The California High-Speed Rail Authority’s chief executive officer has stepped down from the controversial agency, where public interest is dropping and taxpayer costs are rising.
CEO Roelof van Ark called it quits at the a board meeting in Los Angeles Thursday (Jan 12, 2012) only a few days after an advisory panel recommended putting the brakes on the multimillion dollar project now estimated to cost more than $100 billion in taxpayer approved California bond funds.
CEO Roelof van Ark announced his departure in harmony with Chairman Thomas Umberg, of the CHSRA’s Board of directors, who announced he will step down from the post.
Van Ark, will leave his $375,000 job in March, while Umberg said he will step down as chair next month and remain a board member, nominating Dan Richards to fill his chairmanship. Umberg reportedly told the media the top job is full-time, but the project and responsibilities have grown. He also said he could not contribute the needed “200 hours a month to chair the Authority.”
The rail plan has come become a political football since it was first okayed by voters in 2008, most recently for inaccurate estimates of cost and predicted ridership forecast. California’s High-Speed Rail Authority recently released a new business plan, which now estimates the bullet train would cost around $98 billion, about triple the original $33 billion estimate voters were told when they gave it the green light.
“About $2.6 billion in Proposition 1A bond money should be withheld from the project until a better business model is produced," according to the California High-Speed Rail Peer Review Group
The advisory group consists of well-known finance and transportation experts, was commissioned by Proposition 1A to assist lawmakers on the rail plan, which would connect Northern and Southern California by a 520-mile-long high-speed bullet train. The high speed train would travel between San Francisco and Los Angeles in two hours and 40 minutes said experts.
Most recently critics contend that continued waste and mismanagement surrounding the California High Speed Rail Authority's efforts to push forward with the construction of a high speed rail train has turned into a fiscal train wreck.
A October 2010 study published by Stanford management professor Alain Enthoven, former World Bank analyst William Grindley and Silicon Valley financial consultant William Warren revealed that based on the history of high speed rail projects around the world, “there is little if any chance the system will pay for itself.”
President Obama's proposed high-speed train system will be replaced with a fleet of buses that will rocket along highways at speeds up to 165 mph. He said will save a bundle of money.
On a related note all comments on the CHSRA Small Business Program are due Monday, January 16, 2012. If you haven't submitted feedback yet, or have additional comments, you’re urged to do so by sending them to:
CaliforniaHigh-Speed Rail Authority
Attn: SB/DBE Liaison
770 L Street, Suite 800
Sacramento, California95814
Your comments can also be submitted via email to SBProgram@hsr.ca.gov or via fax to (916) 322-0827. For your reference, all Small Business Program documents are available at the Authority’s website: http://www.cahighspeedrail.ca.gov/sb-resources.aspx.
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