In many ways I think that california high speed rail is a symbol of everything positive and everything negative about 21st century transit projects in the USA. And despite all the massive issues I still can't help but be very hopeful for the project, and hopeful for phase 1 as a whole from SF to LA. It was really cool to see the sheer scale of work being done in this video, thanks so much for this unique experience.
@@mattoniomaximus9765 the primary reason i have for voting for biden, besides stopping trump, is for the possibility of cahsr getting a few more crumbs from the admin
Great video! It's so cool that you drove the whole route! As a Fresno native, I appreciate you visiting my old hometown, derelict as it is. I was last there 2 years ago and frankly, it still looks the same as it did in 1979, just so much poorer. The city has great bones as you astutely noticed. I have high hopes for this station as Fresno's last best chance at revitalization, but that train has to get to the Bay Area for that to happen. Otherwise, Fresno and the other Valley cities will remain stagnant and poorer. OMG comparing Fresno Civic Center to the Aztecs was awesome!! But then you slayed me with the "disappointing, flaccid, dinky, afterthought of an arch" for the San Joaquin River bridge. I agree, that river deserves better. In fact, Fresno has designated that entrance from the river as one of the city's major gateways. The least they could have done was ask for a "gateway" design. Flaccid just seems appropriate. Did I see a pedestrian on the freeway at the San Joaquin River? Of course there was. It's Fresno. I never understood the need for a Madera station. I don't think it was originally going to have one. It's only 12 miles from north Fresno. Madera doesn't even have a hospital anymore. That is just an indication of how bad the economic situation is in the Central Valley. Hospitals struggle to stay open. Downtown Fresno lost it's last CVS and Walgreen's a little over a year ago. These used to be vibrant middle class cities with neighborhoods that looked like they were right out "Leave It To Beaver". It's just sad what's happened to those cities, even as California's economy exploded. As for those drivers who almost caused an accident, Bakersfield is #11 most dangerous city for driving and Fresno is #25 (LA ranks #31 for comparison) according to a US News & World Report study in 2023. The "Dangerous by Design" 2024 report by Smart Growth America ranks Bakersfield as the 4th most dangerous city for pedestrians in the US. Fresno ranks 7th. By comparison, LA is #30 (but Riverside/San Berdo is #12).
Where the project in Fresno is located downtown gives outsiders the wrong impression of Fresno. The Fresno population has been going north for the last 100 years. The area north of Herndon Ave. looks the exact opposite of downtown. The fact that north of Herndon Ave. is a different school district has a lot to do with this.
@@dfirth224 yes the city has been constantly moving north, and in doing so has let the rest of the city decline. Fresno has become a city of two faces on either side of it's Mason-Dixon line; one rich and green north of Herndon and the other poor and dry south of Herndon (especially south of Shaw), smooth streets north of Herndon and rutted gutted out streets south of Herndon, clean neighborhoods north of Herndon and a trash filled city full of empty lots and shuttered businesses south of Herndon. Fresno ranks as the nation's 8th dirtiest city for 2023 and it's duly earned. Downtown Fresno is the right impression for Fresno and is exactly what visitors should see because most of the city looks like downtown. Little spots of hope like the few blocks of the Tower District aren't enough to save it. Most of the people of Fresno live south of Herndon, in areas that look like downtown. Blackstone, Fresno's once proud main street, is an embarrassing, trash-filled, and derelict monument to what Fresno has become.
I used to drive through Fresno on the CA-99 many weekends in a row for work, the reference to the 150% scale and alien race is spot on 😂. That is the exact kind of feeling I got, compared to the freeway structures immediately beneath it, it seems like some ancient race of giants left that thing behind.
I think the biggest benefit of the initial operating segment won’t be for people traveling from one part of the valley to another, but rather as an efficient way to get from Fresno and Bakersfield to the waiting ACE and San Joaquins trains in Merced that can take them to the rest of Northern California. As mentioned in the video, the local Hanford-Fresno or Madera-Fresno connections won’t really be an local route upgrade, but rather a continuation of the level of local service currently run by San Joaquins trains (which will terminate in Merced rather than Bakersfield once CAHSR starts running). Of course, for longer trips involving ACE and San Joaquins transfers the value starts to come back for locals since it can take them further without driving. I also expect a fair bit of showing off to lawmakers in an effort to get funding for the rest since the entire Central Valley section in progress so far is being built to 250 mph design and 220 mph operational standards. Most Americans really haven’t experienced that kind of ground speed unless they traveled abroad to China. Not even trains in Europe run that fast.
Japan shows that cross-platform transfers between HSR and conventional rail can be very effective. The question is whether or not San Joaquins and ACE can provide the necessary frequency.
Ridership is going to be so low though. Yeah fast is great and all, but people won't care because its going to be less convenient to travel by rail to these cities when you don't have your car with you at your destination.
shouldn’t ACE or the San Joaquins run on the high speed line too if they aren’t running that much high speed trains? I heard the frequencies and timings are like 1-2 an hour, would be helpful to use those empty segments for regular intercity trains like they do in Belgium with their HSL to Netherlands.
@@TheRandCrews Funny that you mention that because that’s kind of the plan. The California High Speed Rail Authority is only planning on becoming a HSR operator once they have connected the Central Valley to San Francisco. The initial service from Bakersfield to Merced is going to be fully high speed with the new tracks and trains, but the interim operator is going to be the San Joaquin Joint Powers Authority which is the operator of today’s San Joaquins service. As a result, the Merced cross-platform transfer will be SJJPA to SJJPA. The Madera station location in the video that seemed like it was in the middle of nowhere actually isn’t a CAHSR Authority-led proposal even though it’s on the CAHSR line. That Madera station is a SJJPA-led project to keep serving its Madera passengers one it switches to temporarily operating CAHSR trains south of Merced.
I'm a first time viewer - thank you for taking the time to drive the Phase 1 route. I'm a native Californian and spent quite a few decades in sales calling on offices in all the towns you've mentioned. Each one has it's own unique character and history - it's nice that you noticed the positive along with the challenges. It sounds like politics, rather than logic, influenced where some of the stations are going to be located. Or, with budget constraints, it may have been cheaper to bulldoze farmland than prepare a more logical location. I hope that they continue to build out the entire line so that we might actually have long-range public transportation system.
Yeah, that I could see. The drive from Fresno to San Jose wasn't that bad, but its not exactly short. San Jose to S.F. was a bear. Bakersfield to L.A. generally sucks, although I do like the part through the mountains. Either way, a good alternative on a drive like that would be nice. S.F. is about 20-25 years off for CAHSR, as far as I've figured, unless $25 billion shows up from the federal government in the next 5-6 years. L.A. is in doubt, in my opinion, unless you make that $50 billion instead of 25.
11:32 the towns around Kings/Tulare are going to regret rejecting an HSR station in their town. The connection to LA and the Bay will be huge for economic growth in the Central Valley cities with HSR stations.
The opposition to HSR is all political. It's all been Republicans who are against it. Nothing new. Republicans in Congress voted against the Interstate Highways in 1954. And it was a REPUBLICAN President who wanted it. He wanted an American autobahn like the one he saw in Germany in 1945. Eisenhower had to wait until the Democrats retook control of Congress in 1956 to get the Interstate Highway bill passed.
APPARENTLY, from what I understand: it was the Union Pacific that resisted against the SUPERIOR Hwy-99 route SO MUCH that the CAHSR just gave up and went with the BNSF route instead.
@@Rustyrailhead The HSRA business plan says SF to Kings/Tulare should take 131 minutes. There is no air service from Hanford or Visalia and driving to San Fransisco from either takes at least three hours and twenty minutes and up to five hours. This isn't terribly convenient for daily commuting but it would make business trips from SF/San Jose/LA much more convenient and connect Valley businesses to a whole host of customers as well as business service and consulting providers. I could also see it making the cities in the valley much more attractive to businesses looking to locate back office functions away from the higher cost coastal metro areas.
The fundamental question is will California High-Speed Rail benefit the Central Valley economically over its first 100 years of operation once completed. The rail line will provide millions of Californians fast connections at a dozen stations which is much more efficient that flying between each area. The Central Valley is deficient in reliable airports with Fresno Airport often shut down winter mornings due to Tule Fog. As one of the most economically depressed areas of California what better way is there to make improvements than to provide better transportation
No one is flying between cities on this route. They drive. And they will still drive because it's preferrable to have your car with you at your destination.
Worst case, a lot of Federal money goes to the payroll of Central Valley workers. The real boon would be when Pacheco Pass opens up new bedroom communities of Silicon Valley.
@@bensonr2 there are already over 1 million passengers a year taking the San Joaquins passenger train service operated by Amtrak's fifth-busiest service in California's San Joaquin Valley on six daily round trips on this route. 😀
Thank you for the splendid video. Watching from the Netherlands, I hope that CHSR service from LA to SF will commence before my life ends. (I am 68.) I am particularly excited because I grew up in California. (Dutch, I returned to the fatherland after retiring from teaching at an international school in the UK (31 years!).) Keep up the good work!
This CAHSR progress is exactly why I was so happy to see the success of the Brightline project in Florida. Because the success of that project would help with the Brightline West project between Vegas and LA, which would then lead into the CAHSR lines
speaking of not doing much walking in fresno, I walked pretty much every segment shown in video here within the fresno city limits in the september heat 😂 lots of sunscreen and water were required
I will most likely be a middle-aged man by the time this project, initially approved by voters several years before I was old enough to vote for it, is operational, but god damn if I'm not still rooting for it.
@@DefensisIndus a market research firm should find out which mascot is most appealing, although a cat is certainly an appealing option (and it would probably be wise to get concept drawings from Japanese artists, as they really know their stuff).
Connecting Bakersfield to los angles should have been the first priority since there is no train that services this route. Amtrak already serves the central valley and its stops at bakerfield. Rider then takes a bus for the rest of the trip to los angles.
With Amtrak they bus you from Bakersfield over the grapevine. Had to pick my mom up at the bus station when she would come for a visit. So by that logic this leg is complete. Go figure.
Fun Fact: Golden State Blvd. was the original CA 99. I believe there's the same street/situation in Bakersfield, and there definitely is in Turlock. In Modesto, it was what is now 9th street.
