First, a procedural issue. I used to send lots of emails; 1,300+ of them at last count. Now I write this blog instead. It's like a several-times-daily newspaper, each with one article and one editorial.
Although the blog readership is climbing daily, I still get comments from people who claim that receiving the emails was much easier for them than having to reach out and read this blog. I'm sorry, but reading blogs is not that difficult. One click, and it's on your screen.
So, here's one actionable solution. If you believe in what this blog presents to you, you therefore have a pro-active role to play; and that is to copy and paste the blogs into emails and send to others. Things can and will change if you spread the word and inform others. That's your job. Don't make others do your work for you. It's your responsibility. If you don't light a candle, you are contributing to the darkness.
So, if you find this blog useful and informative, then send out an email to, say, ten people that you know with a copy of the latest blog on it. Also, send them the URL for the blog:
http://high-speedtraintalk.blogspot.com/ In your email, tell them to do the same for ten people that they know. Get the word out!
In short, become an active participant in fighting the threat of the greatest boondoggle to ever hit California, and the United States. Everyone can and should do this. It's a small thing to ask, but promises big results; a well informed constituency.
Now, down to business.
"Get me to the train on time." Even if they can meet the deadline, is it legal?
The first thing you gather in reading this article by Tim Sheehan in The Fresno Bee is that the Central Valley HSR project is far from being a shoo-in. They are in a deadline squeeze. They have federal time lines that they may not meet. This is something that the former CEO of the CHSRA, Mehdi Morshed predicted and warned them about, whereby he was immediately silenced by Rod Diridon of the Board. That didn't make the problem go away. And, needless to say, the CHSRA is still in a total state of denial.
They are now confronting this very problem head-on. Can they complete all the required CEQA paperwork in time to meet the federal deadlines? They, of course, say that they can. Also, we have to see what they get away with. There may be the typical closing of one eye by all the "watch-dogs" that have up to now been so forgiving of all their other transgressions. So, the rail authority has been getting away with all sorts of illegal shenanigans.
Of course, there's another issue not mentioned in this article and that's the questionable legality of what they intend to do; that is, not comply with the AB3034 requirements of completing a usable "segment." They're going to build a "section," as Diridon called it, which is merely a part of a "segment." He raised this question with their legal counsel who, appropriately, waffled and then agreed that it might not be legal.
AB3034 was edited and amended several times during its creation in order to constrain the CHSRA, which was already identified as untrustworthy before the 2008 elections. The law required a peer group, which even today is not yet fully constituted. It required a number of other constraints on the rail authority agenda (such as a legitimate business plan, reliable ridership projections, identification of funding sources, etc.) and the rail authority is now devoting a great deal of time and energy seeing what they can wiggle out of.
AB3034 requires that the intended segment must be HSR usable and have a working HSR operation on that segment. That also the rail authority doesn't intend to do.Therefore, by law, they are not eligible to receive Proposition 1A bond funds since they are out of compliance with the legislation. And, without those bond funds, they got nothin'! They might lay some track with only the federal dollars, but it would have nothing to do with high-speed rail. And that's not what they exist to do. You see the problem?
Our finger-shaking won't cut it. They have gotten away with all sorts of fudging and they will continue to do so. That is, unless those of us in California who strongly object to this project begin to get our act together, they will in fact get away with 'murder.' They will build a bunch of nearly useless rail in the Central Valley, spend as much money as they can get their hands on, especially with no one stopping them, and they will be abetted by the state legislature.
And all of us in California will be the helpless victims, with only ourselves to blame for our inadequate and unfocused efforts.
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Deadline pressure threatens high-speed rail
Experts warn project may already be running late.
Posted at 10:04 PM on Saturday, Jan. 22, 2011
By Tim Sheehan / The Fresno Bee
California's high-speed rail project has a tight schedule to keep: It must meet a series of deadlines to keep $2.5 billion in federal money. But some experts say the program already is running late.
Construction of the system is supposed to start in late 2012 or early 2013 and be completed in 2017.
But no detailed environmental reviews have been finished, no property has been acquired and no construction contracts have been awarded.
All of that has to happen before dirt can begin to fly on the first section to be built between Fresno and Bakersfield.
"In my heart of hearts, I don't think the expectations are realistic," said James Moore II, director of the Transportation Engineering program at the University of Southern California. "There will be delays."
Those delays not only would threaten the funding -- they also would postpone the expected bonanza of construction jobs for the Valley well past next year, experts say.
The size and scope of the high-speed rail project's first segment make it perhaps the largest infrastructure effort in the Valley's history. And the clock is ticking.
The California High-Speed Rail Authority's grant agreement with the Federal Railroad Administration requires that environmental studies be completed and certified by September for sections from Merced to Bakersfield.
