the success of the project and the protection of taxpayers:
1) To reduce traffic congestion and pollution and encourage high-speed rail ridership, high-speed rail stations should link up to robust local public transit options. We’re encouraging cities to invest in transit hubs around high-speed rail station stops, and encourage this Legislature to also invest in public transit services in the state budget.
2) Public-private partnerships should only be brokered with robust taxpayer protections. We recognize that private investment is critical to the business plan, but we should ensure that financial risks and benefits are shared between private investors and the taxpayers alike.