I'm 74 years old. I remember when 9th St. in Modesto was US 99. Going through downtown Turlock was the worst, you'd hit a red light at every corner. Golden State Blvd. in cities up and down the valley was old U.S. Highway 99. The Main St. of the West Coast. US 99 carried more traffic, especially trucks, than 101 did. The reason 99 was not converted to I-5 between Bakersfield and Stockton is the California Aqueduct. Both were built at the same time. The dirt removed from the aqueduct was used to build I-5.
Always love a good Brady Bunch special trip to Hawaii where they just happen to find a secret cave with a haunted idol reference. 70s TV writing was insane. Oh, and thanks for the insightful video as always! As a structural engineer, I find CASHRs choice of structures endlessly baffling. Perhaps it’s just embedded ways of working, but so many of these long viaducts could have been post tension precast concrete segmental. Instead they have an army of rodbusters hand placing rebar in-situ. Just seems insanely backwards.
You're welcome. In regard to the last part, jobs? The politicians that support these types of projects genuinely see them as jobs projects as much as transportation. Although, let me edit that. On second thought this doesn't make much sense unless the Authority is pressuring contractors to use unnecessary human labor and I have no evidence of that.
@@LucidStew it's worth remembering that these first four CPs were bid-design-build, meaning the contractor selected then designed the structures and charged CHSRA whatever that cost. Going forward, CHSRA will design everything in-house then bid that out to contractors, which hopefully should reduce costs as well as the number of change orders, and they've acknowledged that's what they should have done from the start. Lessons learned here such as those will be applied both toward CAHSR going forward as well as other US HSR projects, which very likely would have been the case regardless of wherever the first US HSR project began.
Major projects like this take 20 years. It took 20 years to build the Interstate Highway system, starting in 1957. The "Big Dig" in Boston took 20 years.
I honesty hope it never gets finished. Just another project to bulldoze and level yet another lage swath of my home here in Merced just as 99 did in the 60s. Merced Station is going set to wipe out multiple blocks This thing is an expensive disaster that should have never been made. All we needed was to give Amtrak its own line so it doesnt have to stop for all the freight. That alone would massivly cut travel time. I hope this blight is never complete.
@@hyper6500 You realize that giving Amtrak its own dedicated line would share most of the costs of the HSR tracks, right? They'd still have to aquire land, build crossings and overpasses, and negotiate with the freight railroads. And what makes you think people would choose Amtrak over flying? Amtrak is multiple times more expensive than flying, and it would still take most of a full day to make the full trip from LA to SF.
@@appleintosh not really, amtrak on the east cost traveling the same distance nonstop is a couple hrs vs 6+ for current Amtrak. The only reason ots slow is because it has to share track with Freight and stop for freight. If it could run non stop at the east cost speeds of 100-150mph it would be fine. This is just an overly expensive project being made for no other reason than they can. Its garbage that when complete will likely have very expensive ticket prices to make up for it's never ending rising cost. The ticket will probably be more expensive than any Amtrak ticket. HSR to be truly successful needs more than just a fast line to be used over other options. The reason HSR works in almost every other country its because theres more to the HSR than the train alone. You need smaller lines feeding it like light rail and subways, ample public transportation and more. In Japan you can ride the shinkansen to you destination and take other smaller transit lines/public transit to your destination without ever needing your own car all using the same rail pass you used to ride the HSR. CA HSR is just an expensive, over budget fubared project made because politicians want something shiny.
Honestly Stew, I liked what was shown; it should be useful against all the anti-HSR websites on TH-cam? I'm one of the few that's majorly impressed with what has been completed thus far. However, I think that more still needs to be completed. The HSR Board hasn't been very good at instructing the work crews to completing the projects. Honestly, I think they need to hire a few more work crews to complete the guideway. The project is moving along, but it still needs the Biden Administration to pony up enough operating capital so that the initial operating segment can be finished in 2033; me being generous? Also, I'm awaiting how HSR plans on connecting the Bay Area and Los Angeles as well as the Sacramento and San Diego segments?
It is a huge undertaking. I got a profound sense of that before I even reached the Central Valley. Driving through Antelope Valley it struck me that this is A LOT. It proposes to go a VERY long way. What I got out of the trip was what I hoped to get out of it: bringing the perspective down to a human scale. And, like the car next the Cedar Viaduct and all the silly imagery I used there, the true, gargantuan scale of the proposition became more apparent. I agree. What they've done is impressive. But, also, the idea that this was going to be built in 15 years for $35 billion now seems quite silly. And the inflation of the budget to the stratosphere seems ever more realistic.
I recall the people of California voted for this in 2008, so help me understand why this means the Biden administration needs to pay for it. California voted for it, let California pay for it.
@@mattc3696 Not everything that was voted for could be covered by only California. It was assumed that some of the assistance would come from Congress as the CA HSR was considered an infrastructure project on par with what was happening on the Northeast Corridor. Are you now saying that the Federal Government shouldn't have to pay for projects outside of the Northeast Corridor?
It's interesting you would label me as an optimist, when most find me to be pessimistic on the subject. I'd say the only thing I'm really optimistic about is the ability to meet the Merced-Bakersfield funding gap at some point in the future. Beyond Merced-Bakersfield, I'm not convinced anything will be completed, although I can imagine scenarios where it might be. Personally I do not believe Phase 2 has any chance of being built, and Phase 1 Anaheim-S.F. is a long-shot.
@@LucidStew Youre really confident in a Government that is broke. Our service economy is collapsing, work from home is growing. Wheres the need for this as far as future business needs change.
What's this project comes online the areas next to the station's need to be rezoned into high density commercial centers. Madera and Kings/Tulare are especially sad. Parking lots can remain since they're a necessity but the farmland surrounding the lots need ro be replaced with massive hotels, offices and housing towers. UC Merced should house a campus next to the Merced Station to increase ridership.
Great video and good field work. I wish the high speed rail had done a Sacramento to Bakersfield route first. Sacramento is the state capital, and would have been a great starting point for service. They even could have opened it in smaller phases, for example, Sacramento to Stockton, than extend to Modesto, Merced, and so on. That is how Japan and France built their first lines, anyways.
I mean, technically its still possible, but unless there is a massive federal windfall, the Authority desperately needs to borrow on any future earnings it can demonstrate, and Bakersfield-SF is supposedly the first part that can turn a profit.
If you take Amtrak's San Joaquins from Madera to Bakersfield you pass under the Wasco, Tulare River, and Conejo Viaducts and it travels next to a lot of right of way
That's what all of the middle of California looks like! The only real difference is the ethnic diversity and how much closer together the towns are, here in CA. We are a MASSIVE farming and military industrial complex state, in addition to everything else we have.
I always say Texas and California ARE rival states, but SIBLING rivals. Both huge, diverse, economically and politically powerful, former Mexican states with a lot of American emigrants that rebelled from Mexico, joined the Union around the same time, were part of the Wild West, blessed with fertile agricultural land, oil money (Cali just hides its wells better), and massive contributions to the Military-Industrial Complex. They just ended up on opposite sides of the Civil War and with some *slight* differences in the balance of political power between urban and rural parts of each state, which our First-Past-the-Post voting system lets snowball into what LOOKS like totally opposite politics, when its really like 55-45 for one and 45-55 for the other.
A lot of these communities and towns took in massive migration from Oklahoma and Texas after the dust bowl. And these areas are still way more similar to Texas and Oklahoma than the rest of California. Bakersfield used to be the home of country music stars like Merle Haggard and Buck Owens, for example.
I was walking through Turlock one day and it felt a LOT like Texas. American flags, large but sparse/low houses, american flags everywhere, sidewalks that've seen better days, astonishing flatness, pickup trucks, and all that EastCal has quite a way to go. Apparently the population of California east of the I-5 is higher than the population to the west, which is crazy to imagine. And much that they're building there's single-family low-density tract housing in the middle of nowhere Dunno what HSR would do
San Andreas the tracks will be above ground. Same for all major faults. Tulare Lake, the right of way is elevated on about 10 foot high berms. Flooding won't be an issue in the mid-term. They could have problems in the longer-term though if the state and local water districts don't get subsidence under control. The big headline idea is that the lake might flood again. Of course that's not out of the realm of possibility, but Success and Terminus dams are both being improved, so that should happen less often in the future. The bigger concern is changes in the track geometry, to which the system will be fairly sensitive since the train is suppose to travel at 220mph through there. They may need to re-level those berms on occasion. I think in the very long-term if problems persist, they may simply do as they have with levees and aqueducts: raise it up.
As someone not from California, or even the US, but have driven from SF up to Portland and Vancouver, though never the Central Valley it is amazing just how big the state is and how vast and flat the Central Valley is. Watching this you can understand why they decided to start this part, it's so incredibly flat, but it does really need through trains to SF even if not HSR until the rest is built or I can see usage being a problem (and attracting people to move to cities like Merced or Bakersfield. I guess those stations in the middle of nowhere were to get the locals to vote for spending money on the project. When is this section due for completion? They really need to get some trains running between places, even if not particularly high speed for people to start feeling it's moving along, or is it an all of nothing thing?
Revenue service of the initial operating segment in the Central Valley is projected to begin 2030-2033. And I think that was the idea for getting it done first. Once there is a proof of concept, and Californians get their first taste of high speed rail, that would ensure the funding for the remaining connecting segments between SF-LA. And of the two, the SF segment will probably get done first, linking CAHSR to Caltrain should be easily done. There is really only one "station in the middle of nowhere." And that is the Hanford Station. But that will service not only Hanford, but Visalia and the Lemoore Naval Air Station. It's possible that most CASHR trains won''t stop there.
That is correct The Amtrak San Joaquins will terminate (from the north) at Merced where there will be a direct transfer available to high speed rail. The ACE train will also be coming in and terminating in Merced. The reason for the termination in Merced is that from there, the high speed rail will be faster, thus it will reduce redundancy as well as get passengers to their destination faster.
SJJPA, who operates the San Joaquins, will be the interim service provider for CAHSR's Central Valley segment when it opens, and remain it at least until CAHSR reaches SF. That could explain the discontinuance of Amtrak rail service south of Merced, since this initial CAHSR route will effectively be an extension of the San Joaquins (and why pay to run two parallel services?). AFAIK, one of the goals for CAHSR is to reduce diesel emissions, such as from trains, which makes it sound like that arrangement will be permanent even after CAHSR reaches SF and CHSRA resumes operations. If that proves the case, it really brings into question why the new Madera station, which is supposed to be a transfer point between Amtrak and HSR, if Amtrak trains will permanently be discontinued south of Merced in 2030-33. At least the Wasco station will remain active until then, hence the new pedestrian underpass there, as HSR construction and eventual train testing happens. It also makes me wonder if the San Joaquins will one day be discontinued entirely once CAHSR reaches Sacramento, as ACE could provide local service between Merced and Sacramento, and virtually all of the cities/stations the San Joaquins serve are served by other rail services, either Capitol Corridor or BART, with the exception being getting between Stockton and Antioch/Martinez (and maybe Richmond).
