Today, Trump DOT Secretary Sean Duffy announced he is auditing California High Speed Rail, in what is clearly a pretext to revoke $4 billion in federal funding, like Trump did last time. But is Duffy right about HSR's problems? Here's why not: 🧵 Duffy: the project is a “bridge to nowhere” ❌
Reality: Initial segment serves >1 million people, the state’s fastest-growing cities. High speed rail internationally stops at Merced-sized cities, and Central Valley start was forced by the feds w support of Central Valley GOP.

Why do we need to exempt rail electrification from CEQA? Why doesn't environmental law promote environmental goods like catenary? We've published Part 1 in a series answering these questions, starting off with some basic principles about the law. #AB2503 calelectricrail.org/how-ceqa-holds… CEQA requires agencies to analyze potential environmental impacts, attempt to mitigate them, and allows citizens to sue if the report wasn't good enough. While this is helpful for potentially harmful projects like gas plants or highways, it has a bad track record for transit. 2/

Tweeting live from a @SouthCoastAQMD webinar on a proposed Memorandum of Understanding on railyard emissions, in lieu of a regulation. AQMD is making the case that the MOU is stronger than proposed rules @SouthCoastAQMD AQMD: "It's very variable how railroads choose to comply with CARB's rule", they are hoping increase certainty.

Yeah that's the problem, you need to require catenary, not just "zero emissions" (aka bad faith hydrogen pilots that will fail).

Happy #CleanAirDay! Southern California has never met federal ozone standards, and the Inland Empire consistently has the dirtiest air in the US. Why, and how do we fix this? A thread: lung.org/research/sota/… Ozone comes from Nitrogen Oxides (NOx), which are produced when cars and trucks burn fuel. SoCal has high NOx emissions for 2 reasons:
1. Very low mode share: 70% of LA county and 80% of San Bernardino County drove alone
2. Diesel pollution from trucks etc at ports and warehouses