California Gov. Gavin Newsom's pitch for $4.2 billion of state funding for high-speed rail is a big lie.
"Let's get the job done. Let's finish the Central Valley component," Newsom said during a Bay Area visit last week to push his budget plan. "The voters set aside the money for this purpose, I want to get those dollars out from Prop 1A and finish that job. Doing it in a fast and judicious way."
Let's be clear: That's not what Californians approved back in 2008.
If Newsom really believes his claim about voters' desires, then he should ask them. Let's put high-speed rail back on the ballot with realistic independent cost estimates, timelines and environmental analyses and see what California voters really think.
Newsom knows that would be a losing venture.
In 2008, when voters approved nearly $10 billion of state bond funding, they were promised bullet trains traveling at more than 200 mph from San Diego to San Francisco and Sacramento at a cost of $45 billion. By last year, the cost estimate had jumped to $83 billion and perhaps as high as $100 billion, but just for a system from San Francisco to Anaheim.
Newsom knows that the state cannot deliver the system voters were promised. "Right now," Newsom said in his 2019 State of the State address, "there simply isn't a path to get from Sacramento to San Diego, let alone from San Francisco to L.A."
Newsom has flip-flopped since then. But nothing else has changed. There never was enough money and there never will be. And if voters had been told the truth back then they would have never approved California's high-speed rail to nowhere.
The governor now wants the last of the voter-approved money to "finish the Central Valley component." That's just a 171-mile segment from Merced to Bakersfield. And the $4.2 billion Newsom wants won't even be enough to finish that $22 billion segment.
After that, then what? Californians were told the private sector would invest. It hasn't. Californians were told federal funding would close the gap. That's a pipe dream. Even with a Democratic administration in Washington, and the passage of a $1 trillion infrastructure package, there's only the possibility of a trickle of federal money for California high-speed rail.
It's been more than 13 years since voters passed Proposition 1A. If they had been told that the money they were approving would at best deliver improved rail service through the Central Valley, the measure would have been resoundingly defeated. The voters were misled and now Newsom is doubling down on the lie.
Fortunately, the governor can't spend the remaining $4.2 billion of voter-approved money without the Legislature's consent. And, thus far, lawmakers, including from Newsom's own party, are balking.
High-speed rail is an appealing concept. But, as the lack of private investment shows, it will never pencil out. And, without substantial ridership, it's not at all clear that it will reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
It's time to end this boondoggle. Or at least ask voters if they want to continue throwing good money after bad.