Wow I must say, I’ve never seen a non celebrity creator (no disrespect if you are a celebrity then my apologies) put so much work into a single video. I personally was hoping for some Southern California HSRA news but even without that your efforts definitely warranted a full watch still. I wish you nothing but the best of health and resources so that you’re able to continue doing the great work that you do. Blessings!
I'm a celebrity in my own mind. XD Thank you for the kind words. I will continue to try to live up to as high a standard as I'm able and will continue to attempt to improve my content!
As a Mainer I am very intrigued by this project. California just impresses me with its forward thinking and financial might. I wish this project the very best. Sure it is expensive now, but in twenty years time it will seem cheap. Go forward USA not backwards.
Completeness depends on what part you're referring to. The initial 119 mile construction segment is about 60% done. The Merced-Bakersfield initial operating segment is about 40% done. The ~500 miles of Phase 1 Anaheim-S.F. is 15% done. The entire 800 mile system is 9% done. As far as dates go, #1 is scheduled to be done end of 2026, #2 before 2034, #3 no official estimate. I'd guess at 2060-2070, #4 no official estimate I'd guess around 2100.
@@ChopsticksDIYGarden I would, however, anticipate things changing around 2050 after the global depression in the 2030s is resolved and the environmentalists come fully into power, so it could be closer to 2070. Depends how things play out. It's almost impossible to predict the future 50 years out. This also assumes no civil war, WW3, or AI takeover between now and then.
Thanks for taking us along on your vacation, Stew--and for making it all about CAHSR! The Fresno station is indeed best situated of any of the Central Valley stations, and I hope Fresno takes advantage of that to reimagine their downtown. I was there recently and was--disappointed. It even prompted me to write an article for my local paper about how cars are not the answer to downtown business woes. Note how every spot on Fulton St is occupied, but the vacancy rate is ~50%! Can't wait for the next leg of the journey!
I'm not entirely convinced transit is the answer either. I think in compact spaces feet are important. Good and safe places to walk to and from. Of course there needs to be a means of getting to and from those places, but I think the starting point is the proper mixture of living, working, and recreating within walking distance.
The good: Structures being built. Viaducts over freight are good and necessary. Fresno is definitely going to benefit a lot from CAHSR. Still not worth sacrificing LA for, but San Francisco to Palmdale and then Las Vegas would not be bad. The bad: Kings/Tulare and Madera stations. CAHSRA should nix them, as they're too close to other necessary stations and driving will probably be faster. Also getting rid of those two stations makes the travel time from Merced to Bakersfield better. The ugly: the wait for next week. Looking forward to the Merced to San Francisco leg. Hopefully 12,000 subscribers by then.
@@onetwothreeabc Madera and Kings/Tulare are regional rail locations at best, they don't belong on a high speed rail line, especially one that is legally required to go from LA to SF in 2 hours 40 minutes. I suppose if the Merced to Bakersfield is that's ever built, they would be just filler stations to make it seem like less of a failure.
@@absolutezeronow7928 There will be a lot of trains passing Madera and Kings/Tulare once Phase I is finished for sure. But this is a political project. It has to make sure all stakeholders are OK with the plan. Kings/Tulare is also the transfer station for the transvalley line (proposed). Amtrak will stop their San Joaquin service after the HSR is running.
@@onetwothreeabcNot just for cross valley corridor service, but also thruway bus service to the central coast. Kings/Tulare has more functionality than people give it credit for, and Hanford is also going to start a station-area planning effort before the end of the year.
Really exciting to see what's been going on with the initial segment of CHSR! Ultimately I do think it was the right decision to build the line through the central valley, connecting smaller communities in between major urban centres is a big positive high speed rail has over plane travel. I am worried about the phases of this project. It's no secret that the initial operating segment will not attract very high ridership and once open it will incur sizable operating costs. Leaving it mothballed is not an option politically. But the lower passenger numbers, high operating cost, the already high construction cost and the even higher future construction cost for complex tunneling segments are all factors that can be used by bad actors in politics to torpedo the project. Personally I think the initial operating segment should've went up to Stockton. From there it is much easier to connect the train to the Bay Area and then you would essentially be running an upgraded San Joaquins. Don't know what to do with the train from there on. Electrification of the stockton subdivision? Pull the HSR set with a diesel loco? eBART extension to the subdivision? Make the whole thing a regular BART extension? Depends on how much cash you can secure within and outside the scope of CHSR. Personally I don't think eBART should've been built in the first place but now that it has perhaps this is some way to justify its existence besides cost cutting and lay the foundations for expanding commuter rail on existing railways in the area
Once done, or even in its current state, you certainly wouldn't mothball it. You have a new, high speed rail corridor to utilize. All passenger traffic through the San Joaquin Valley should be routed onto the new CAHSR row regardless of CAHSR's ultimate fate. Especially the way California is pushing for climate-based initiatives, proliferation of electrified rail corridors in the state is fairly inevitable. The Central Valley spine will then be an asset like any other, even if the high speed portion takes 50 years to make it over the mountains into L.A.
High speed train to Bakersfield. Wow. Holy cow. I'm overwhelmed. I've been to Bakersfield probably 30 times in 50 years. The only thing I do when I get there is leave. At least one thing won't change. 😂
I saw that there was a trenched section under construction for the area near Corcoran (the Whitley Avenue Underpass), that seems crazy to me given the recent flooding.
I've heard tell that the Merced-Bakersfield San Joaquins service will be suspended after the merced-bakersfield segment is completed, which sucks for places which used to have SJ service but now don't I've heard that people often take the train from Hanford to Fresno so
Hanford Station design will help state prison employees get to work, and hopefully open up more housing options. Also, we have a lot of commuters traveling up and down the valley
It takes longer to drive from SFO to OAK than it does to drive station to station in many parts of the phase 1 project. Not to mention many of the areas these stations are located aren't very walkable. Even if I can get to the kings-tulare station, I'll still need a car to get to Visalia. And that's assuming I had a reason to go there.
When it was first proposed they said it would be around $100 per ride. Any update on that? I checked and I can fly from SF to LA for $73 today, and be there in 90 minutes.
@@Scoots1994 It's actually required that the state not lose money on operations. Their expectation in that ridership will be similar to the NEC, and Amtrak services on the NEC run at an operating profit.
@@Scoots1994 Not necessary, most HSL are built with two tracks but every stop is equipped with passing loops (i.e. temporarily four tracks) with platforms on the outer tracks.
It's worth noting the Madera HSR station is not being funded or built by CHSRA. That's being done by the City of Madera, Madera County, SJJPA, and I believe a couple other local public entities. The choice of location, AFAIK, had more to do with providing a station for north Fresno neighborhoods than it did for Madera itself, which to be somewhat fair any location along the BNSF tracks is less than ideal for Madera, although Ave 12 seems by far the least ideal. The station itself is supposed to provide a transfer point between HSR and Amtrak, although getting between them will require walking across a parking lot, and if the discontinuance of Amtrak service south of Merced once HSR begins is to be permanent, then there really is zero point having this new station apart from providing north Fresno a place to board HSR without having to drive into downtown Fresno, even though that seems a relatively minor inconvenience at best.
Awesome video. Waiting on the SF section. It looks like the Central Valley is gearing up to have high speed trains running by 2030, testing by 2028. Service to SF, LA won’t be until another 10 years or so. Also to answer about the Kings Tulare station. It was mainly politics. Visalia and Tulare didn’t want the train running through their cities. Even tho Visalia is the largest city between Fresno and Bakersfield, and is in bad need of transportation. But good thing they are planning the cross corridor which will run from Visalia, Lemoore, & Lindsey.
@@LucidStewI have good hopes for 2030 for the Central Valley segment as work has been coming along pretty swift compared to the connector segments to our major regions. All the hard work is being done now which is connecting and building the viaducts, after that all that’s left is laying track and electrifying the route. Going on Amtrak you can see how much is done, from what you can’t see in a vehicle.
@@californiamade5608 12/31/30 is the earliest the schedule affords, they're currently behind schedule, and they have a 9 year track record of not meeting schedules.
@@LucidStewsure but now it is a different story especially with strong support from the current administration. Lawsuits, politics, and acquiring land is what truly delayed it. Now that most of that has been taken care of, the current paste of work and timeframe seems to be much more realistic than it was 8 years ago. Especially with the much more visible work done in recent years.
@@californiamade5608 I realize people like the the narrative that the CAHSR Authority is not at fault, but it doesn't hold up. I suggest reading the state auditor's report from 2018. The Authority was downright incompetent until 2017. Current leadership freely admits that they had to dig out from under a lot of mistakes. As to their current pace, its very slow and they're not keeping to it. The evidence is in the Central Valley reports, published every month. They're struggling to spend the $1.8B budgeted this year, which is putting them behind schedule and will ultimately put them over budget in the mid-term. This after squandering so many years of construction that they no longer have the funds to complete Merced-Bakersfield. While things are better, they're not good.
@@LucidStew I liked it! I can't say I look forward to driving around the construction as it nears my house. Your video cleared up a lot of questions as to the route though, thanks!
As someone who’s been in Fresno for almost all of my life, it’s nice to hear your thoughts about our city as usually videos only talk about the crime or homelessness l within our city. Fresno and quite a bit of the cities in the Central Valley have been ignored for quite a long while, with a lot of focus on the major coastal cities which I find quite sad, though I do love living here as even though we are the 5th largest city in California, we don’t have any modern skyscrapers and only a few historical tall building inland the downtown area which gives an amazing view going all the way to the Mountains! From what I’ve seen of the redevelopment plan I quite love it, no building with boring modern day architecture and respecting the cities history, it makes me very hopeful for the cities future. Although I’m not sure what to think of the station design, especially since I find different renderings with different designs, but whatever the design is I remain hopeful that the high speed rail project will help Fresno and the rest of the Central Valley prosper once again!
It'd be great for Fresno to bring back a modern form of its streetcar network. There've been a few past proposals that sadly never materialized. Seems like there are a few corridors reaching out from the downtown area that would be great for streetcars, including along Fulton.
