In Short-sighted Republicanthink: Dollars for Roads or Dollars for Rail?

[FayeforCure]

When talking about rail.........Republicans will always paint Democrats as Big Spenders.......But what if their short-sighted thinking actually leads to far more Big Spending on traditional modes of transportation?

Many just don't even want to face reality here, because they are so stuck on short-sighted ideology, and want to obstruct anything Obama may want even if it hurts us as a nation. Just more childish immature behavior.



Dollars for Roads or Dollars for Rail

Emily Rusch is the state director of the California Public Interest Research Group.

Updated January 27, 2012, 2:53 PM


There is no question that California needs to invest in more and better transportation. California’s population is expected to grow from 37 million today to 50 million people by 2030, and 60 million by 2050.

There is no cheap option: roadway and airport expansions have a steep price tag, and an environmental cost.


Providing transportation infrastructure for 20 million additional people in California will require significant investment, no matter which mode we choose.

The Brookings Institute reports that 6 million people already fly between the Los Angeles basin and the San Francisco Bay Area each year, making it the second-busiest air corridor in the nation. Official predictions show that traffic on Interstate 5 and California 99 in the Central Valley will double over the next 25 years.

Unless we invest in alternatives, traffic will grow worse and airport delays more frequent. For crowded areas like Los Angeles, building major new highways and runways would be extremely difficult and expensive.

Although the price tag for high-speed rail is daunting, it is important to consider the budgetary and societal costs of highway and airport expansions that California would need without it. As with rail, the costs are particularly high in crowded urban areas where investment is most needed.

To build similar capacity via roads and airports would require 2,326 new lane miles of highways, 115 new airport gates, and four new airport runways, at an estimated $171 billion to build.

California’s need to invest coincides now with unprecedented opportunities: an extremely low cost for borrowing capital, a construction industry with idle capacity, and federal rail grants already committed.

So, we have a choice in California. Invest in highways and airport expansions, or high-speed rail? The rail will also reduce harmful air pollution, give travelers an attractive option to avoid crowded freeways, and encourage denser development around stations. Investing in high-speed rail is the smarter choice.

http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2012/01/26/does-california-need-high-speed-rail/california-can-spend-on-roads-or-on-rail

The moral of this story is Republicans would rather Big Spend twice as much on traditional (regressive) modes of transportation than invest just half of that in a more wisely chosen cutting edge (progressive) mode of transporttion. Go figure   

Stupid is as stupid does.

[NotNow]

Just a few questions Faye,

Do you read these articles before you post?  There is no mention of Republicans or Democrats in the article, the name calling is all your editorializing.  California is a state dominated by Democrats both in state and Federal office holders.  You are aware of that, aren't you?   

Also, here is just one comment that was posted:

DemographiaSt. Louis & ParisReport Inappropriate Comment. Vulgar . Inflammatory . Personal Attack . Spam . Off-topic ..SubmitCancel .
Flag
..The "Jaw-Droppingly Shameless" California High Speed Rail Alternatives Cost Claim

As Joseph Vranich and I indicated in our Wall Street Journal op-ed, the $171 billion "alternatives" cost is hugely exaggerated (California High Speed Rail Fibs, http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142405297020351360457714435139044543....

It is based upon a fundamentally flawed analysis asks how many seats could be on the train, not how many cars are taken off the road. Generally, high speed rail removes few cars from the road (more on that at newgeography.com).

The alternatives cost estimate is exaggerated to an extent not seen even in the highly criticized business of rail ridership forecasting. The highway cost estimate is doubling the 2040 train size. A further doubling occurs from more than doubling the 2040 service level. Another 50 percent is added by assuming the rail route would impact (equally) duplicate roadway sections. When the multiplicative effect of these exaggerations is put together, little remains.

The air capacity increase assumption is based upon a plane capacity that could be easily increased to handle any conceivable increase in air patronage in the corridor, avoiding the necessity for new runways or new gates.

Mother Jones columnist Kevin Drum said it best: The alternative cost estimate is "jaw droppingly shameless." (http://www.newgeography.com/content/002640-jaw-droppingly-shameless-moth...

Wendell Cox


I would tend to listen to the people that live in California on this subject.  They have the most direct knowledge. 

Posts like this do not enhance ones credibility among those that still reason.

[FayeforCure]

Wow.......quoting Wendell Cox!

“Wendell Cox, has been on the bankroll of the American Highway Users Alliance, a lobbying group founded in the 1930s by General Motors Corp. And, according to a June 1999 Texas Observer article, the Wendell Cox Consultancy has done a lot of work for private bus companies who bid on the very contracts which Cox promotes after rail projects are scuttled.”

http://placemakinginstitute.wordpress.com/2010/01/04/wendell-cox-intellectual-terrorist/

Yeah the cost estimate of alternatives might be exagerated.......but by how much?

