The United States is currently undergoing a significant push to develop high-speed rail infrastructure, aiming to provide alternatives to traditional air and car travel. Major initiatives, such as the private Brightline West project and the public California High-Speed Rail system, are at the forefront of this effort. While the U.S. has historically lagged behind Europe and Asia in rail technology, recent federal funding from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law has injected billions of dollars into these projects. Developers face ongoing challenges, including high construction costs, land acquisition, and the necessity for dedicated tracks to achieve speeds over 150 miles per hour.
- High-speed rail is generally defined as systems reaching speeds of 125 to 155 miles per hour or more.
- Brightline West is a $12 billion private project designed to connect Las Vegas to Southern California, with a target completion date before the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics.
- The California High-Speed Rail project is currently under construction in the Central Valley, though it has faced significant delays and budget increases since its inception.
- The federal government recently awarded $8.2 billion in grants to support major passenger rail projects across the country.
- Amtrak’s Acela remains the only operational high-speed service in the U.S., though it is often limited by shared tracks and aging infrastructure in the Northeast Corridor.
- Proposed projects in Texas and the Pacific Northwest are exploring the feasibility of connecting major city pairs like Dallas-Houston and Seattle-Portland.
- Key obstacles to U.S. rail expansion include high population density in corridors, geography, and the legal complexities of land use.
Gemini said 60 Minutes is an American television news magazine that has been a staple of CBS News since its debut in 1968. Created by Don Hewitt, the program is renowned for its hard-hitting investigative journalism, high-profile interviews, and in-depth feature stories that have earned it a reputation as the gold standard of broadcast news for over half a century.
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Newsom is a big THEFT. Newsom cared about kickbacks ONLY. He needs to be tried in DOJ trial
People keep bringing up the railroad being built expeditiously. So much nostalgia. Who here is envious of actually being the laborer building it?
Monorail. Monorail! MONORAIL!!!
WE WANT TRAINS AND WE WANT THEM NOW!
200+ injuries/fatalities in Florida in 16 years? We are talking about Florida, right? Yeah, there's gonna be a learning curve for Florida man and Florida woman, so that data you can minimize to reflect a more reasonable data point, yes?
It's blame game and excuses time Baby !!!!!
USA knows only how to destroy (think Gaza, Iran, Iraq , Afghan etc), not build.
I’m sorry, is 200 people struck and killed in 10 years – 10 YEARS seriously a problem we want to call out to question the safety of trains? The double safety standards between trains and cars is laughable. Every year roughly 350 people die on Utah highways. 3500 in 10 years compared to 200? Give me a break. Whatever headline people can catch to decry trains – as long as it sounds significant, who cares if it actually paints the real picture? And again, where’s the funding? We solve pedestrian strikes on busy highways by grade separating. It’s a hugely expensive undertaking, yet nobody bats an eye when we start digging to lay pavement or putting up massive columns and bridges. Also, can we stop grabbing for the HSR headlines? The moment you go over 150 mph with a train you take something already costly and increase it exponentially. Average speed is what dictates travel time. Most of the best rail systems in the world aren’t truly “high speed”. But they’re faster than highway speed, and they make sure to do it efficiently. That’s how you keep costs down and travel times low. But anyway, I’ll continue to drive to work surrounded by hundreds of people who barely have to know how to read or write to get a “license” to operate a vehicle and when I go on vacation I’ll wait 5 hours at TSA to spend half that time on the plane. 🙄 According to everyone else trains are too expensive anyway. 😅
Ca is a joke!! They couldn’t even make and build a bridge. The Bay Bridge is made in Chynnna. What gives…
It's strange that the US doesn't require public approval for war, but it does for public infrastructure development. This shows the US's priorities in the world.
What a disingenuous statistic on bright line fatalities. 200 fatalities in the last 10 years? Lets compare that to traffic fatalities driving the same route. Theres no data on it but there were ~3000 fatalities only in florida only in 2024 so i would guess they would far outstrip the train collisions.
You have to be stupid in the US particularly the West Coast and as big and vast the US is with all the empty spaces that people would take the train, any train. It was a big scam, no one will use it and they will lose money, just the case of total democrat mismanagement as with everything else.
Absolute incompetence is where the problem begins. @ 2:58, we see a shining example of where it starts . . . . blame it on the 'voter' who "didn't understand what it is actually gonna take to get this project delivered" . . . 😶 . . . . seriously?! . . . . the voter? . . . . classic 'blaming the victim' mentality. This clown can't even make it as a snake oil salesman!
I can fly to Chicago from Des Moines for $99 and have four flights to choose from. I just don't see how the economics of high speed rail in the West can compete with that. Some Eastern US areas may have the population density to support HSR. But not here.