I love the idea of a high-speed rail. I'm a sucker for big infrastructure projects, but my goodness gracious has it been mishandled that it's taken this long for so little.
Let’s get one thing straight. There not many people that will want to ride the high speed train to Merced. If I was in charge I build the Los Angeles to Bakersfield. People will ride the Lancaster to Los Angeles. People will ride that portion of the high-speed rail. The High Speed Rail wanted to build the less expensive part first. I would’ve built the portion that might make a profit. I build the central valley portion last. The other portions are just going to get more expensive. Then again I’m just a maintenance man with no degree just common sense. Brian from the peoples Republic of California .
How far south from the Bay Area does then new rail electrification reach? Would it be possible for the high-speed trains from the CAHSR to utilize this electrification to travel to the Bay Area until the CAHSR line reaches that destination? I ask, because I traveled on the Eurostar trains from London to the Channel Tunnel on regular electrified tracks until England's HSR1 was completed at a later date.
That is the plan, it will run along Caltrain tracks from Gilroy to SF to the new Terminal, though meantime at 4th and King with intermediate stops on the way.
San Jose. Essentially CAHSR will run on Caltrain tracks north of San Jose. The main addition for CAHSR is the maintenance facility in Brisbane, which is where they will store the trains for the SJ-SF section.
@@LucidStew but isn't the plan for CAHSR to meet up and share Caltrain tracks beginning at the Gilroy station? What is the plan from Gilroy to San Jose/Diridon, then?
@@rockwellmath The plan is for the CAHSRA to build that. Caltrain doesn't have any money. Caltrain's 2025 Capital Outlay budget is less than what CAHSR spends in a month.
Found the complaint about bakersfield drivers funny. Last time I went, the only bad driver was the uber we were in who made a left directly in front of somebody going 40
They're making good progress! Things are starting to really take shape. I would like to have seen pictures of the downtown underpasses though. Are they ready for the railroad to move back from the shoo-fly to the original location?
You can see Fresno St. undercrossing at 17:42 nothing happening there. At 18:07 you can see no right turn at Tulare St. at F St., and at 19:54 road closed at H St. The satellite imagery from 6/9/2024 shows the shoofly still in place.
I am from France where there are a lot of high speed trains, between large centers. Here we may have at some time in the "future" a line between nowhere to nowhere, beautiful. The reason for not starting from LA or San Francisco is very difficult to understand. It look that maybe people will be able to go from LA To San Fransisco by the year 2060 with a good amount of wishes. I will be long gone by then, but I do enjoy the French high speed trains every time I go there including the train to London, no need to wait for this train to have fun.
They are doing work in San Francisco, it's just not quite as visible. Instead of large construction projects like in the Central Valley section, the SF improvements are crossing improvements and electrification of existing rail. The Central Valley section is also the easiest and cheapest to complete, given that the land out there is cheap and the majority of the right of way will be on the surface. The sections extending to SF and LA will both need expensive tunnels to be dug to get out of the valley.
Our governor doesn't like High Speed Rail and has said that multiple times. He is corrupt and sleazy. Our prior governor Jerry Brown was much better, but Newsom wants to get rid of the High Speed Rail project and thus directed it to focus on a "train to nowhere."
@@shreychaudhary4477 I don;t know were you learn geography; but Madera and Kings-tulare are in California, USA not in France. Did you miss elementary school?
@@Christiane069 I mean that there are stations in France that are also in the middle of nowhere. While here in California, the Kings-Tulare station site is ~5.44 km from the closest town (Hanford)'s center and the Madera station site being ~9.28 km from the closest town (Madera)'s center but in France you have stations like Meuse and Lorraine, which while closer to the closest village, they're further from good-sized cities. (like how Lorraine is halfway between Metz and Nancy, a good 18km from Metz and 28km from Nancy (this might be what the Kings-tulare station is trying to do with Hanford and Visalia)) For comparison, Hanford has ~58,000 people and Madera has ~67,000 people but idk if this is a fair comparison because France has a lot more smaller settlements closer together than the California Central Valley
As someone born and raised in Tulare County, I’m very excited for this to finally be operational. The one disappointment that I’ve had with it is when asking County Supervisor Amy Shuklian about if there will be any future rail projects in the county outside of the planned connector project she said there is no talks and any that have been had were shot down or dismissed as unnecessary because they don’t believe anyone would use them.
@@shreychaudhary4477 Because express bus service will likely be adequate for the population, and if they wanted to add capacity they could cut headways further, which would work out better from a service standpoint.
As someone with a car in a large geographic area where a car would be needed at the destination as well, what is the incentive for me to use the high speed rail to go from Bakersfield to Fresno or beyond when I can drive straight from my house to my destination and still have personal transport when I get there?
Right, I think most people with a car probably wont use this. Once(or if) it's connected to S.F. and L.A., then it would function more like an airport, where you'd assume some provision of transportation on the other end.
A thought regarding the Kings/Tulare station - perhaps part of the intent is as a rail gateway to the south entrance for Sequoia NP? Granted, that’s a bit of a stretch … just a thought.
that definitely could be one. Amtrak also runs thruway bus service between Hanford and Paso Robles/SLO, which I'm sure will continue with HSR and be a possible way of getting between the Central Coast and Bay Area/NorCal (maybe less so SoCal once HSR reaches LA, since total travel time would likely be close to drive time on 101, which could also be the case for SF).
In my opinion, it would be wise to initially buy multi-mode trains that can run away from the overhead wires to serve more destinations and for emergencies.
The only thing I'd change in this video is calling the San Joaquin Valley by its proper name. The Central Valley is the name of a region that includes the Sacramento Valley and the San Joaquin Valley. High Speed Rail construction is only in the San Joaquin Valley, for now, and people should call the valley by its proper name.
Great to see the progress. Wish they get trains running by 2028 along with Brightline West. Should run Amtrak dual-mode Airos on intern basis for through one-seat service to Sacramento and Oakland.
The initial intent was 77% of equivalent airfare, but of course that was years ago and it won't be running for years to come. I've also seen 20 cents/mile in 2011 dollars in an older document, which works out to about 32-35 cents by the time it could be running in the early 2030s.
A reminder that Bakersfield sued HSRA to have more control over the alignment, so direct all hate mail to City Hall.
I think the current city council would've been fine with the former alignment. Our previous council was a literal nightmare blunt rotation.
In many ways I think that california high speed rail is a symbol of everything positive and everything negative about 21st century transit projects in the USA. And despite all the massive issues I still can't help but be very hopeful for the project, and hopeful for phase 1 as a whole from SF to LA. It was really cool to see the sheer scale of work being done in this video, thanks so much for this unique experience.
As long as California funds it, it can be built.
@@onetwothreeabc I would not be opposed to more Biden bucks like we got from the Infrastructure bill hah
@@mattoniomaximus9765 the primary reason i have for voting for biden, besides stopping trump, is for the possibility of cahsr getting a few more crumbs from the admin
@@mattoniomaximus9765 That’s gone already. Cal HSR has already got billions. No more this round.
@@onetwothreeabc Because California has plenty of extra money.
Great video! It's so cool that you drove the whole route! As a Fresno native, I appreciate you visiting my old hometown, derelict as it is. I was last there 2 years ago and frankly, it still looks the same as it did in 1979, just so much poorer. The city has great bones as you astutely noticed. I have high hopes for this station as Fresno's last best chance at revitalization, but that train has to get to the Bay Area for that to happen. Otherwise, Fresno and the other Valley cities will remain stagnant and poorer.
OMG comparing Fresno Civic Center to the Aztecs was awesome!! But then you slayed me with the "disappointing, flaccid, dinky, afterthought of an arch" for the San Joaquin River bridge. I agree, that river deserves better. In fact, Fresno has designated that entrance from the river as one of the city's major gateways. The least they could have done was ask for a "gateway" design. Flaccid just seems appropriate. Did I see a pedestrian on the freeway at the San Joaquin River? Of course there was. It's Fresno.
I never understood the need for a Madera station. I don't think it was originally going to have one. It's only 12 miles from north Fresno. Madera doesn't even have a hospital anymore. That is just an indication of how bad the economic situation is in the Central Valley. Hospitals struggle to stay open. Downtown Fresno lost it's last CVS and Walgreen's a little over a year ago. These used to be vibrant middle class cities with neighborhoods that looked like they were right out "Leave It To Beaver". It's just sad what's happened to those cities, even as California's economy exploded.
As for those drivers who almost caused an accident, Bakersfield is #11 most dangerous city for driving and Fresno is #25 (LA ranks #31 for comparison) according to a US News & World Report study in 2023. The "Dangerous by Design" 2024 report by Smart Growth America ranks Bakersfield as the 4th most dangerous city for pedestrians in the US. Fresno ranks 7th. By comparison, LA is #30 (but Riverside/San Berdo is #12).
Where the project in Fresno is located downtown gives outsiders the wrong impression of Fresno. The Fresno population has been going north for the last 100 years. The area north of Herndon Ave. looks the exact opposite of downtown. The fact that north of Herndon Ave. is a different school district has a lot to do with this.
@@dfirth224 yes the city has been constantly moving north, and in doing so has let the rest of the city decline. Fresno has become a city of two faces on either side of it's Mason-Dixon line; one rich and green north of Herndon and the other poor and dry south of Herndon (especially south of Shaw), smooth streets north of Herndon and rutted gutted out streets south of Herndon, clean neighborhoods north of Herndon and a trash filled city full of empty lots and shuttered businesses south of Herndon. Fresno ranks as the nation's 8th dirtiest city for 2023 and it's duly earned.
Downtown Fresno is the right impression for Fresno and is exactly what visitors should see because most of the city looks like downtown. Little spots of hope like the few blocks of the Tower District aren't enough to save it. Most of the people of Fresno live south of Herndon, in areas that look like downtown. Blackstone, Fresno's once proud main street, is an embarrassing, trash-filled, and derelict monument to what Fresno has become.
I used to drive through Fresno on the CA-99 many weekends in a row for work, the reference to the 150% scale and alien race is spot on 😂. That is the exact kind of feeling I got, compared to the freeway structures immediately beneath it, it seems like some ancient race of giants left that thing behind.
I think the biggest benefit of the initial operating segment won’t be for people traveling from one part of the valley to another, but rather as an efficient way to get from Fresno and Bakersfield to the waiting ACE and San Joaquins trains in Merced that can take them to the rest of Northern California.
