ilbegone
04-02-2011, 10:31 AM
I don't get it.
Somehow governmental derived money shoveled towards a project is considered to be "creating jobs" while investor funded jobs of significantly less environmental impact are deemed to be, to environmentally cataclysmic.
Consider, for example, the high speed train proposed to be built between Victorville to Barstow. It's estimated to be a $6 Billion (hah!) project which has backing from Sen. Harry Reid. It's supposed to be built with private funds, but =>a federal loan may be needed to kick it off<=.
Some of the pitch is to reduce greenhouse emissions in the I-15 corridor, but 85 minutes on the train instead of 3 hours in a car will be the selling point.
It will be rail with electrical construction - I imagine it will be similar to urban light rail construction.
Backers talk of all the jobs it will "create"; 18,361 jobs (way too specific and obviously inflated) for four years, most workers imported by contractors from out of the area.
Meanwhile Barstow will permanently lose jobs. Estimates, depending on from which side the estimate originates, will cost Barstow 500 to 2000 jobs.
I've worked in and around Barstow several times - Barstow doesn't need to lose any jobs.
And if it does get started, you can bet it will be impacted such as the Sunrise Powerlink project from El Centro to San Diego is now - it will take far more than four years and 6 bil as well as federal "rescue" funds to complete.
The Sunrise Powerlink project, which I believe is entirely investor financed, consists of a 500 KV line from El Centro to a substation just east of Alpine on Interstate 8. It is then stepped down to two 220 kv circuits which will run underground through Alpine, then resume overhead to San Diego.
After having been started maybe a couple of months ago, it has been beset with environmental lawsuits; landowner lawsuits; hostile governmental agencies; and nit picking environmental, archaelogical, cultural, and other "monitors". If recollection serves me right, there are as many or more jobsite "monitors" on these jobs as there are productive construction hands.
There have been stories of employees of the various contractors having been set up by environmentalists to inadvertently violate the rules, from helicopter pilots to laborers (who, according to the accounts, were fired) and the minutest violation can be cause for project shut down.
At least part, if not the majority, of the project was shut down last week due to all the outside interference - jobs lost which did not take away from any local employment.
And that job's environmental disturbance is much less than the train project from Victorville to Vegas.
Somehow governmental derived money shoveled towards a project is considered to be "creating jobs" while investor funded jobs of significantly less environmental impact are deemed to be, to environmentally cataclysmic.
Consider, for example, the high speed train proposed to be built between Victorville to Barstow. It's estimated to be a $6 Billion (hah!) project which has backing from Sen. Harry Reid. It's supposed to be built with private funds, but =>a federal loan may be needed to kick it off<=.
Some of the pitch is to reduce greenhouse emissions in the I-15 corridor, but 85 minutes on the train instead of 3 hours in a car will be the selling point.
It will be rail with electrical construction - I imagine it will be similar to urban light rail construction.
Backers talk of all the jobs it will "create"; 18,361 jobs (way too specific and obviously inflated) for four years, most workers imported by contractors from out of the area.
Meanwhile Barstow will permanently lose jobs. Estimates, depending on from which side the estimate originates, will cost Barstow 500 to 2000 jobs.
I've worked in and around Barstow several times - Barstow doesn't need to lose any jobs.
And if it does get started, you can bet it will be impacted such as the Sunrise Powerlink project from El Centro to San Diego is now - it will take far more than four years and 6 bil as well as federal "rescue" funds to complete.
The Sunrise Powerlink project, which I believe is entirely investor financed, consists of a 500 KV line from El Centro to a substation just east of Alpine on Interstate 8. It is then stepped down to two 220 kv circuits which will run underground through Alpine, then resume overhead to San Diego.
After having been started maybe a couple of months ago, it has been beset with environmental lawsuits; landowner lawsuits; hostile governmental agencies; and nit picking environmental, archaelogical, cultural, and other "monitors". If recollection serves me right, there are as many or more jobsite "monitors" on these jobs as there are productive construction hands.
There have been stories of employees of the various contractors having been set up by environmentalists to inadvertently violate the rules, from helicopter pilots to laborers (who, according to the accounts, were fired) and the minutest violation can be cause for project shut down.
At least part, if not the majority, of the project was shut down last week due to all the outside interference - jobs lost which did not take away from any local employment.
And that job's environmental disturbance is much less than the train project from Victorville to Vegas.