SACRAMENTO — Nonpartisan state analysts have a message for Gov. Gavin Newsom and the legislature: Make up your mind when it comes to bullet trains.
In a report released Tuesday, the Legislative Analyst Office cautioned against any continued waffling about whether the state should complete its high-speed rail vision of 220-mph trains whisking passengers from San Francisco to Los Angeles in less than three hours — a vision voters approved in 2008 under Prop 1A.
On the one hand, Newsom, in his State of the State address earlier this month, said the project would cost too much and take too long.
“Right now, there simply isn’t a path to get from Sacramento to San Diego, let alone from San Francisco to L.A.,” he said in his Feb. 12 address. “I wish there were.”
The next day, he back-tracked on his earlier comments, saying the state was committed to “connecting the Central Valley and beyond.” But just what that means is less clear, the report said. Does that mean the governor would be postponing, or “effectively terminating,” the remaining portions of the project? If it does complete the Merced to Bakersfield segment, would those tracks carry high-speed trains or augmented Amtrak service?
Representatives from the governor’s office did not immediately return a request for comment. But the report’s authors warned that continued uncertainty over the plan will lead to unnecessary costs from purchasing land it doesn’t need or drafting plans for trains that might never leave the station.
The legislature should take the turnover of the new administration to re-evaluate the project, the report said. If it remains committed to seeing the full route from San Francisco to Los Angeles, it should work to address the estimated $55 billion to $58 billion funding gap the project faces. If not, the legislature will want to consider how to modify the project, the report said, by scrapping it altogether or otherwise reducing its scope.
Some of those decisions could begin taking place as soon as this spring, said Sen. Jim Beall, D-San Jose, and chairman of the Senate’s Transportation Committee. The committee plans to hold a hearing in March to hear about alternatives for the train’s future in the Golden State. Beall expects the governor’s office to then make some proposals in May for alternative paths forward.
But Beall cautioned that if the route doesn’t connect to Silicon Valley, it won’t attract enough riders to cover the costs of operation. And that means the taxpayers will be footing the bill.
Perhaps the state could complete the Central Valley segment while it continues work on the Silicon Valley segment, Beall said, by purchasing land, redeveloping Diridon Station in downtown San Jose and doing some preliminary engineering work. It also could run trains up and over the Pacheco Pass, rather than digging a costly tunnel underneath it, a move that would further sacrifice the trains’ speed.
“We should look at all those options,” Beall said. “But the primary commitment is to have no government subsidies of the operating costs.”
Other legislators, however, would rather see the project scrapped altogether. Assembly member Jim Patterson, R-Fresno, said it’s time to admit defeat. The state should use its remaining Prop 1A funds to pay back a $3.5 billion grant from the federal government and make reparations to farmers, business owners and others whose lives have been impacted by construction.
“What we need now,” he said, “is to ensure that Fresno and the Central Valley is made whole by the High Speed Rail Authority before they run out of money.”
