Having said that, this is an excellent example of “proxmyering.” In fact, high-speed rail between Vegas and Sacramento would solve many problems that otherwise will have to be addressed piecemeal and less efficiently.

Vegas threatens to outgrow it’s life-support network, and in terms of providing that support, efficiently, over the long haul, a high-capacity rail corridor makes enormous sense. The current highway is dangerously choked and is one of many critical infrastructure problems that are, well, generally ridiculed as “earmarks” and “pork” when it’s convenient.

It’s also an example of how things have to get done in Nevada, given a truly broken political system that is adverse to anything that doesn’t directly and immediately benefit a large, Republican donor. (Casinos and Mining, for the most part)

The train trench, in Reno, at least thirty years overdue, was built in part, I understand, with Homeland Security funds, since it was painfully obvious what would happen if an LNG tank were to explode in the center of town.

That fact – and all the others involved with having a railroad going through town at grade – no problem for thirty years. Until it could be presented as a “national security” issue.

Sausage and Politics, sausage and politics…

Which, for one, can run on existing track within the limits of existing signalling systems.

And, for another, can take curves @ speed whereas ordinary trainsets must operate @ a reduced speed thus.