ORANGE COUNTY PERSPECTIVE : A Stumble at the Starting Gate

Federal Railroad Administrator Gilbert Carmichael, in Anaheim on Monday for a convention on high-speed rail, talked about the Bush Administration’s enthusiasm for such systems. He spoke in optimistic terms about the prospects of the magnetic levitation system planned for a Las Vegas-Anaheim line and deplored the “negativism” of the press.

A somewhat more realistic assessment would have to be that while a private high-speed train would be a good idea for the California-Nevada run, it has run into such problems that a serious reevaluation of this particular project is now unavoidable. While there may well be a place in the state’s future for high-speed trains, the proposed Anaheim-Las Vegas maglev gambler’s special has never looked like much of a winner, even from the starting gate. It looks even less like a winner now that there are delays in testing the maglev in Germany, a byproduct of bureaucratic confusion wrought by reunification. More important, the charade is over that this train can ever be a purely private venture.

This has become clear because Bechtel Corp. acknowledges that it cannot pay for the project without help from tax-exempt state bonds that, in fact, would exceed the annual limit on such bonds used for private purposes. And the price for building the train and the cost of borrowing have kept escalating.

These troubles have created a political problem. This is not a mass-transit proposal, after all. It has a very weak claim on public financing. It’s true that some local stops are envisioned, but essentially the idea is to build a system to move people between two playgrounds--Las Vegas on one end and Disneyland on the other. Legislators were willing to indulge the concept as long as they were not asked to extend any public credit for an exclusive ridership.

But Bechtel is going to have to go hat in hand to the government, not just on the public bonds, but also seeking federal permission to remove any cap on fares. Given the recession, the timing of special breaks for private transportation ventures could not be worse. One argument advanced for the maglev was that if it could be shown to work here, it would catch on elsewhere.

But the notion of making special provisions for private rail investors, in the hope that the public might derive a peripheral benefit, is out of step in tight times. Maglev proponents are talking merely of delay. But let’s face it, the gambler’s special is in serious trouble. To the public it looks like too much of a gamble.