Another regulatory train wreck is coming in California, which calls itself the Golden State. But California’s governance is pure lead. Never has an area with so much going for it—weather and natural beauty—been so mismanaged by its politicians. The tax and regulatory wounds they inflict are nonstop, which is why businesses and people are fleeing the state. For the first time since it achieved statehood in 1850, California has been losing population.
Even so, the regulatory wreckers in Sacramento are still going at it. They are scheming to ban diesel-powered locomotives. Older engines would be pro- hibited by 2029, and longer-distance freight trains would have to be at zero emissions of carbon dioxide by 2035. The battery technology for these train engines doesn’t yet exist. But the once-Golden State’s modern socialists never let reality get in the way of their fantasies.
Railroads will have to deposit billions of dollars into a special fund, so they’ll someday be able to buy zero-emission locomotives. In other words, money that could be productively employed now will instead sit around unused to buy what may never exist. After all, zero-emission train engines would require batteries up to ten times the size of today’s. Go for smaller such engines? Putting aside their inefficiency, smaller battery locomotives are vulnerable to fires and explosions.
Given California’s economic size, these regs would end up banning some two-thirds of the nation’s locomotives from entering the state. California’s socialists know this would be a neat way to coerce the rest of the country to follow what California is doing.
Would this force more freight onto supersized long-haul trucks? Not so fast. California has a mandate to force a transition to electric trucks.
This whole exercise is dangerous. It makes trains and trucks more prone to accidents. It’s a massive waste of money that the private sector could otherwise use to enhance our standard of living.
When it comes to transportation, California has demonstrated a unique ineptitude with its project to build a 463-mile high-speed rail system be- tween San Francisco and Los Angeles. To call this fiasco a white elephant is an insult to pachyderms. It’s a decade behind schedule, and the estimated cost has vaulted from $35 billion to $135 billion and climbing. Only one-fourth of the system’s length is under construction, with the route having been repeatedly altered for political reasons. Projected ridership, which was unreal- istic from the get-go, has been scaled back. Funding is uncertain.
Sacramento is counting on a Democratic win in November to prevent a permanent derailment of this ill-begotten scheme. That bailout isn’t going to happen.
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