For the first section to be built between Fresno and Bakersfield, contracts for final engineering and construction must be awarded by September 2012, and construction must be finished by September 2017.
The section would be the initial piece in what is ultimately planned as an 800-mile system linking the state's urban centers with trains capable of speeds up to 220 mph. Service is not likely to begin until 2020 or later, after the system has grown to link Los Angeles and San Francisco.
Even the California High-Speed Rail Authority acknowledges the challenging time frame. "It's certainly optimistic, and it's very tight," said Rachel Wall, the authority's press secretary.
But authority managers say it's a realistic schedule because so much study and analysis already has been done, accelerating after voters approved Proposition 1A in November 2008 to provide $9 billion for high-speed rail.
"We think these Valley sections are well enough along that this is a doable time frame," said Jeff Barker, the authority's deputy executive director.
"We've got some things going on simultaneously, and even giving ourselves some time for delays, we're real comfortable with the time frame."
The federal money is intended to stimulate the economy quickly in the Valley and the state.
But for government bureaucracies that sometimes move at a glacial pace, "quickly" is a relative term -- and that is what worries observers.
Detailed planning
The construction itself would be a formidable task. But there is much to do even before the first shovel pierces the ground.
The first hard deadline for the federal funds involves environmental-impact reports, or EIRs, detailing the potential effects of the train system on Valley communities, farms and wildlands. Final versions of those reports must be certified by the end of September.
Consultants have been working on the Valley EIRs for more than a year, and the authority plans to issue drafts in February for 45 days of public comment and debate.
That is about two months later than what the authority set as its target last year. Consultants will then make revisions or come up with responses based on those comments, before final versions are opened for public comment.
Authority official Barker thinks seven or eight months is plenty of time for the environmental process, but Moore isn't sure.
"Those EIRs are going to raise a lot of questions," he said. "If that's a necessary condition for proceeding, that could hold things up."
The EIRs also will form the basis for the rail authority's final selection of a route for the tracks between Fresno and Bakersfield.
Until that happens, the authority cannot seek or award bids for construction or even start buying the land it needs for the tracks.
Engineers and planners also are working on the preliminary design for the system.
By the time the authority expects to start soliciting bids from contractors -- late this year or in early 2012 -- this work is expected to be at least 30% complete.
Contractors would complete the design and build the system. Under the federal grant agreement, those design-build contracts must be awarded by September 2012.
Along the way, the state must submit detailed plans to federal officials for how right of way will be acquired, how roads and utilities will be moved, and how hazardous materials will be handled.
But all of that still depends on funding, which is not yet pinned down and faces its own obstacles.
Money matters
Gov. Jerry Brown and the state Legislature must agree to allocate money from Prop. 1A to match the federal funds. Barker said the authority will seek its first installments of money in the state's 2012-13 budget.
Prop. 1A requires that an independent panel of transportation and rail experts approve budget requests before any bonds are sold.
The same panel late last year issued a report questioning the authority's lack of a detailed financing and income plan, lack of a business model for operating and managing the system, and lack of staffing to oversee the project.
Some legislators also have criticized the authority's preliminary estimates of revenues and ridership as "unrealistic." One example: a projection of as many as 102,700 riders daily on the statewide system, including 4,500 boardings daily in Fresno.
"Obviously there are challenges and questions, and the onus is on us to address those questions," Barker said. "By the time we bring our budget request, we'll have to have all these questions answered."
Should the Legislature reject the budget request, "that would be saying, 'No, we don't want high-speed rail,' " Barker added. "That would be telling the federal government to take back the $2.5 billion and saying we don't want it."
If the armful of "ifs" are accomplished -- if the rail authority meets the deadline for environmental review, if it gets money from the Legislature, and if it awards construction contracts in time -- then it's on to the dirty work.
Shovels in the ground
The rail authority suggests that building the segments between Merced and Bakersfield will create as many as 80,000 temporary construction jobs between 2012 and 2017.
But because only 30% of the engineering is expected to be completed on the project by the time contracts are awarded next year, much work will remain on the drawing board until perhaps 2013 and 2014.
"We won't have 10,000 hard hats on the ground laying rail in September 2012," said Barker. "Final engineering will be the first phase of work being done."
The first work that the public would see is likely to be land acquisition, clearing property and demolishing structures in the path of the tracks, said John Popoff, an engineer on the authority's management team.
Read more: http://www.fresnobee.com/2011/01/22/2243485_p2/deadline-pressure-threatens-high.html#ixzz1BsyDzKJX
Read more: http://www.fresnobee.com/2011/01/22/2243485/deadline-pressure-threatens-high.html#ixzz1Bsy3n4Le
