I think that today, that the building of the California High Speed Rail (CAHSR) should of started in the most congested areas of California. These are the urban cities I called metropolitan San Francisco-Oakland and San Jose, along with Los Angeles-Anaheim, San Bernardino-Riverside to San Diego first, and establishing a station in the city of Santa Clarita, which is located in the Santa Clarita Valley, population of 210,089, instead of a CAHSR from Madera through Fresno, Hanford and Bakersfield.
The cost has ballooned to close to $100 billion dollars, some of that money could of been used to build a new bridge for replacing the Richmond-San Rafael Bridge, Interstate 580 (Old California state route 17) between U.S. 101 and Interstate 80 (Old U.S. 40) as well as the need for one additional bridge across the San Francisco Bay Area linking Interstate 380 near the San Francisco International Airport to the Interstate 880/Interstate 238 interchange. The number of Interstate 238 should of been routed as a California state route.
Finally, if California needs such a project, they should take the entire project apart financially and look what is being spent per month of every year, budget wise to save money!
Scott C. Presnal
Morro Bay