[Gordo]

^I would certainly welcome that approach being taken, and those areas being built first, but that would be nearly impossible politically. You have to face facts - ballot initiatives are the only way to fund things in California, and the only way to get enough money to build what you're talking about is to go statewide with an initiative framed like prop 1A was (which allowed 50%+1 to pass). Very unlikely that you'd get San Diego County or Riverside County to vote to pay for a train from LA to Palmdale. The Bay Area would be even more difficult - San Mateo or Marin County paying for high speed service connecting San Joaquin County to Santa Clara County? LOL. Only the "sexiness" of LA to SF (and the state-level, assembly-initiated tricks to make it a 50%+1 prop) make it remotely feasible politically.

You could possibly get something done in Southern California, because of the ginormous counties (and small number of them) that exist, but trying to put together anything in the 15+ counties of the Bay Area and Central Valley (Sac to Fresno)? Impossible.