When California voters passed a referendum in 2008 to construct a high-speed rail connecting Los Angeles to San Francisco, there was no shortage of skeptics. Forty-seven percent of the state voted against the plan, and a group of think tanks issued a nearly 200-page report that year arguing costs would skyrocket, ridership would not match projections, and the environmental benefits were overstated.
The skeptics, of course, have been vindicated. But few thought it would be as bad as it has since turned out to be. Fifteen years, and countless setbacks later, not a single mile of track has been laid, and estimated costs have risen to $128 billion — or $200 million per mile. There is no money left, and even the secretary of the California State Transportation Agency now admits, “We can’t get this project done without federal support. It’s just not going to happen.“
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Nevertheless, Forbes reported last week that the California High-Speed Rail Authority now plans for the entire project to be powered by solar energy once it is complete because…why not? After all, it is not as if this bullet train is ever going to exist anyway. As such, its visionaries certainly have an interest in periodically devising new, wholly unrealistic schemes that appeal to those who voted for it as a way of distracting from their incompetence.
Forbes noted the plan includes “552 acres of solar panels generating 44 megawatts of electricity” and that “work could begin by 2026 to ensure it’s ready to power trains by 2030.” But anybody paying attention to the progress made thus far knows this is a pipe dream for a few reasons.
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For starters, solar energy is incredibly unreliable because solar panels do not produce energy when it is dark or there is bad weather. Not only that, but there is no other bullet train in the world that is “fully powered by renewables.” Considering California’s high-speed rail is already teed up to be uniquely inefficient relative to those in other parts of the world, both in terms of speed and cost, it seems unlikely to be exemplary in this domain. And last, the initial plan was passed in 2008 to be completed and operational in 2020. But it is now 2023, and there is nothing to show for the intervening 15 years. Adding another, even more complicated element on top of what has already proven to be difficult for California seems like a recipe for even more failure.
This is exactly how scams work: huge promises, no results, and then more huge promises to cover up the fact there were no results in the first instance. Evidently, there is no bigger scam than progressive governance. The reason is unmistakable: When on the ground reality inevitably clashes with the progressive imagination, reality wins every time — and the people pay the price.
Jack Elbaum is a summer 2023 Washington Examiner fellow.