As mentioned in the video, the local Hanford-Fresno or Madera-Fresno connections won’t really be an local route upgrade, but rather a continuation of the level of local service currently run by San Joaquins trains (which will terminate in Merced rather than Bakersfield once CAHSR starts running). Of course, for longer trips involving ACE and San Joaquins transfers the value starts to come back for locals since it can take them further without driving.
I also expect a fair bit of showing off to lawmakers in an effort to get funding for the rest since the entire Central Valley section in progress so far is being built to 250 mph design and 220 mph operational standards. Most Americans really haven’t experienced that kind of ground speed unless they traveled abroad to China. Not even trains in Europe run that fast.
Japan shows that cross-platform transfers between HSR and conventional rail can be very effective. The question is whether or not San Joaquins and ACE can provide the necessary frequency.
Ridership is going to be so low though. Yeah fast is great and all, but people won't care because its going to be less convenient to travel by rail to these cities when you don't have your car with you at your destination.
shouldn’t ACE or the San Joaquins run on the high speed line too if they aren’t running that much high speed trains? I heard the frequencies and timings are like 1-2 an hour, would be helpful to use those empty segments for regular intercity trains like they do in Belgium with their HSL to Netherlands.
@@TheRandCrews The platform heights are different.
@@TheRandCrews Funny that you mention that because that’s kind of the plan. The California High Speed Rail Authority is only planning on becoming a HSR operator once they have connected the Central Valley to San Francisco. The initial service from Bakersfield to Merced is going to be fully high speed with the new tracks and trains, but the interim operator is going to be the San Joaquin Joint Powers Authority which is the operator of today’s San Joaquins service.
As a result, the Merced cross-platform transfer will be SJJPA to SJJPA. The Madera station location in the video that seemed like it was in the middle of nowhere actually isn’t a CAHSR Authority-led proposal even though it’s on the CAHSR line. That Madera station is a SJJPA-led project to keep serving its Madera passengers one it switches to temporarily operating CAHSR trains south of Merced.
I'm a first time viewer - thank you for taking the time to drive the Phase 1 route. I'm a native Californian and spent quite a few decades in sales calling on offices in all the towns you've mentioned. Each one has it's own unique character and history - it's nice that you noticed the positive along with the challenges. It sounds like politics, rather than logic, influenced where some of the stations are going to be located. Or, with budget constraints, it may have been cheaper to bulldoze farmland than prepare a more logical location. I hope that they continue to build out the entire line so that we might actually have long-range public transportation system.
As someone who lives in the Central Valley, I will use high speed rail a lot once it is extended outside the valley. Soooo probably not for a while
Yeah, that I could see. The drive from Fresno to San Jose wasn't that bad, but its not exactly short. San Jose to S.F. was a bear. Bakersfield to L.A. generally sucks, although I do like the part through the mountains. Either way, a good alternative on a drive like that would be nice. S.F. is about 20-25 years off for CAHSR, as far as I've figured, unless $25 billion shows up from the federal government in the next 5-6 years. L.A. is in doubt, in my opinion, unless you make that $50 billion instead of 25.
11:32 the towns around Kings/Tulare are going to regret rejecting an HSR station in their town. The connection to LA and the Bay will be huge for economic growth in the Central Valley cities with HSR stations.
The opposition to HSR is all political. It's all been Republicans who are against it. Nothing new. Republicans in Congress voted against the Interstate Highways in 1954. And it was a REPUBLICAN President who wanted it. He wanted an American autobahn like the one he saw in Germany in 1945. Eisenhower had to wait until the Democrats retook control of Congress in 1956 to get the Interstate Highway bill passed.
I suspect they'll be very enthusiastic about the Cross Valley Corridor once FOMO sets in
When Completed how long will it take to ride from here to SF bay.
APPARENTLY, from what I understand: it was the Union Pacific that resisted against the SUPERIOR Hwy-99 route SO MUCH that the CAHSR just gave up and went with the BNSF route instead.
@@Rustyrailhead The HSRA business plan says SF to Kings/Tulare should take 131 minutes. There is no air service from Hanford or Visalia and driving to San Fransisco from either takes at least three hours and twenty minutes and up to five hours. This isn't terribly convenient for daily commuting but it would make business trips from SF/San Jose/LA much more convenient and connect Valley businesses to a whole host of customers as well as business service and consulting providers. I could also see it making the cities in the valley much more attractive to businesses looking to locate back office functions away from the higher cost coastal metro areas.
I can't wait to see these trains speed across the countryside. Something we as Americans deserves to have in our vast country.
The fundamental question is will California High-Speed Rail benefit the Central Valley economically over its first 100 years of operation once completed. The rail line will provide millions of Californians fast connections at a dozen stations which is much more efficient that flying between each area. The Central Valley is deficient in reliable airports with Fresno Airport often shut down winter mornings due to Tule Fog. As one of the most economically depressed areas of California what better way is there to make improvements than to provide better transportation
No one is flying between cities on this route. They drive. And they will still drive because it's preferrable to have your car with you at your destination.
The real question is will it ever become operational
Who cares?
Worst case, a lot of Federal money goes to the payroll of Central Valley workers. The real boon would be when Pacheco Pass opens up new bedroom communities of Silicon Valley.
@@bensonr2 there are already over 1 million passengers a year taking the San Joaquins passenger train service operated by Amtrak's fifth-busiest service in California's San Joaquin Valley on six daily round trips on this route. 😀
Thank you for the splendid video. Watching from the Netherlands, I hope that CHSR service from LA to SF will commence before my life ends. (I am 68.) I am particularly excited because I grew up in California. (Dutch, I returned to the fatherland after retiring from teaching at an international school in the UK (31 years!).) Keep up the good work!
Sorry, you do not have a clue!
don't hold your breath.
This CAHSR progress is exactly why I was so happy to see the success of the Brightline project in Florida. Because the success of that project would help with the Brightline West project between Vegas and LA, which would then lead into the CAHSR lines
Nice to see what's happening out there without having to drive it myself. Thanks!
speaking of not doing much walking in fresno, I walked pretty much every segment shown in video here within the fresno city limits in the september heat 😂
lots of sunscreen and water were required
Best to not do too much outside mid-summer in inland California between noon and 6pm if you can avoid it.
@@LucidStew yeah I probably won’t be doing doing it again. got some great photos of the cedar viaduct out of it though
Calling out the Fresno slackers 😂😂😂
I was disappointed by the lack of the fire hose technique to spray the upper reaches...
I will most likely be a middle-aged man by the time this project, initially approved by voters several years before I was old enough to vote for it, is operational, but god damn if I'm not still rooting for it.
I wonder if this HSR will have a mascot, somewhat like what Japan does. I propose the mascot be a bowl of stew
A skunk? I kid...
USA is great at mascots 😂 especially with sports
@@DefensisIndus a market research firm should find out which mascot is most appealing, although a cat is certainly an appealing option (and it would probably be wise to get concept drawings from Japanese artists, as they really know their stuff).
Yellow-billed magpie. One of California's two endemic birds. Common in the central valley.
We need a cartoony Tule Elk
Connecting Bakersfield to los angles should have been the first priority since there is no train that services this route. Amtrak already serves the central valley and its stops at bakerfield. Rider then takes a bus for the rest of the trip to los angles.
With Amtrak they bus you from Bakersfield over the grapevine. Had to pick my mom up at the bus station when she would come for a visit. So by that logic this leg is complete. Go figure.
Fun Fact: Golden State Blvd. was the original CA 99. I believe there's the same street/situation in Bakersfield, and there definitely is in Turlock. In Modesto, it was what is now 9th street.
I'm 74 years old. I remember when 9th St. in Modesto was US 99. Going through downtown Turlock was the worst, you'd hit a red light at every corner. Golden State Blvd. in cities up and down the valley was old U.S. Highway 99. The Main St. of the West Coast. US 99 carried more traffic, especially trucks, than 101 did. The reason 99 was not converted to I-5 between Bakersfield and Stockton is the California Aqueduct. Both were built at the same time. The dirt removed from the aqueduct was used to build I-5.
At the AMF Bowling alley has the best "fish n chips"
Always love a good Brady Bunch special trip to Hawaii where they just happen to find a secret cave with a haunted idol reference. 70s TV writing was insane.
Oh, and thanks for the insightful video as always!
As a structural engineer, I find CASHRs choice of structures endlessly baffling. Perhaps it’s just embedded ways of working, but so many of these long viaducts could have been post tension precast concrete segmental. Instead they have an army of rodbusters hand placing rebar in-situ. Just seems insanely backwards.
You're welcome. In regard to the last part, jobs? The politicians that support these types of projects genuinely see them as jobs projects as much as transportation. Although, let me edit that. On second thought this doesn't make much sense unless the Authority is pressuring contractors to use unnecessary human labor and I have no evidence of that.
@@LucidStew it's worth remembering that these first four CPs were bid-design-build, meaning the contractor selected then designed the structures and charged CHSRA whatever that cost. Going forward, CHSRA will design everything in-house then bid that out to contractors, which hopefully should reduce costs as well as the number of change orders, and they've acknowledged that's what they should have done from the start.
Lessons learned here such as those will be applied both toward CAHSR going forward as well as other US HSR projects, which very likely would have been the case regardless of wherever the first US HSR project began.
Great video! It's a shame it's taking it's time but gotta have hope it will eventually be finished
It'll never be done. $2T by 2070.
Major projects like this take 20 years. It took 20 years to build the Interstate Highway system, starting in 1957. The "Big Dig" in Boston took 20 years.
I honesty hope it never gets finished. Just another project to bulldoze and level yet another lage swath of my home here in Merced just as 99 did in the 60s. Merced Station is going set to wipe out multiple blocks This thing is an expensive disaster that should have never been made. All we needed was to give Amtrak its own line so it doesnt have to stop for all the freight. That alone would massivly cut travel time. I hope this blight is never complete.
@@hyper6500 You realize that giving Amtrak its own dedicated line would share most of the costs of the HSR tracks, right? They'd still have to aquire land, build crossings and overpasses, and negotiate with the freight railroads. And what makes you think people would choose Amtrak over flying? Amtrak is multiple times more expensive than flying, and it would still take most of a full day to make the full trip from LA to SF.