And China did something similar in 5-7 years if I recall with a way difficult terrain from China to Laos. During the construction many unexploded bombs had to also be removed due to the Vietnam war. And as we speak contracts are already in place to build railway from Vietnam into Laos and Cambodia into Laos. The only construction right now being built is from Bangkok, Thailand to Vientiane, Laos.
The problem with America is bureaucracy too much red tape and poor financial management in the US government. When cost of living goes up everything goes up and in many cases wages don't go up. Which leads to poor quality workmanship or lack of labor. Keep housing affordable and provide good quality of life for your people then there will be less people complaining.
The US's population density sparring a few regions, is not conducive to high speed rail.
the key word here is corruption
Thank Gavin Newsom for this
Gotta be honest, here in Germany things aren’t that different this days, too. A single family household can stop the entire construction by complaining at the court that the track would cross their garden and people in the train will see them naked (real story, while the easiest decision was right around the corner – planting a hedge; the actual matter was the money). It used to be much different in past, building railway today generally has become complicated. Another story: we live on the border with the Netherlands and trying to connect just two cities on two sides of the border has become a nightmare and not to something you would expect: apparently, while constructing just the signalization at one single railway crossing, German company who had to write the project draft or more precisely assign a certain company with this task, assigned it to their previous partner which the Dutches tracked down by looking at the editing history and overruled the German railroad company to make the right company write this project draft!
2008 also marked the beginning of China's high-speed rail network, with the opening of the Beijing-Tianjin high-speed rail line for the Olympics.
I honestly think that if you took another look at that project and looked at all the fluff all the contract contractor ,and middle management . I think you’ll find out that if you cut out the pork, the project will get back in order financially I truly believe that $33 billion complete the project today. 100% I believe that that project could be done with the funds that they have today. I think what they have to do is to redirect in a reorganization and unholy deal with the community. I think about it the wrong way and it’s costing them getting penalized for. I think he’s checked out. They’re not talking specifics to just still talk to Disneyland effect when you listen to the media you don’t really get hard facts.
No we can't build things. People put too many road blocks in the way. Charge way more than necessary. Take kickbacks and fraud.
They give 501b visas for walmart workers, when we ahould be giving them to people who can build these rail lines.
This country is too busy spending money on foreign wars instead of investing money in this country on such things as high speed trains, infrastructure, etc.
just goes to show that government has no business in enterprise and enterprise non in government.
I don’t think the voters full understood? 3:08 it’s the fault of those who voted for it? What
This video singularly focuses on the enormous costs of doing so and doesn’t go over the myriad of reasons why or look to a nation like China that has developed a nationwide HSR in less time than California has yet to finish a single line from LA to SF. Yes divisive politics plays a part into it, but more than that it’s how insanely bureaucratic and over regulated the system we’ve built is to the point of paralysis. And no I’m not some libertarian whacko or some communist China glazer. I’m pointing to examples like how we built The Empire State Building in downtown Manhattan in 1930 in only 410 days. We built the national highway system and giant projects like the Hoover Dam and so on because the country was not being held hostage by private interests, corporate capital and any number of agencies, regulatory bodies, bureaucratic framework and so on. We’re cutting programs but giving a 40% increase to the military budget so we can bomb Iran better? Social Security and Medicare takes up nearly half of the entire federal budget, and it’s because we’re not willing to step on any toes of the healthcare industry?
This country needs to get the reigns back in place and get private capital out of politics and elections and reign in corporate America and put its priorities into serving the people and not the wealthy elites that run the country and grow fat off of parasitizing the rest of the nation.
An African country is doing what cannot be done in the US… The world is laughing at us.
America cannot do really much for the common good anymore. Its labeled as socialist & becomes a political talking point. Theres just no way.
Stonehenge…seems appropriate
America is the greatest..!!!
FREEDOM FOR RICH PEOPLE..!!
USA.!! USA.!! USA.!!
California committee to determine why state has so many unfinished projects is disbanded.
The problem…it’s the private sector. This program was put in the hands of the private sector that by no surprise at all!! Saw a blank check and naturally they sat on their hands
The gov can run these projects without all the issues because they cap the contracts and in fact they can also even create their own construction companies to facilitate these projects
Rail needs to happen in the US. This is the one way to counter the growing energy cost crisis we are all seeing.
I think the bane of the problem is that the people with the money cannot be trusted. That has to be the only reason.
Blaming voters first and then blaming the private sector is pure bs! How is it that we still haven't learned from other countries how to get this done right and efficiently. The problem is and always will be, car companies and big oil. What they want to do is allocate the funds to fund the illegal war. This is about bureaucracy!