Posted on 02/16/2010 7:05:08 PM PST by Willie Green
RALEIGH, N.C. -- Gov. Bev Perdue says the high-speed rail project will create 4,800 jobs over the next four years.
North Carolina received $545 million in stimulus money to build the rail system, which will run from Atlanta through Charlotte, to Raleigh and on to Washington, D.C.
In Mecklenburg County, the money will go toward building extra high-speed rail lines, new railroad crossings and a maintenance yard in Charlotte.
For more information on the high-speed rail project, visit http://www.bytrain.org/.
BS...
So where do they place the windmills and solar panels on the track?
So, have the environmental impact statements been done? Have the environut lawsuits been satisfied? If not, then four years is a terribly optimistic timeline.
Waste of time and taxpayer money. There is not a light rail system or passenger rail system that has worked in the last 50-70 years. They are all money eaters of the taxpayers funds and they can never sustain or justify their existance.
>> NC received $545 million in stimulus money to build the rail system
>> 4,800 jobs over the next four years
100 jobs / month
Wouldn't it just make more sense to have these 4800 people dig a hole in the ground a mile deep? They could fill it back in once they were done and the taxpayers wouldn't be stuck with another bankrupt railroad system needing a "bailout" all of the time.
Exactly, and well said. Just more claptrap from FR’s occasionally resident Marxist.
That’s only $114K per job (not counting that the jobs themselves will evaporate when the project is done, and the project will continue to be a drain on finances).
“Gov. Bev Perdue says the high-speed rail project will create 4,800 jobs over the next four years”
Why is Gov. Bev low balling this job count, why not say 400,000,000 jobs? That number is just as believable in the eyes and ears of leftist, socialist big government stooges.
This rail project costs tax payers big money to start, to build and to run it until all agree it’s a bust which will be years after Gov. Bev is dead and gone.
Since these are Amtrack projects, “moneypit” would be a mild descriptor.
They are ramming a pig like this down our throats right now too from Madison to Milwauke. Noone but Governor Doyle wanted it. He wants it to be his legacy since he’s not running again. It will be unsustainable and subsidized by us tax payers.
What they are not counting on is that once they put it out for competitive bid, (which they'll have to) they'll find that the track components, control systems, and cars will come from overseas suppliers. The contractor doing the physical construction will low-ball the bid 'cause he's using foreign workers here on a work visa. In the end, they'll be lucky if there are 100 temp jobs that end up going to Americans.
More like 40 years..
Yet people complain about NASA...
Stalin announces full employment with road through forest to Siberian work camps. Unemployment zero, great productive investments!
Reminds me of a proposed windfarm in my area. The windturbines will come from China (paid by the American tax drone).
“all money eaters of the taxpayers funds and they can never sustain or justify their existance.”
Not true. Check the Utah Transit statistics. UTA is a profit center for the last 5 years. I will have to admit though that having federal funds for the Olympics and using them to expedite the building of the UTA system really helped. I call it a system because it is all 3, heavy passenger rail service, light rail, and bus combined into one neat package. They also provide funds to car poolers so they can buy 15 passenger vans. They lease these vans to a group, and collect the money as passengers to pay for the vans. An extremely successful and profitable business for UTA.
I have met many professionals (doctors, nurses, bankers and University students who just love riding the bus/train system.
10s of thousands of skier use the bus system to go to big and little Cottonwood canyon ski resorts, saving themselves the hassle of driving the canyon roads and having to put on chains and dodge avalanches.
....Bob
I consider myself very fortunate to have grown up in the '60s when classic muscle cars were king: Mustangs, GTOs, 'Vettes, etc. etc. etc.
But the days of cheap gasoline are over,
Full size SUVs will never make a comeback, let alone the muscle cars of my youth.
The GOP is STUPID and myopic for opposing construction of modern passenger rail.
As gasoline becomes more costly, more Americans will demand efficient rail transit. And the GOP is on the wrong side of progress.
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