@@appleintosh not really, amtrak on the east cost traveling the same distance nonstop is a couple hrs vs 6+ for current Amtrak. The only reason ots slow is because it has to share track with Freight and stop for freight. If it could run non stop at the east cost speeds of 100-150mph it would be fine. This is just an overly expensive project being made for no other reason than they can. Its garbage that when complete will likely have very expensive ticket prices to make up for it's never ending rising cost. The ticket will probably be more expensive than any Amtrak ticket. HSR to be truly successful needs more than just a fast line to be used over other options. The reason HSR works in almost every other country its because theres more to the HSR than the train alone. You need smaller lines feeding it like light rail and subways, ample public transportation and more. In Japan you can ride the shinkansen to you destination and take other smaller transit lines/public transit to your destination without ever needing your own car all using the same rail pass you used to ride the HSR. CA HSR is just an expensive, over budget fubared project made because politicians want something shiny.
What gets missed a lot is the existing underground utilities that had to be relocated or reconstructed to standard.
Honestly Stew, I liked what was shown; it should be useful against all the anti-HSR websites on TH-cam? I'm one of the few that's majorly impressed with what has been completed thus far. However, I think that more still needs to be completed. The HSR Board hasn't been very good at instructing the work crews to completing the projects. Honestly, I think they need to hire a few more work crews to complete the guideway. The project is moving along, but it still needs the Biden Administration to pony up enough operating capital so that the initial operating segment can be finished in 2033; me being generous?
Also, I'm awaiting how HSR plans on connecting the Bay Area and Los Angeles as well as the Sacramento and San Diego segments?
It is a huge undertaking. I got a profound sense of that before I even reached the Central Valley. Driving through Antelope Valley it struck me that this is A LOT. It proposes to go a VERY long way. What I got out of the trip was what I hoped to get out of it: bringing the perspective down to a human scale. And, like the car next the Cedar Viaduct and all the silly imagery I used there, the true, gargantuan scale of the proposition became more apparent. I agree. What they've done is impressive. But, also, the idea that this was going to be built in 15 years for $35 billion now seems quite silly. And the inflation of the budget to the stratosphere seems ever more realistic.
@@LucidStew There will be no inflation 2025
I recall the people of California voted for this in 2008, so help me understand why this means the Biden administration needs to pay for it. California voted for it, let California pay for it.
@@mattc3696 Not everything that was voted for could be covered by only California. It was assumed that some of the assistance would come from Congress as the CA HSR was considered an infrastructure project on par with what was happening on the Northeast Corridor.
Are you now saying that the Federal Government shouldn't have to pay for projects outside of the Northeast Corridor?
@@AnthonyPinkerton-d7p Seems presumptuous to expect outside assistance for a completely in state project. The NW corridor serves multiple states.
This is some high-quality CAHSR content. Thank you Mr. Stew.
Really great overview of the work that's been done and the amount of structure that has been put in place.
The dedication of driving the entire route is insane! Thank you so much for your hard work! The video was a real eye-opener
I'll agree to being a little off-kilter. I like a good road trip. It was fun until Lodi. 😁
Thanks for the update, you doing a great job, Dunlap CA, Fresno County.
Your optimism is amazing. You’re supporting politician’s dreams. Wet dreams, actually.
It's interesting you would label me as an optimist, when most find me to be pessimistic on the subject. I'd say the only thing I'm really optimistic about is the ability to meet the Merced-Bakersfield funding gap at some point in the future. Beyond Merced-Bakersfield, I'm not convinced anything will be completed, although I can imagine scenarios where it might be. Personally I do not believe Phase 2 has any chance of being built, and Phase 1 Anaheim-S.F. is a long-shot.
@@LucidStewamen
@@LucidStew Youre really confident in a Government that is broke. Our service economy is collapsing, work from home is growing. Wheres the need for this as far as future business needs change.
What's this project comes online the areas next to the station's need to be rezoned into high density commercial centers. Madera and Kings/Tulare are especially sad. Parking lots can remain since they're a necessity but the farmland surrounding the lots need ro be replaced with massive hotels, offices and housing towers. UC Merced should house a campus next to the Merced Station to increase ridership.
wow i just looked it up and its here
do you think they will have a non-stop option so it actually takes the advertised time to get from SF to LA?
They’ll have to. You can already see through tracks planned at every station.
Yep, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_High-Speed_Rail#Stations_and_stop_patterns
No. If going from El Lay to SF was the primary motive it would go up the I-5 median. This thing will have more stops than an urban bus. 😂
Supposed to be twice daily, but I wouldn't bet on 2 hour 40 minutes in service.
It doesn’t have dedicated rail in LA, so it will definitely slow overall trip time.
Great video and good field work. I wish the high speed rail had done a Sacramento to Bakersfield route first. Sacramento is the state capital, and would have been a great starting point for service. They even could have opened it in smaller phases, for example, Sacramento to Stockton, than extend to Modesto, Merced, and so on. That is how Japan and France built their first lines, anyways.
I mean, technically its still possible, but unless there is a massive federal windfall, the Authority desperately needs to borrow on any future earnings it can demonstrate, and Bakersfield-SF is supposedly the first part that can turn a profit.
My Grandpa was born in Hanford in 1910. Wild to think about how different life was then. 😅
If you take Amtrak's San Joaquins from Madera to Bakersfield you pass under the Wasco, Tulare River, and Conejo Viaducts and it travels next to a lot of right of way
I lived in Hanford, CA for over 12 years. Love the whole area.
ive never been to Merced but to me it looks like a town that would be equally at home in Texas or Oklahoma
That's what all of the middle of California looks like! The only real difference is the ethnic diversity and how much closer together the towns are, here in CA. We are a MASSIVE farming and military industrial complex state, in addition to everything else we have.
I always say Texas and California ARE rival states, but SIBLING rivals. Both huge, diverse, economically and politically powerful, former Mexican states with a lot of American emigrants that rebelled from Mexico, joined the Union around the same time, were part of the Wild West, blessed with fertile agricultural land, oil money (Cali just hides its wells better), and massive contributions to the Military-Industrial Complex. They just ended up on opposite sides of the Civil War and with some *slight* differences in the balance of political power between urban and rural parts of each state, which our First-Past-the-Post voting system lets snowball into what LOOKS like totally opposite politics, when its really like 55-45 for one and 45-55 for the other.
A lot of these communities and towns took in massive migration from Oklahoma and Texas after the dust bowl. And these areas are still way more similar to Texas and Oklahoma than the rest of California.
Bakersfield used to be the home of country music stars like Merle Haggard and Buck Owens, for example.
I was walking through Turlock one day and it felt a LOT like Texas. American flags, large but sparse/low houses, american flags everywhere, sidewalks that've seen better days, astonishing flatness, pickup trucks, and all that
EastCal has quite a way to go. Apparently the population of California east of the I-5 is higher than the population to the west, which is crazy to imagine. And much that they're building there's single-family low-density tract housing in the middle of nowhere
Dunno what HSR would do
I didn’t see any comment about how CAHSR will handle Tulare Lake or the San Andreas fault. Do any public documents show the proposed solutions?
San Andreas the tracks will be above ground. Same for all major faults. Tulare Lake, the right of way is elevated on about 10 foot high berms. Flooding won't be an issue in the mid-term. They could have problems in the longer-term though if the state and local water districts don't get subsidence under control. The big headline idea is that the lake might flood again. Of course that's not out of the realm of possibility, but Success and Terminus dams are both being improved, so that should happen less often in the future. The bigger concern is changes in the track geometry, to which the system will be fairly sensitive since the train is suppose to travel at 220mph through there. They may need to re-level those berms on occasion. I think in the very long-term if problems persist, they may simply do as they have with levees and aqueducts: raise it up.
I expect that the areas next to the station underneath the railway tracks will be for the homeless the way things are really going .
I glad you got to see the great drivers in Bakersfield.
From a Right of Way engineering perspective, this project is insanely massive
As someone not from California, or even the US, but have driven from SF up to Portland and Vancouver, though never the Central Valley it is amazing just how big the state is and how vast and flat the Central Valley is. Watching this you can understand why they decided to start this part, it's so incredibly flat, but it does really need through trains to SF even if not HSR until the rest is built or I can see usage being a problem (and attracting people to move to cities like Merced or Bakersfield. I guess those stations in the middle of nowhere were to get the locals to vote for spending money on the project. When is this section due for completion? They really need to get some trains running between places, even if not particularly high speed for people to start feeling it's moving along, or is it an all of nothing thing?
Revenue service of the initial operating segment in the Central Valley is projected to begin 2030-2033. And I think that was the idea for getting it done first. Once there is a proof of concept, and Californians get their first taste of high speed rail, that would ensure the funding for the remaining connecting segments between SF-LA. And of the two, the SF segment will probably get done first, linking CAHSR to Caltrain should be easily done.
There is really only one "station in the middle of nowhere." And that is the Hanford Station. But that will service not only Hanford, but Visalia and the Lemoore Naval Air Station. It's possible that most CASHR trains won''t stop there.
12:20 Well, my understanding is that San Joaquins service will be withdrawn south of Merced when CAHSR opens.
If I remember right, it's not planned to end at Merced but at Tulare. It's somewhere in an AmpereBeep video from a while back.
@@kopshi But there is no Tulare San Joaquins station...
That is correct The Amtrak San Joaquins will terminate (from the north) at Merced where there will be a direct transfer available to high speed rail. The ACE train will also be coming in and terminating in Merced. The reason for the termination in Merced is that from there, the high speed rail will be faster, thus it will reduce redundancy as well as get passengers to their destination faster.
SJJPA, who operates the San Joaquins, will be the interim service provider for CAHSR's Central Valley segment when it opens, and remain it at least until CAHSR reaches SF. That could explain the discontinuance of Amtrak rail service south of Merced, since this initial CAHSR route will effectively be an extension of the San Joaquins (and why pay to run two parallel services?).
AFAIK, one of the goals for CAHSR is to reduce diesel emissions, such as from trains, which makes it sound like that arrangement will be permanent even after CAHSR reaches SF and CHSRA resumes operations. If that proves the case, it really brings into question why the new Madera station, which is supposed to be a transfer point between Amtrak and HSR, if Amtrak trains will permanently be discontinued south of Merced in 2030-33. At least the Wasco station will remain active until then, hence the new pedestrian underpass there, as HSR construction and eventual train testing happens.
