The Great California Train Robbery

A subway to Silicon Valley will cost $12.75 billion for six miles

WSJ editorial. 

"Who says the Biden Administration isn’t productive? Every day it seems to issue a new and costly regulation, and every day it announces another giant grant for its political allies. The latest example is a redundant six-mile subway in Silicon Valley that will cost more than NASA’s new Mars mission.

The Federal Transit Administration last week announced a $500 million down payment for the project and is expected to finalize a $6 billion award later this year. This new underground line will extend the Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) through San Jose and Santa Clara, which are already served by the region’s Caltrain and public buses.

A decade ago, the duplicative subway was estimated to cost $4.4 billion and open in 2026. Local transportation planners wanted BART to “ring” the San Francisco Bay. Estimated costs have since ballooned to $12.75 billion—$2.1 billion a mile—owing to inflation and engineering changes. Now service isn’t expected to start until 2037.

A local project manager blamed soaring costs and delays on “a shortage of skilled labor in the Bay Area and the country.” Perhaps more construction workers would be available if the Administration weren’t splashing around hundreds of billions of dollars on green energy and public works like the Silicon Valley subway.

A January audit skewered the local transit agency in charge of the project for a lack of transparency about its costs. Note also that BART ridership is running 50% below pre-pandemic levels owing to a population exodus and more remote work. Crime and vagrancy on trains have also scared away riders.

All of this is why even some local Democrats are criticizing the subway. But Biden officials and the project’s supporters in Congress, including Reps. Ro Khanna and Anna Eshoo, don’t mind grabbing taxpayer dollars. The Administration pushed the 2021 bipartisan infrastructure bill so it could reward political allies and buy votes.

Biden officials also recently handed California another $3.1 billion for its bullet train to nowhere. Recall that the Obama Administration conditioned several billions of dollars in stimulus funding on the first segment being built in the Central Valley district of Rep. Jim Costa, a longtime bullet-train supporter who provided a critical vote for ObamaCare.

The train’s first 170-mile leg between Merced and Bakersfield isn’t expected to be done for another nine years at a cost of $35 billion. NASA’s Mars rover will return to earth before the 500-mile train—with an estimated $128 billion price—is finished, if it ever is.

Undaunted, the Administration recently awarded $3 billion to a bullet train from Las Vegas to Rancho Cucamonga (population: 176,336), an hour east of Los Angeles. The project’s developer says round-trip prices may run around $400—more than twice as much as a plane fare. Biden officials hope the train will be a re-election ticket for Nevada Sen. Jacky Rosen, who has repeatedly boasted about her role in promoting the Vegas train.

None of this politically driven infrastructure spending will improve economic productivity. The projects squander scarce federal resources that could go for more vital causes like national defense. The California trains make Amtrak look like a good investment."