To sell his high-speed rail program, President Obama desperately needed a success story—a high-speed train operating during his administration that would awe the public and lead to a national demand for more such lines. That success story was going to be Florida’s Orlando-to-Tampa line, the only true high-speed route (as opposed to speeding up existing trains by 3 to 5 mph) that could have been completed during Obama’s term in office (assuming he is re-elected).
Anticipating that success, the administration drafted a proposal to use federal gasoline taxes and a “new energy tax” to fund $53 billion for more high-speed rail lines over the next six years. (The proposal also included $250 billion for highways, $120 billion for urban transit, $27 billion for “livability,” and $25 billion for an infrastructure bank.)
The chances of that happening died when Florida Governor Rick Scott decided to turn back the $2.4 billion in federal dollars dedicated to the Orlando-Tampa line. To maintain momentum behind high-speed rail, the administration could have given all of that money to California, the only other state proposing to build true high-speed rail.
Instead, the Department of Transportation gave nearly $1 billion of the $2.4 billion to Amtrak and states in the Northeast Corridor to replace worn out infrastructure and slightly speed up trains in that corridor, as well as connecting routes such as New Haven to Hartford and New York to Albany. Most of the rest of the money went to Midwestern states—Illinois, Iowa, Minnesota, Michigan, and Missouri—to buy new trains, improve stations, and do engineering studies of a few corridors such as the vital Minneapolis-to-Duluth corridor. Trains going an average of 57 mph instead of 52 mph are not going to inspire the public to spend $53 billion more on high-speed rail.
The administration did give California $300 million for its high-speed rail program. But, with that grant, the state still has only about 10 percent of the $65 billion estimated cost of a San Francisco-to-Los Angeles line, and there is no more money in the till. If the $300 million is ever spent, it will be for a 220-mph train to nowhere in California’s Central Valley.
In essence, the administration has given up on high-speed rail. New York Times editorial writers haven’t figured that out yet, opining that Florida Governor Scott made a dreadful mistake when he rejected the rail money. In fact, as tax activist Doug Guetzloe told a Tampa newspaper, “Federally funded rail is like being given a brand new Maserati and then you have to pick up the gas and the insurance — forever. The car looks great, but the costs will kill you.”
The Times suggested that Florida taxpayers will resent Scott’s decision whenever they are stuck in traffic. But no one seriously believes that intercity rail will ever relieve traffic congestion, most of which is in cities, not between them. In its original application for high-speed rail funds, Florida’s DOT admitted that Orlando-to-Tampa traffic grows more every five years than all the cars the trains were expected to take off the road, so at best high-speed rail was a very expensive and temporary solution to congestion.
Outside of the Times editorial offices, most transportation experts agree that the President’s high-speed rail program is over and his draft transportation bill is dead on arrival. Taxpayers throughout the country should thank Scott (as well as Ohio Governor John Kasich and Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker) for saving them the hundreds of billions of dollars that Obama’s program would have eventually cost.