It also makes me wonder if the San Joaquins will one day be discontinued entirely once CAHSR reaches Sacramento, as ACE could provide local service between Merced and Sacramento, and virtually all of the cities/stations the San Joaquins serve are served by other rail services, either Capitol Corridor or BART, with the exception being getting between Stockton and Antioch/Martinez (and maybe Richmond).
I can't believe that they started making it last I hard it was canceled or it was still in planning thanks for the update 😊
good morning,Enjoyed. top masterpiece!🙂
You mean to tell me my days of visiting Déjà vu are numbered 😮😞
They'll have to relocate to one of the new office towers coming to area.
I use to live in Madera, I'm glad they'll be getting a first crack at this project. Well needed in that part of the state.
Wow I must say, I’ve never seen a non celebrity creator (no disrespect if you are a celebrity then my apologies) put so much work into a single video. I personally was hoping for some Southern California HSRA news but even without that your efforts definitely warranted a full watch still. I wish you nothing but the best of health and resources so that you’re able to continue doing the great work that you do. Blessings!
I'm a celebrity in my own mind. XD Thank you for the kind words. I will continue to try to live up to as high a standard as I'm able and will continue to attempt to improve my content!
@@LucidStew Another big fan here.
As a Mainer I am very intrigued by this project. California just impresses me with its forward thinking and financial might. I wish this project the very best. Sure it is expensive now, but in twenty years time it will seem cheap. Go forward USA not backwards.
They've been working on it for 10 years, and it's probably 1/3 done. I guess they'll take another 20 years to finish it.
Completeness depends on what part you're referring to. The initial 119 mile construction segment is about 60% done. The Merced-Bakersfield initial operating segment is about 40% done. The ~500 miles of Phase 1 Anaheim-S.F. is 15% done. The entire 800 mile system is 9% done.
As far as dates go, #1 is scheduled to be done end of 2026, #2 before 2034, #3 no official estimate. I'd guess at 2060-2070, #4 no official estimate I'd guess around 2100.
@@LucidStew Around 2100 sounds about right. We'll have teleportation by then.
@@ChopsticksDIYGarden I would, however, anticipate things changing around 2050 after the global depression in the 2030s is resolved and the environmentalists come fully into power, so it could be closer to 2070. Depends how things play out. It's almost impossible to predict the future 50 years out. This also assumes no civil war, WW3, or AI takeover between now and then.
Great video my friend, enjoyed the updates. I look forward to more. Just Subscribed too
Thanks for the sub! More to come, soon.
Thanks for taking us along on your vacation, Stew--and for making it all about CAHSR! The Fresno station is indeed best situated of any of the Central Valley stations, and I hope Fresno takes advantage of that to reimagine their downtown. I was there recently and was--disappointed. It even prompted me to write an article for my local paper about how cars are not the answer to downtown business woes. Note how every spot on Fulton St is occupied, but the vacancy rate is ~50%!
Can't wait for the next leg of the journey!
I'm not entirely convinced transit is the answer either. I think in compact spaces feet are important. Good and safe places to walk to and from. Of course there needs to be a means of getting to and from those places, but I think the starting point is the proper mixture of living, working, and recreating within walking distance.
The good: Structures being built. Viaducts over freight are good and necessary. Fresno is definitely going to benefit a lot from CAHSR. Still not worth sacrificing LA for, but San Francisco to Palmdale and then Las Vegas would not be bad.
The bad: Kings/Tulare and Madera stations. CAHSRA should nix them, as they're too close to other necessary stations and driving will probably be faster. Also getting rid of those two stations makes the travel time from Merced to Bakersfield better.
The ugly: the wait for next week. Looking forward to the Merced to San Francisco leg. Hopefully 12,000 subscribers by then.
San Joaquin will be gone after Cal HSR is running. Madera and Kings/Tulare are there to compensate this.
@@onetwothreeabc Madera and Kings/Tulare are regional rail locations at best, they don't belong on a high speed rail line, especially one that is legally required to go from LA to SF in 2 hours 40 minutes. I suppose if the Merced to Bakersfield is that's ever built, they would be just filler stations to make it seem like less of a failure.
@@absolutezeronow7928 There will be a lot of trains passing Madera and Kings/Tulare once Phase I is finished for sure.
But this is a political project. It has to make sure all stakeholders are OK with the plan.
Kings/Tulare is also the transfer station for the transvalley line (proposed). Amtrak will stop their San Joaquin service after the HSR is running.
@@onetwothreeabcNot just for cross valley corridor service, but also thruway bus service to the central coast. Kings/Tulare has more functionality than people give it credit for, and Hanford is also going to start a station-area planning effort before the end of the year.
How is LA being "sacrificed"?
Really exciting to see what's been going on with the initial segment of CHSR! Ultimately I do think it was the right decision to build the line through the central valley, connecting smaller communities in between major urban centres is a big positive high speed rail has over plane travel.
I am worried about the phases of this project. It's no secret that the initial operating segment will not attract very high ridership and once open it will incur sizable operating costs. Leaving it mothballed is not an option politically. But the lower passenger numbers, high operating cost, the already high construction cost and the even higher future construction cost for complex tunneling segments are all factors that can be used by bad actors in politics to torpedo the project.
Personally I think the initial operating segment should've went up to Stockton. From there it is much easier to connect the train to the Bay Area and then you would essentially be running an upgraded San Joaquins.
Don't know what to do with the train from there on. Electrification of the stockton subdivision? Pull the HSR set with a diesel loco? eBART extension to the subdivision? Make the whole thing a regular BART extension? Depends on how much cash you can secure within and outside the scope of CHSR. Personally I don't think eBART should've been built in the first place but now that it has perhaps this is some way to justify its existence besides cost cutting and lay the foundations for expanding commuter rail on existing railways in the area
Once done, or even in its current state, you certainly wouldn't mothball it. You have a new, high speed rail corridor to utilize. All passenger traffic through the San Joaquin Valley should be routed onto the new CAHSR row regardless of CAHSR's ultimate fate. Especially the way California is pushing for climate-based initiatives, proliferation of electrified rail corridors in the state is fairly inevitable. The Central Valley spine will then be an asset like any other, even if the high speed portion takes 50 years to make it over the mountains into L.A.
What another 10 years to complete, I hope I'm still alive to see it completed and ride on it.
Bakersfield-Merced? 10 years is a reasonable assumption.
High speed train to Bakersfield. Wow. Holy cow. I'm overwhelmed.
I've been to Bakersfield probably 30 times in 50 years. The only thing I do when I get there is leave. At least one thing won't change. 😂
"The only thing I do when I get there is leave" ok, that made me laugh.
This will be an awesome project that will be enjoyed by our great, great, great-grandchildren in 200 years.
"A society grows great when old men plant trees in whose shade they shall never sit."
Going in the footsteps of The Four Foot?
I saw that there was a trenched section under construction for the area near Corcoran (the Whitley Avenue Underpass), that seems crazy to me given the recent flooding.
i can't wait!!! 😀 I've recently moved to the valley and can't wait.
I've heard tell that the Merced-Bakersfield San Joaquins service will be suspended after the merced-bakersfield segment is completed, which sucks for places which used to have SJ service but now don't
I've heard that people often take the train from Hanford to Fresno so
Hanford Station design will help state prison employees get to work, and hopefully open up more housing options. Also, we have a lot of commuters traveling up and down the valley
It takes longer to drive from SFO to OAK than it does to drive station to station in many parts of the phase 1 project. Not to mention many of the areas these stations are located aren't very walkable. Even if I can get to the kings-tulare station, I'll still need a car to get to Visalia. And that's assuming I had a reason to go there.
You might want to have a black cover on your dash to reduce or eliminate the reflection. 4K/60p would be nice. Thanks for the video.
When it was first proposed they said it would be around $100 per ride. Any update on that? I checked and I can fly from SF to LA for $73 today, and be there in 90 minutes.
No, ticket prices are probably the last thing that will be updated. The early business plans indicated they desired 77% of equivalent air fare.
@@LucidStew They also said it would be profitable. At this rate I'm not sure I'll be around for it to be operational. :)
@@Scoots1994 It's actually required that the state not lose money on operations. Their expectation in that ridership will be similar to the NEC, and Amtrak services on the NEC run at an operating profit.
@@LucidStew Is there enough track to have express trains as well as trains that stop at every stop?
@@Scoots1994 Not necessary, most HSL are built with two tracks but every stop is equipped with passing loops (i.e. temporarily four tracks) with platforms on the outer tracks.
So where are they going to do with the In-N-Out in Merced? Are they gonna put in a different location?
Personally, if I were from Merced, I would petition to have it lifted by its foundations and put in a nice park somewhere.
Atta boy, well done!
It's worth noting the Madera HSR station is not being funded or built by CHSRA. That's being done by the City of Madera, Madera County, SJJPA, and I believe a couple other local public entities. The choice of location, AFAIK, had more to do with providing a station for north Fresno neighborhoods than it did for Madera itself, which to be somewhat fair any location along the BNSF tracks is less than ideal for Madera, although Ave 12 seems by far the least ideal.
The station itself is supposed to provide a transfer point between HSR and Amtrak, although getting between them will require walking across a parking lot, and if the discontinuance of Amtrak service south of Merced once HSR begins is to be permanent, then there really is zero point having this new station apart from providing north Fresno a place to board HSR without having to drive into downtown Fresno, even though that seems a relatively minor inconvenience at best.
Awesome video. Waiting on the SF section. It looks like the Central Valley is gearing up to have high speed trains running by 2030, testing by 2028. Service to SF, LA won’t be until another 10 years or so. Also to answer about the Kings Tulare station. It was mainly politics. Visalia and Tulare didn’t want the train running through their cities. Even tho Visalia is the largest city between Fresno and Bakersfield, and is in bad need of transportation. But good thing they are planning the cross corridor which will run from Visalia, Lemoore, & Lindsey.
Don't hold your breath for 2030. There is almost no chance of SF by 2040, definitely not to L.A.
@@LucidStewI have good hopes for 2030 for the Central Valley segment as work has been coming along pretty swift compared to the connector segments to our major regions. All the hard work is being done now which is connecting and building the viaducts, after that all that’s left is laying track and electrifying the route. Going on Amtrak you can see how much is done, from what you can’t see in a vehicle.
@@californiamade5608 12/31/30 is the earliest the schedule affords, they're currently behind schedule, and they have a 9 year track record of not meeting schedules.
