Yes, but the route into San Francisco mostly follows an already existing rail corridor that is plenty wide for four tracks for most of its width. Palo Alto, Menlo Park and Atherton (PAMPA) have kicked up a fuss about the dedicated corridor for the HSR, in response to presumed catastrophic declines in property values if an existing rail corridor gets more trains.

So in response the revised business plan calls for upgrading the exiting Caltrain corridor so that HSR and Caltrain can share the corridor. That implies that by the time capacity constraints force widening of the corridor in those areas it will be (1) even more expensive and (2) will be such an in-demand upgrade to an existing rail service by that time that PAMPA opposition at that point is likely to be both diluted and in a position to be steamrollered.

The big problem in the descent to the LA Basin is not development since the corridor was first studied in the 1990's, but rather detailed geography and environmental constraint in the descent into the San Fernando Valley.


I've been accused of being a Marxist, yet while Harpo's my favourite, it's Groucho I'm always quoting. Odd, that.