high speed rail

California High Speed Rail: More Cost Overruns & Delays? (Los Angeles Times)

According to Los Angeles Times reporter Ralph Vartabedian (see: Cost overruns hit California bullet train again amid a new financial crunch, October 8), the troubled California high speed rail system could face additional cost overruns.  read more »

High-speed rail advocates tout a 0.008% reduction in pollution

A recent op-ed in The Seattle Times written by transit activists claims a high-speed railroad from Portland to Vancouver B.C. would reduce air pollution.  read more »

Malaysia to Drop Singapore to Kuala Lumpur High Speed Rail Project

Fresh from his recent national election victory, Prime Minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad announced that a planned high-speed rail project from Kuala Lumpur to Singapore will be cancelled. Kuala Lumpur is Malaysia’s largest urban area, with approximately 7.8 million residents, while Singapore has nearly 6 million residents.  read more »

Former Hawaii Democratic Governor Urges Trump to Stop Funds for Honolulu Rail

A full page ad in today’s Washington Post (April 21, 2017) featured former Democratic Governor Benjamin J. Cayetano asking President Trump to stop further funding for the Honolulu rail project. The project has ballooned in cost from $5 billion to $10 billion, with most of the funding coming from local sources. There are serious concerns about the ability of Honolulu or Hawaii to afford completion of the project. Cayetano says that the line will be the most costly in the world. A proof of the ad is below and a pdf is available here.  read more »

Caltrain and Blended High Speed Rail Promise Peninsula Traffic Paralysis

The following notice was issued by the Community Coalition on High Speed Rail in the San Francisco Bay Area.

A TRANSPORTATION EXPERT CONFIRMS OUR WARNINGS:
THE SO-CALLED "BLENDED" PROJECT WILL
PARALYZE TRAFFIC ON THE PENINSULA  read more »

California’s Attack on Rule of Law

Morris Brown, founder of Derail (a citizen group opposed to California’s high speed rail project) writes over at Fox and Hounds Daily that newly enacted California Assembly Bill 1889 is unconstitutional.  read more »

"Rising Rail Chaos" in Honolulu

That's what the Honolulu Star Advertiser calls it in an April 8 editorial entitled "Rising Rail Chaos Bodes Ill for Us All." Honolulu’s urban rail project has experienced a host of problems, which were described by University of Hawaii professor Panos Prevedoros in January, who called the project “the nation’s largest infrastructure fiasco by far” on a per capita basis.  read more »

Taiwan High Speed Rail Near Bankruptcy

Efforts are underway by the Taiwan government for a government led restructuring to avoid bankruptcy (Plan to stop Taiwan's high-speed rail going bust set for review). Since opening in 2007, this privately financed and operated system has been plagued with ridership well below projections.  read more »

Court Rules Against California High Speed Rail

California Superior Court Judge Michael Kenny ruled against the California High Speed Rail Authority in two decisions announced on November 25. In the first, Judge Kenny ruled that the Business Plan failed to meet the requirements of the voter approved referendum under California Assembly Bill 3034 (2008), in not identifying sufficient capital funding for the first segment. As a result, the Business Plan needs to be redrafted.  read more »