Public Transportation and Smart Growth

I think that Amtrak WOULD use the would-have-been high-speed rail route if it became available. Assuming that it wasn't engineered with the sorts of high-speed "flyover" over- and underpasses that I've seen in Europe, I believe that Amtrak officials would be plum tickled to move over to a rail route that they DON'T have to share with BNSF freight trains and where they could run passenger trains at higher speeds than they do now.

I'm not the sort of railroad historian that some guys I knew in my father's generation were, but I do know that one of the technological developments that was occurring on railroads just as the automobile was beginning to move from rich man's toy to something many middle class people could afford to drive was that passenger tracks were beginning to separate from freight tracks on the privaely-owned railroads.

This trend was halted by the development of paved highways, increased auto travel, and excessive regulation by the Interstate Commerce Commission (Yes, I DO believe that SOME regulation IS necessary, but too much really CAN make for serious problems).

If the state of California chooses to build that line (and assuming that the Teab@ggers don't put Amtrak's pelt on their wall like they've been wanting to do for years), Amtrak would quite likely be more than willing to shift over to a new right of way with few if any grade crossings and engineered to allow them to run trains at faster speeds.