The year is 1993. Bill Clinton has just entered office. Only one out of four homes has a PC, and virtually no home has internet. It’s in that same year, which now seems so long ago, that California establishes the California Intercity High-Speed Rail Commission to plan for high-speed rail (HSR). Thirty-three years later, California’s high-speed rail is woefully behind schedule and enormously over budget, reflecting decades of political and organizational failures.

Early fails doomed it from the beginning, and later fails would follow one promise after another of fresh starts and better decision-making—unkept promises that have now reached the point of incredulity.  

The project’s fails continue. A report released earlier this month by High-Speed Rail’s inspector general documented that nearly 60 percent of California High-Speed Rail consultant travel expenses reimbursed by the state violated contracts and/or state rules, including visits to an escape room (whatever that is), nightclubs, and a tiki bar. The inspector general also warned that the project may run out of cash by December 2027, as the project still has yet to lay any track.

I have followed California high-speed rail for several years, including providing testimony about the project to the US House of Representatives. Below is a timeline listing some of the major problems that have plagued the project. 

1999 – Take the long way out of LA. After being established in 1996, California’s High-Speed Rail Authority (CHSRA), identifies possible routes to connect Northern and Southern California. Engineers prefer a route along Interstate 5 and through the Tejon Pass corridor, but a longer, more expensive route through Palmdale is chosen, reflecting political horse-trading. Former High-Speed Rail Chair Michael Tennenbaum calls the longer route “Ridiculous and wasteful. . . . The desert route sacrificed travel time and increased the costs, and opened the door to a whole series of problems that have become only clearer as time has gone on.”

2008 — Another problematic route choice. A route through the Pacheco Pass is selected to connect the Central Valley with the Bay Area, but it involves tunneling through very difficult geological conditions and requires two tunnels to handle both directions of track. However, a French engineering firm with substantial high-speed rail experience prefers an alternative route through the Altamont Pass. Both routes involve significant seismic risks, which highlight the difficulties and uncertainties associated with the project. These issues appear to remain unresolved today, as the 2026 project business plan calls for continued geotechnical investigations of the Pacheco tunnels. After all these years, could this tunneling be done safely and without the cost of a moonshot? We may never know, because I don’t see the project ever getting that far and there is no dedicated funding for these investigations.

2008 — $9.95 billion bond passes, but without a legitimate business plan. In November, voters pass Proposition 1, the “Safe, Reliable High-Speed Passenger Train Bond Act,” by a 53/47 ratio. The proposition approves a $9.95 billion bond to begin a project that will cover eight hundred miles of track, and whose SF-to-LA route will cost $33 billion and be ready to ride in 2020. The bond funding is to provide seed money until federal and private investor support comes on board.

But “reliable” should never have been part of the ballot proposition title. The 2008 business plan missed its September 1 deadline and didn’t appear until shortly after the proposition vote. If the business plan had been released on time, I can’t realistically see how the proposition would have ever been approved: the business plan was not a business plan in any reasonable sense of the........

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