Merced to Bakersfield is exactly right. Build it there first, figure out how to build it, fuckup where it's cheaper and gain the experience so when you have to tear up downtown LA and SF you know what the fuck you're doing and can get in, get it done right the first time, and then get out. No one wants to live in a construction zone, but it's worse when something goes wrong and the construction zone lasts 3x longer than it has to.
On the other hand, how many additional people would be served by the infrastructure if they would just be brave and take a risk on an imperfect solution rather than bickering about it for X years or decades?
This, exactly. We Americans have very little knowledge base on how to build HSR, so it's as much a workforce training and proving ground as it is a functional line.
You would think we would just hire the dutch/swiss/italians (take your pick out of europe) to come build our HSR, similar but opposite of how we destroyed their cities when they brought in our 'traffic engineers' in the 60s and 70s.
I wouldn't say there's a technical knowledge gap insomuch as there are regulatory and political issues in the cities that need more time to resolve than building a line through farm country & desert do.
