Governors ask for funds to study high-speed rail

[Robert C]

Just saying wrote:

Why not use the 10 million to build the train as far north as you can?...

That will give you less than a mile of TRUE high-speed (150+ MPH) rail.
Once again, this is NOT the same animal as the Railrunner or Amtrak. Think $40 Billion for an overall project cost. That's one of many projected cost estimates of the Los Angeles-San Francisco-Sacramento high-speed rail line which is roughly the same length. These are huge population centers with a lot of development in between and high-speed rail likely makes sense.
For about 1/100 of that cost you can get conventional (79MPH) rail service with 2 - 4 trains per day on existing tracks (with a few upgrades) from El Paso-ABQ-Denver. You'll probably have enough left over for ABQ-Lubbock-Dallas/Fort Worth and even ABQ-Lubbock-Houston.

[Thinker]

Here's the deal, 10 MILLION for a study, yeah right, what tax payer rip off. Just slush money for Bill and his friends.

I'm all for the trains Railrunner and high-speed rail, as long as it is self funding. If you think this is such a great idea I'm sure you would be happy to pay a hundred dollars to go from Alb. to SF. I'm tired of holes we as tax payers though money in. It's time those who want these things need to belly up to the plate and pay for them, not the rest of us.

[sam]

What about the " PAY to PLAY " investigation on richardson, it seems it was brushed under the carpet as nothing has been published about it

[Got Potholes]

Just a thought, is it just me or did our NM roads suffer and degrade when the Gov robbed peter to pay paul from the road maintenance budget to pay for the over runs on Rail runner? Now this?

[Andy Nazario]

In a time of financial difficulties, should we be wasting money on studies and programs that have such a high financial impact on the budget?

[kvster]

Wow Bill how have you avoided being impeached. First you lie to NM and run as a republican then after elected you switch to being a democrate, then you make a deal with Mexico to pay THEM for the empty seats on the Mexican airline. no you want to wast 10 million on a study. how about using that 10mm in your school system? NM is ranked 48th in kids graduating. oh now i get it you were educated in NM that eplaines why you run NM into the ground. you waste the tax payers money. I bet your big idea to build it, is use illegals to build it and MS-13 to run security on the trains. The way you waste money ran NM into the ground you should go back to being a republican.

[kvster]

Say What wrote:

And the Governor? Governors? What's the reasoning here of El Paso to Colorado speeding through NM? Certainly not economic development for New Mexico. Care to explain your reasoning for us stationary NM citizen taxpayers?

They want to be able to get the illegals faster transportaion so tghey can make the whole SW a save haven for illegals and their travles at NM expense

[Real Futures]

A real forward-thinking real governor in the 1930s saw the real need for a modern east-west tansportation system. Route 66 through New Mexico. The only real solution to Texas to Arizona I-40 traffic congestion (40 times greater than "I-25") and more and more traffic fatalities is a high speed commuter rail between Tucumcari and Gallup. < period)

[Just left of right]

Matt wrote:

<quoted text>
He shouldn't have to. It's obvious if you stop and think about before opening your mouth. The track will be built with labor that will come from the state, our state will benefit from this the most given it will go through our entire state. The train will make stops where people can get off and make purchases or even stay a night over to see a city they haven't been to before. They will spend money there too.

Well, when the State resurfaced our neighbor three times in a month, the company they hired to do the work was out of Kansas, as were the workers (I asked them). That is NOT helping our state's workers!

[Just left of right]

Stanley Kowalski wrote:

Well, Rio Grande Foundation is a mouthpiece for the GOP. Their position is always the same: Lower taxes for the wealthy is better than any public investment.
HSR (the genuine article, 220 mph) really competes with short-haul air. It costs as much as a completely new divided highway, maybe $35 million per mile. It also grows ridership every year in the 8% range. It has no problem attracting riders anywhere its deployed. If we don't abolish the estate tax, we can raise $20 billion per year for the build out. That's a lot of rail at the expense of Paris Hilton.

Wow, see, you just saved the tax payers 10 million by doing the reasearch already!

[cgg]

I have a slogan: "Get through New Mexico as fast as you can!"

[Chris Robbins]

I like this idea, because it means Colorado, New Mexico, and West Texas will be more prepared to deal with a changing world, and we will have more competitive transportation choices and options. High speed rail will reduce the increasing cost of gasoline by balancing out some demand, it will also compete with airlines which hold a massively subsidized monopoly over long distance travel in this country - come to think of it, we could probably fund this HSR line by not subsidizing airlines, airports, and runways anymore.

Anyway, it is clear to me that Albuquerque, El Paso, and Denver don't need HSR to relieve current congestion or reduce pollutants like southern California, the Chicago area, and the Northeast. We want this corridor for economic development. Our cities and states are growing, not shrinking. We will need this HSR corridor when the price of gas inevitably increases again, and we'll be happy that we invested a relatively small percentage of 2009 dollars instead of a whole lot of 2020 or 2040 dollars.

Starting engineering, ridership, and environmental studies on this corridor now is the right thing to do for our children and grandchildren. We all know that this technology is going to be built elsewhere first, but it is time to get in line to do it in the Rocky Mountains. That is why I support the bipartisan Surface Transportation Authorization Act of 2009, which would invest in public transit and HSR, by writing to my congressman and senators.

[Me again]

Just another way to take our tax dollars and fill the politians pockets.

[Karen S]

The statment that people driving to Denver would have four or five people in their
vechicle is wrong. The average
is two most of the time its only one. Most of the traffic
from Albuquer to Denver are business travelers (solo driver) and truckers (also solo drivers). The greatest
users for a high speed train
are tourists

[erin]

people are drinking brown water in abq and the democrates are focusing on this, wake up people stand up against the democrates

[Dave]

You are Absolutley CORRECT !!!

Just saying wrote:

Why not use the 10 million to build the train as far north as you can? At least then if it doesn't work we can use the track for the railrunner.
Perhaps not enough publicity?
Another smart expensive move GOV...NOT!!
How much longer do we have you in office... You don't even like it here, you showed us when you ran for President and announced in California!
Why don't you just get the ***** out before you bankrupt our state like your pal Arnold did! Go homey and show Cali what you can do....Pull A Palin...We won't miss ya!

[CornDaddy]

Citizen Kane wrote:

It really ticks me off when people complain about the railrunner. Yeah there are a lot of people who do not benefit from it. Still, there are a lot of people who do.

Yup, ridership by MRCOG showed that 1/4th of 1% of the corridor population rides it. That's a lot???

Citizen Kane wrote:

The current Railrunner is just the beginning. This is something that should have been in place years ago and today we might have had inexpensive rail service to many parts of the state. I like rail because I can relax and not have to worry about the idiot drivers in this state.

I may embrace the idea, provided taxpayer costs are reasonable along with a whole passel of unasked and unanswered questions at this point in time. But if the $10mil apparently required just for the study is an indicator of how much this will cost taxpayers, it needs to be dumped in the trash heap post haste!

[El Wapo]

What good is it going to do??? Is it going to keep the state economically sound? This facination with trains is unreal. Why not use the money for a high speed train and put it in education

[Just left of right]

Does it bother anyone else that New Mexico always seems to be looking to the federal government for money? Perhaps we should be the "gimme state". It disturbs me that not only do our state and local governments condone entitlement attitudes but actually encourage them.

[John]

The current train cost 25million dollars a mile. Now, how long is NM?? Simple math.