@@LucidStewsure but now it is a different story especially with strong support from the current administration. Lawsuits, politics, and acquiring land is what truly delayed it. Now that most of that has been taken care of, the current paste of work and timeframe seems to be much more realistic than it was 8 years ago. Especially with the much more visible work done in recent years.
@@californiamade5608 I realize people like the the narrative that the CAHSR Authority is not at fault, but it doesn't hold up. I suggest reading the state auditor's report from 2018. The Authority was downright incompetent until 2017. Current leadership freely admits that they had to dig out from under a lot of mistakes. As to their current pace, its very slow and they're not keeping to it. The evidence is in the Central Valley reports, published every month. They're struggling to spend the $1.8B budgeted this year, which is putting them behind schedule and will ultimately put them over budget in the mid-term. This after squandering so many years of construction that they no longer have the funds to complete Merced-Bakersfield. While things are better, they're not good.
If you're ever down there again, I've heard tell that Superior Dairy in Hanford is an absolutely amazing ice cream place
Fun trip and video. Still wonder if I will live long enough to ride it.....
It's pretty reasonable right now to assume it will be operating in 8-12 years.
I don't hear the term "Cyclopean" used much outside of H.P.Lovecraft stories, good job!
Well spotted! Misused here, but I was going more for dramatic flair than accuracy. :D
@@LucidStew I liked it! I can't say I look forward to driving around the construction as it nears my house. Your video cleared up a lot of questions as to the route though, thanks!
As someone who’s been in Fresno for almost all of my life, it’s nice to hear your thoughts about our city as usually videos only talk about the crime or homelessness l within our city. Fresno and quite a bit of the cities in the Central Valley have been ignored for quite a long while, with a lot of focus on the major coastal cities which I find quite sad, though I do love living here as even though we are the 5th largest city in California, we don’t have any modern skyscrapers and only a few historical tall building inland the downtown area which gives an amazing view going all the way to the Mountains!
From what I’ve seen of the redevelopment plan I quite love it, no building with boring modern day architecture and respecting the cities history, it makes me very hopeful for the cities future. Although I’m not sure what to think of the station design, especially since I find different renderings with different designs, but whatever the design is I remain hopeful that the high speed rail project will help Fresno and the rest of the Central Valley prosper once again!
It'd be great for Fresno to bring back a modern form of its streetcar network. There've been a few past proposals that sadly never materialized. Seems like there are a few corridors reaching out from the downtown area that would be great for streetcars, including along Fulton.
I love the idea of a high-speed rail. I'm a sucker for big infrastructure projects, but my goodness gracious has it been mishandled that it's taken this long for so little.
Let’s get one thing straight. There not many people that will want to ride the high speed train to Merced. If I was in charge I build the Los Angeles to Bakersfield. People will ride the Lancaster to Los Angeles. People will ride that portion of the high-speed rail. The High Speed Rail wanted to build the less expensive part first. I would’ve built the portion that might make a profit. I build the central valley portion last. The other portions are just going to get more expensive. Then again I’m just a maintenance man with no degree just common sense.
Brian from the peoples Republic of California .
So very very true! Obviously you make perfect sense. Thank you for commmenting.
This was a great comical video
How far south from the Bay Area does then new rail electrification reach? Would it be possible for the high-speed trains from the CAHSR to utilize this electrification to travel to the Bay Area until the CAHSR line reaches that destination? I ask, because I traveled on the Eurostar trains from London to the Channel Tunnel on regular electrified tracks until England's HSR1 was completed at a later date.
That is the plan, it will run along Caltrain tracks from Gilroy to SF to the new Terminal, though meantime at 4th and King with intermediate stops on the way.
San Jose. Essentially CAHSR will run on Caltrain tracks north of San Jose. The main addition for CAHSR is the maintenance facility in Brisbane, which is where they will store the trains for the SJ-SF section.
@@LucidStew but isn't the plan for CAHSR to meet up and share Caltrain tracks beginning at the Gilroy station? What is the plan from Gilroy to San Jose/Diridon, then?
@@rockwellmath The plan is for the CAHSRA to build that. Caltrain doesn't have any money. Caltrain's 2025 Capital Outlay budget is less than what CAHSR spends in a month.
Found the complaint about bakersfield drivers funny. Last time I went, the only bad driver was the uber we were in who made a left directly in front of somebody going 40
I'm a native Californian, so I'm used to it. It would just be nice to stretch that out to an entire day rather than one intersection. :)
They're making good progress! Things are starting to really take shape. I would like to have seen pictures of the downtown underpasses though. Are they ready for the railroad to move back from the shoo-fly to the original location?
You can see Fresno St. undercrossing at 17:42 nothing happening there. At 18:07 you can see no right turn at Tulare St. at F St., and at 19:54 road closed at H St. The satellite imagery from 6/9/2024 shows the shoofly still in place.
Two things will happen A. It will be obsolete when completed. B. And the largest Vagrant camp in the country!
Hey that's a mascot idea! A vagrant. (I live in the valley, lighten up)
Looking forward to your next installment. Well done so far.
I'll taking boring looking bridges n stuff if they can actually get that finished before Australia collides with the west coast.
"No views" party!
No views as in video views, right?
I am from France where there are a lot of high speed trains, between large centers. Here we may have at some time in the "future" a line between nowhere to nowhere, beautiful. The reason for not starting from LA or San Francisco is very difficult to understand. It look that maybe people will be able to go from LA To San Fransisco by the year 2060 with a good amount of wishes. I will be long gone by then, but I do enjoy the French high speed trains every time I go there including the train to London, no need to wait for this train to have fun.
They are doing work in San Francisco, it's just not quite as visible. Instead of large construction projects like in the Central Valley section, the SF improvements are crossing improvements and electrification of existing rail. The Central Valley section is also the easiest and cheapest to complete, given that the land out there is cheap and the majority of the right of way will be on the surface. The sections extending to SF and LA will both need expensive tunnels to be dug to get out of the valley.
Our governor doesn't like High Speed Rail and has said that multiple times. He is corrupt and sleazy.
Our prior governor Jerry Brown was much better, but Newsom wants to get rid of the High Speed Rail project and thus directed it to focus on a "train to nowhere."
Lots of French high speed stations are in the middle of nowhere too. Like Madera Station or Kings-Tulare level bad. How do y'all deal with it?
@@shreychaudhary4477 I don;t know were you learn geography; but Madera and Kings-tulare are in California, USA not in France. Did you miss elementary school?
@@Christiane069 I mean that there are stations in France that are also in the middle of nowhere.
While here in California, the Kings-Tulare station site is ~5.44 km from the closest town (Hanford)'s center and the Madera station site being ~9.28 km from the closest town (Madera)'s center
but in France you have stations like Meuse and Lorraine, which while closer to the closest village, they're further from good-sized cities. (like how Lorraine is halfway between Metz and Nancy, a good 18km from Metz and 28km from Nancy (this might be what the Kings-tulare station is trying to do with Hanford and Visalia)) For comparison, Hanford has ~58,000 people and Madera has ~67,000 people
but idk if this is a fair comparison because France has a lot more smaller settlements closer together than the California Central Valley
As someone born and raised in Tulare County, I’m very excited for this to finally be operational. The one disappointment that I’ve had with it is when asking County Supervisor Amy Shuklian about if there will be any future rail projects in the county outside of the planned connector project she said there is no talks and any that have been had were shot down or dismissed as unnecessary because they don’t believe anyone would use them.
Given that they're considering half hour headways for both, I'm kind of surprised they plan to anything beyond the express bus
@@LucidStew How come? Is half an hour too good headways for train?
@@shreychaudhary4477 Because express bus service will likely be adequate for the population, and if they wanted to add capacity they could cut headways further, which would work out better from a service standpoint.
Im excited for CAHSR, but ill probably be dead before i can go from Sac to SD.
As someone with a car in a large geographic area where a car would be needed at the destination as well, what is the incentive for me to use the high speed rail to go from Bakersfield to Fresno or beyond when I can drive straight from my house to my destination and still have personal transport when I get there?
Right, I think most people with a car probably wont use this. Once(or if) it's connected to S.F. and L.A., then it would function more like an airport, where you'd assume some provision of transportation on the other end.
A thought regarding the Kings/Tulare station - perhaps part of the intent is as a rail gateway to the south entrance for Sequoia NP? Granted, that’s a bit of a stretch … just a thought.
that definitely could be one. Amtrak also runs thruway bus service between Hanford and Paso Robles/SLO, which I'm sure will continue with HSR and be a possible way of getting between the Central Coast and Bay Area/NorCal (maybe less so SoCal once HSR reaches LA, since total travel time would likely be close to drive time on 101, which could also be the case for SF).
They run a shuttle service from Visalia to Sequoia NP!
an issue with driving in the Hanford Visalia area is the Tule fog.
Is this actually happening? I thought there was still a lot of red tape. Either way great news!
its like a tour through my life
Madera has a station? I live here and did not know that
Yeah, its in a weird spot north of the city in the middle of a subdivision off of Road 26.
We are so behind on high speed rails....
They should build a mini mall into the station with restaurant space and retail shops.
Hear me out, what if they built a dome around the station and a small city therein?
This might be the best video on the track construction.. high speed rail website has computer models no live footage
Yeah, I think you have to see it for real from ground level to really appreciate the enormity of it.
In my opinion, it would be wise to initially buy multi-mode trains that can run away from the overhead wires to serve more destinations and for emergencies.
Where was this video two days ago when a guy from my old church at my brother's graduation party tried to tell me this will never get built
Well, depending what part you're talking about... of course never is a very long time.
He probably meant "will never be completed".
The only thing I'd change in this video is calling the San Joaquin Valley by its proper name.
The Central Valley is the name of a region that includes the Sacramento Valley and the San Joaquin Valley.
High Speed Rail construction is only in the San Joaquin Valley, for now, and people should call the valley by its proper name.
Still from NOWHERE TO NOWHERE for many decades
Great to see the progress. Wish they get trains running by 2028 along with Brightline West. Should run Amtrak dual-mode Airos on intern basis for through one-seat service to Sacramento and Oakland.
How much to ride. I remember it cost more to ride to work on Amtrak than drive a car
The initial intent was 77% of equivalent airfare, but of course that was years ago and it won't be running for years to come. I've also seen 20 cents/mile in 2011 dollars in an older document, which works out to about 32-35 cents by the time it could be running in the early 2030s.
Enjoying your video, thank you.
You misspelled Conejo ave. and Its pronounced Al paugh not Allpaugh.