LA Times: Schwarzenegger quietly quashed effort to improve commuter rails

[marmar]

Schwarzenegger quietly quashed effort to improve commuter rails
The governor ordered officials to seek federal money only for the proposed bullet train between San Francisco and San Diego. Rail advocates say the commuter line upgrades should take priority.

By Dan Weikel and Eric Bailey

November 13, 2009


Reporting from Sacramento and Los Angeles - Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger quietly spiked an effort last month to win $1.1 billion in federal high-speed rail stimulus funds for 29 projects to improve the safety, speed and capacity of heavily traveled commuter corridors through Southern California.

Instead, he ordered state officials to seek money for only one project -- the proposed bullet train between San Francisco and San Diego.

The governor's decision was intended to increase the state's chances of receiving high-speed rail money, officials said. California is competing with more than 40 applicants from 23 other states.

But the action has sparked debate among rail advocates about whether too high a priority is being placed on the high-speed train project at the expense of the second-busiest rail corridor in the nation, where budget-strapped commuter services have been trying to improve safety, add track and cut travel times from San Diego to Santa Barbara.

Eliminated from the state application for federal funds was almost $170 million for positive train control -- computer-guided braking systems designed to prevent collisions and allow conventional trains to safely travel at 110 mph. Such automated systems, which the federal government wants installed by 2015, would have prevented the Metrolink crash in Chatsworth last year that killed 25 people in the worst rail accident in modern California history. .........(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-rail13-2009nov13,0,6550006.story

[ChairmanAgnostic]

1. He gets attacked either way.

every rail line in the US could use more money for upgrades and improvements. At the same time, every major cluster of cities (NY Boston DC Phili) (Detroit Chicago St. Louis) (San Diego LA San Fran Seattle) would benefit greatly from high speed rail connections.

In a perfect world, we could do it all. Unfortunately, we have our massive hangover from 8 yrs of Bush and are wasting a trillion a year in Iraq and Afghanistan.

[Hepburn]

2. You hit on something I think about often:

The waste of money to those stupid wars.

Can you imagine all that we could have done to actually benefit ourselves?

Wow...

[ChairmanAgnostic]

3. I don't get why we on the left are so quiet about it.

Every time some right winger yells about health care costs, we should put these wars of choice in their face and force them to defend it.

[mnhtnbb]

5. Too few uncorrupted elected officials.

[ChairmanAgnostic]

7. Too true. I regret that should it continue in this way, our

country will be torn apart by special interests, and unable to ever stand up on its own again.

[Le Taz Hot]

4. This BETTER be the one that goes down

the woefully under-represented population located in the California interior and not another fucking "coastal route." I'm serious! Southern California and the Bay Area get a disproportionate amount of state and federal funding while the Central Valley continues to pay for it. If this is the one that covers the Central Valley I say, "Good!"

Edited for gooder English.

Re-edited for the grammatically anal. Happy now, Sport?

[ChairmanAgnostic]

6. betterer english, please.

[pinto]

8. I think the "leading" proposal is Sylmar - Palmdale - Bkrsfld - Fresno - Sac,

with a spur, Gilroy-San Jose-SF.

[Le Taz Hot]

9. Now THAT would make me happy.

I don't know if anyone is aware of this but if you want to ride the train from, say, Fresno to Los Angeles, you can't do it without having to transfer to a bus in B'Field and riding that the rest of the way. The thing is, it's the same throughout all of inland California. Those of us in the Central Valley have virtually NO options for getting N/S or E/W without having to use fossil fuel. This SHOULD be a concern for the whole state.