And was the cost estimate for alternatives exagerated by some kind of liberal outfit? Hardly!

Is New York-based contractor Parsons Brinkerhoff a liberal institution or a crony capitalist business that exploits citizens desires to reduce air pollution and traffic congestion caused by  automobile transit systems so it can obtain contracts to build HSR? My guess is it is a for-profit business out to win as many public contracts as it can without any regard to the utility of them. Funding bond measures, meaning funding the propaganda of bond measures in order to convince voters to vote for a poorly analyzed transit improvement scheme, indicates Parsons Brinkerhoff is a crony business enterprise, and not a liberal institution concerned with improving the overall condition of society and the environment. Liberals, like conservatives, are just as susceptible to the repetition of exaggerations and the promised goals of grand projects, which also might explain why so many non-liberal Democrats are elected.

as one of the commenters posted at http://motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2012/01/california-hsr-now-even-more-ridiculous

My main point is that spending money on regressive traditional transportation modes is by definition A-okay with Republicans................but they will dig their heels in when it comes to cutting edge progressive modes of transportation ostensibly over cost issues, when they haven't truthfully analyzed the Big Picture.

Even if the cost estimate for alternatives is 50% higher than is realistic..........HSR will still be the preferable ,most cost-effective option.

The cost estimate for alternatives is based on a (inflated?) ridership of 116 million passengers a year for HSR.

In a state with a 40 million population..........

The main concern CA state Democrats have is with accountability and transparency on the HSR project..........not on the issue of investing in a cutting edge mode of transportation fully knowing that the alternatives are just as expensive, if not more.

[NotNow]

Sooooo...you attack the guy but not his facts?  Your Rep v. Dem rant is just that, a rant.  Cali is a Democrat state and whatever their issues in funding this project, it is NOT a partisan party issue.  I am certainly good with HSR projects but you really should watch out for the habit of "Dems GOOD!, Reps BAD!" and "HSR GOOD!, cars BAD!".   That may fly on this forum but thinking people want to see facts and justifications (see OCK's examination of the Florida HSR project), not name calling.  And certainly not false figures which just destroys the credibility of the argument. 

I'm not arguing against your position on this issue Faye.  I am arguing against the way you went about stating your position.  Just trying to help .

[FayeforCure]

Sooooo...you attack the guy but not his facts?  Your Rep v. Dem rant is just that, a rant.  Cali is a Democrat state and whatever their issues in funding this project, it is NOT a partisan party issue.  I am certainly good with HSR projects but you really should watch out for the habit of "Dems GOOD!, Reps BAD!" and "HSR GOOD!, cars BAD!".   That may fly on this forum but thinking people want to see facts and justifications (see OCK's examination of the Florida HSR project), not name calling.  And certainly not false figures which just destroys the credibility of the argument. 

I'm not arguing against your position on this issue Faye.  I am arguing against the way you went about stating your position.  Just trying to help .

NotNow, I get your point........and obviously it is more conducive to limit talk to the merits of a project if it weren't for the fact that Republicans in leadership as a whole tow the party line on being against HSR. Good to know you do in fact favor HSR, and as a Republican you may want to convinvce the Republican leadership of its merits as well.

There is no point for me as an independent Democrat to try to make any headway in convincing Republicans when their party line is to just obstruct Obama in anything he wants (and remember, I am no real fan of Obama either.........whom I generally perceive as Republican lite).

Ock's approach is the kind of incrementalism that hyper-partisanship in this country breeds. I am really glad Dwight eisenhower didn't choose incrementalism when he envisioned the US highway system.


Bold progressive policies cannot be based on incrementalism such as higher speed rail rather than HSR.

The only kind of incrementalism that has been known to work is to start HSR boldly in one state and then expand to other states, as Canada did in 1965 when they started their universal healthcare system.

But never-ending gridlock over routing and higher speed rail vs true HSR is geting us exactly........NOTHING!

People in CA are now running scared and Republicans love it............another victory over Obamarail as Rick Scott so fondly calls it.

[FayeforCure]

Tiptoeing around where the real HSR obstructionism is coming from and what is motivating it, is just not my style.

I think it is wasteful to pretend there are rational reasons for the HSR obstructionism, when it is primarily motivated by Republican ideology aimed at scoring points against Obama.

Hence the reality show antics thread elsewhere.

Politics has become no different than the average reality show antics and for us to pretend it's any different makes us complicit in the never-ending game of the forces that want to move this country forward and the forces that want to keep this country stagnant/regressing while the 1%ers laugh all the way to the bank.

Obviously it isn't an issue of "car is bad and train is good." It is an issue of multi-modality which the car industry and freight lines are holding back.

Lets finally get to the point of multi-modality in the US, after all that's what true freedom of choice is all about.

Instead of endlessly discussing it.