U.S. cancels $929M in California high speed rail funds after appeal rejected
Nothing quite embodies the utter failure of the US and CA in particular as this embarrassing high-speed rail project. This is something that has been pioneered, developed, and commoditized in other countries, both in Europe and Asia.<p>The CA project had incredibly modest ambitions: a single line, over a relatively short distance, through terrain that isn't too challenging, going at moderate speeds, using completely standard technology. This isn't a hyperloop, a maglev, a hyperfast train, a dense network, or anything else that can fail because of technology risk. It's purely a failure at execution, pretty much entirely because of politics and corruption. In the US, the process for infrastructure construction is entirely broken, and the never-ending political battles that pop up with every project completely incapacitate development.