Train to Nowhere? California High-Speed Rail (CAHSR)

Cal­i­for­nia faces heavy pol­lu­tion from sev­er­al fac­tors includ­ing unex­pect­ed high-rate for­est fires, heavy car pol­lu­tion cre­at­ing a “bowl effect” trap­ping the pol­lut­ed air, and large-scale agri­cul­tur­al and oil sec­tors. With many projects ongo­ing to com­bat these issues, the Cal­i­for­nia High-Speed Rail­way (CAHSR) could help reduce vehi­cle emis­sions, a lead­ing pol­lu­tion source in the state. 

The project his­to­ry could be dat­ed back to 1998 when the CA leg­is­la­ture and Gov­er­nor Pete Wil­son estab­lished the “Cal­i­for­nia High-Speed Rail Author­i­ty” (CHSRA). In 2000, the con­struc­tion plan was pro­posed, and CHSRA start­ed to seek peer review. Propo­si­tion 1A for CAHSR got approved in 2008 and received $1 bil­lion in fund­ing. Pres­i­dent Oba­ma also set a nation­al plan of 13,840 km of high-speed rail­way tracks

How­ev­er, con­struc­tion didn’t go smooth­ly. While CAHSR ini­tial­ly gained opti­mism, there was increas­ing oppo­si­tion relat­ed to the poten­tial dam­age to wildlife and dis­rup­tions to local com­mu­ni­ties. Farm­ers were afraid that the rail­way would reduce the acreage of pro­duc­tive agri­cul­tur­al land, sep­a­rate irri­ga­tion routes, and destroy per­ma­nent crops. Cer­tain indus­tries, includ­ing auto and air­plane com­pa­nies, saw the rail­way as a threat and a chance to lose profits. 

Com­pared to Chi­na, lead­ing in the high-speed rail­way net­work, some vot­ers and politi­cians in the USA want to build high-speed rail­ways quick­ly and effi­cient­ly. Unlike Chi­na, which is ruled by a high­ly cen­tral­ized gov­ern­ment, the USA has a slight­ly more decen­tral­ized sys­tem which can result in more oppo­si­tion to the rail­way and ulti­mate­ly pre­vent its con­struc­tion. There are com­pet­ing juris­dic­tions along the rail­way that com­pete over resources and per­son­al pri­vate prop­er­ty rights. These obsta­cles result­ed in CAHSR hav­ing to nego­ti­ate with every local gov­ern­ment the rail­way would pass through. 

Anoth­er issue for the CAHSR was the project cost. From hir­ing con­sul­tants and con­trac­tors to law­suits from res­i­dents, there has been a strain on the railway’s bud­get and fund­ing. CAHSR expect­ed the fed­er­al gov­ern­ment to cov­er some of the con­struc­tion costs, around tens of bil­lions of dol­lars, but the fed­er­al gov­ern­ment only invest­ed $3 bil­lion. This may be caused by Democ­rats being gen­er­al­ly in sup­port of the rail­way, and Repub­li­cans against it, and the fund­ing is depen­dent on which side the White House has the major­i­ty. Cur­rent­ly, the project has been resumed under the Biden admin­is­tra­tion after fund­ing was with­drawn under the Trump administration.

Now, the rail­way con­struc­tion con­tin­ues between Merced and Bak­ers­field, but it’s not antic­i­pat­ed to fin­ish in the near future. The fate of CAHSR is uncer­tain and large­ly depen­dent on pol­i­tics and funding. 

Emission comparison with different ways of transportation:

In GHG (Green­house gas emis­sion), a 5‑passenger car is equiv­a­lent to CAHSR with approx­i­mate­ly 1,200 passengers. 

CEE sub­jects: Con­struc­tion Engi­neer­ing and Man­age­ment, Trans­porta­tion Engineering

Com­ments: An LCA analy­sis I found in a schol­ar arti­cle is real­ly inter­est­ing and it reminds me of the lec­ture in 265.

• Do you think it’s a good idea to build CAHSR? Why or why not?
• What do you think of the rela­tion­ship between projects and dif­fer­ent social fac­tors like gov­ern­men­tal struc­tures and oppo­si­tion from lead­ing com­pa­nies in an industry?
• Part of the con­struc­tion of CAHSR relies on pub­lic trust. Since one train derailed in Ohio in 2023, how do you think pub­lic trust may be affect­ed by this acci­dent? Fur­ther­more, how will it impact pub­lic trans­porta­tion con­struc­tion, espe­cial­ly California’s High-Speed Railway?
• What con­sid­er­a­tions should go into con­struct­ing high-speed rail­ways in the U.S.? What are fac­tors that are unique to the U.S. that might not have to be con­sid­ered in oth­er parts of the world like Europe or vice ver­sa? How can we main­tain that the country’s trans­porta­tion net­work is still serv­ing the people?

• Peer reviewed articles
  • The local eco­nom­ic impacts of high-speed rail­ways: the­o­ries and facts
  • Life-cycle assess­ment of high-speed rail: the case of California
  • Mak­ing the Most of High-Speed Rail in Cal­i­for­nia: Lessons from France and Germany
  • High-Speed Rail Project Devel­op­ment Process­es in the Unit­ed States and China
  • Bench­mark­ing Socio-Eco­nom­ic Impacts of High-Speed Rail Net­works Using K‑Nearest Neigh­bour and Pearson’s Cor­re­la­tion Coef­fi­cient Tech­niques through Com­pu­ta­tion­al Mod­el-Based Analysis
• Pop­u­lar media/news references
  • Will Cal­i­for­nia ever get its high-speed rail?
  • Train to nowhere: can California’s high-speed rail project ever get back on track?
  • Why The US Has No High-Speed Rail
  • This high-speed rail project is a warn­ing for the US
  • How Train Dis­as­ters Changed The Way We Build High Speed Trains| Built From Dis­as­ter | Spark
  • Cal­i­for­nia High-speed Rail Authority
  • How California’s Bul­let Train Went Off the Rails
  • Why the Cal­i­for­nia Bul­let Train Project Failed: 7 “Worst Practices”