Monday, December 20, 2010

Bullet Train vs. Southwest Air vs. Wall

Los Angeles to San Francisco:  $59
The LA Weekly has the gall the challenge the wisdom of building a bullet train to Bakersfield for a trifling $43 billion. Everyone I know is just dying to go to Bakersfield, and to get there by bullet train.

Hey, did you know Southwest will fly you from LA to San Francisco for $59?


Sure you did.  Now the hard part, the math part.  Do you know how many of those airline tickets you could buy for $43 billion?  That's right:  over 728 million tickets.  That's over 364 million round trips.

So why are we taxing ourselves to build this bullet?  Does anyone really want to go to Bakersfield at all, much less by train?

I'd like to propose an alternative public works project, one that is shovel-ready, has zero environmental impact, and could produce a tremendous return on the investment. Here goes:


We would build a giant, continuous drive-in theater along the border with Mexico. Behind the continuous wall, er, screen, we could include hotels, condos, prisons -- you name it. And up top, a nice observation deck. Instant tourist attraction.

Plus, now that you mention it, I suppose it could help secure the border from illegal immigration.
Posted by Walter Moore at 10:03 PM
Reactions: 

6 comments:

  1. Check Victor David Hanson's (phd.) Two Californias on John and Kens website, kfi, and you will see the complete answer to the perplexing question of, ...Why? I just copied it, it is mind blowing.

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  2. Great idea, Walter. Whom should we name it after?
    Janet Napolitano? It should also be equipped with some low-level monorail that could be used to patrol the "wall" expeditiously.

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  3. Now all we gotta do is figure out how to prevent the tunneling under the wall.

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  4. 1. How about "the Good Neighbor Wall?"
    2. Love the idea of a monorail or train on top.
    3. How about subterranean land minds?

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  5. The US Border Wall. Now that's a concept worth exploring. Do you think Napolitano has ever considered this as a viable welfare-to-work project? Maybe California and each of the other border states could sell advertising rights for each side of the wall to help reduce the deficit the "immigrants" that illegally crossed the border has cost us.
    How about:
    1. La Pared de La Frontera (The Border Wall)
    2. Running & Bicycle path beside the monorail.
    3. Sound sensors buried 20 feet apart, at 10 & 20 feet depths to detect tunneling or gophers trying to get to our crops (our gophers have rights to our food too)
    4. Electrify the wall so sections can be activated remotely

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  6. They're building a train so they can keep farmworkers employed. Look where it's being build for christs sakes...

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