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What it is going to take for High Speed Rail to succeed?
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<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><FONT face=georgia,palatino size=3>The only way a national system of HSR can be built is incrementally.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>To build the whole thing at once, you could not throw enough money at it.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>You would first have to pay to build the public sector money-spending machine that would have the needed capacity.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>You could not throw enough money to even build that machine.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>The scale of the project goal would simply institutionalize an ongoing cost overrun that would soak up the funding before it could be applied to track and trains.</FONT></P> <P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN style="FONT-SIZE: 12pt; FONT-FAMILY: 'Times New Roman'; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA"><FONT face=georgia,palatino></FONT></SPAN> </P> <P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN style="FONT-SIZE: 12pt; FONT-FAMILY: 'Times New Roman'; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA"><FONT face=georgia,palatino>The currently committed $15 billion is just a tiny down payment on a system of ten corridors totaling perhaps 10,000 miles.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>When you consider not only the cost of the trains and track, but also all of the grade separation at crossings, the new roadbed infrastructure, and the shoehorning of HSR into operating freight right of ways, the cost will tally into thousands of billions of dollars.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>We would need a whole new government-spending infrastructure just to move the money.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN></FONT></SPAN></P> <P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN style="FONT-SIZE: 12pt; FONT-FAMILY: 'Times New Roman'; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA"><SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"><FONT face=georgia,palatino size=3></FONT></SPAN></SPAN> </P> <P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN style="FONT-SIZE: 12pt; FONT-FAMILY: 'Times New Roman'; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA"><SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"></SPAN><FONT face=georgia,palatino>And then just to make it a little more challenging, consider that we don’t have a dime.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>The whole cost has to be borrowed from future taxpayers.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Overall, a goal of national HSR is about as realistic as a goal of populating the moon.</FONT></SPAN></P>
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