If a camel is a horse designed by a committee, imagine what California high speed rail will become if it is designed by political decrees.

Alex Padilla and Adam Schiff — California’s Senator and Senator-elect — are part of a full-court press in Washington, D.C., to get the federal Department of Transportation to approve a $536 million for the rail project before you-know-who moves back into 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. on Jan. 20.

On the surface, it seems like a sound move if you are among those that believe the high speed project needs to be built.

But there is a little condition that Schiff and Padilla want attached that should alarm high speed rail backers that have at least one streak of pragmatism.

The two senators want the money earmarked specifically for two rail tunnel projects — the Pacheco Pass segment and in the Tehachapi Mountains tunnel.

As such, a $536 million grant tied to the tunnels would effectively lock in a problematic Pacheco Pass tunnel project through the Diablo Range that deserves a second look.

Keep in mind there are actually three schools of thought regarding high speed rail.

There are those that believe it is a game changing public works project.

There are those who believe it will go down in history as the biggest boondoggle ever to drain civilization of resources while not even living up to 20 percent of its promised potential.

Then there are those in the middle.

They see the need for more robust rail service but not the pie-the-sky version that has now ballooned past the $100 billion mark just to connect Los Angeles to San Francisco.

That’s more than triple the $33 billion politicians in 2008 claimed it would cost to build the first phase between LA and SF that would be operable by 2030.

As an aside, they assured California taxpayers 75 percent of the tab would be covered by the federal government and private sector.

The rest would come from the $9.9 billion high speed rail bond that would have enough change left over to help fund the Altamont Commuter Express expansion and other commuter rail projects.

Since then, the state has siphoned off greenhouse emissions fees collapsed into the price of a gallon of gas sold at the pump to keep the project going following cost overrun after cost overrun.

Those in the middle want to see the alternative route to the Bay Area used instead of Pacheco Pass.

It is why the Sierra Club plans to sue to push for the high speed route to reach the Bay Area via the Altamont Pass as opposed to the Pacheco Pass.

The 54-mile Chowchilla to Gilroy segment is now pegged at $19 billion.

And that isn’t with any actual physical vetting of the 13.5-mile Pacheco Pass tunnel. There are more than a few tunnel experts not connected with the rail project that believe the Pacheco tunnel alone will take the entire $19 billion if not more.

Originally, plans called for a series of five tunnels to send the tracks through Pacheco Pass.

But that alignment was too close to San Luis Reservoir and poised serious issues.

That prompted the 13.5-mile long bore.

That is the straight-line distance from Mountain House Expressway on I-205 west of Tracy of downtown Manteca.

It would be the longest railroad tunnel in North America.

And it would cut through an active seismic zone.

The switch from five smaller tunnels to the 13.5-mile tunnel increased the cost estimate for the Chowchilla to Gilroy segment by 40 percent.

And that is without any physical work or land acquisition being done. 

The tunnel would have to cross the Ortigalata fault, estimated to have the potential for a magnitude 7.1 earthquake.

The fault epicenter of the 1989 Loma Prieta quake that pancaked the double decker freeway in Oakland and collapsed a segment of the Bay Bridge was 6.9 on the Richter Scale.

If the Pacheco is built, it would surpass British Columbia’s 9-mile Mount Macdonald as North America’s longest.

The Diablo Range is a mix of shale and metamorphic rock.

Geologists will be studying the pass area to provide the rail authority a better sense of potential costs.

That said, a solid cost estimate that is reliable won’t be easily predictable.

Darrel Cowan, a professor in the University of Washington’s Department of Earth and Space Sciences who studied the Diablo Range as a Stanford PhD student, was quoted in 2020  by the Bay Area News Group saying that drilling through the pass will be dicey at best.

“You’re drilling through soft shale, and then you run into a huge block,” Cowan noted, saying that you can compare the metamorphic deposits to large nuts in a cake — which in reality could be the size of a house, and much larger than the drilling machines.

The Pacheco Pass option was selected as the preferred route, based on the assumption it would be less costly and less disruptive.

But if the rail concept was rethought as something less than zipping trains along at 220 mph, the Altamont Pass option becomes more doable.

It should be noted that the state is already toying with the idea of a starter system, once the current 119-mile segment now under construction stretching from near Merced to south of Bakersfield is completed.

It would have ACE connecting with the state rail system in Merced to reach San Jose.

Straightening out track thorough the Altamont to allow trains moving from the Northern San Joaquin Valley to the Tri-Valley at 110 mph or so would also improve ACE operations.

The trains could also connect at the ACE/Valley Link transfer station to reach BART and San Francisco and confined northward to Sacramento.

The 2008 pitch sold to voters included a second phase after the backbone system from LA to SF was completed that would extend the state rail system to Sacramento and San Diego.

The Schiff-Padilla plea, if it works complete with the stipulation that the $536 million be earmarked for the tunnels, could effectively eliminate the ability to rethink the project.

In their haste to avoid Trump from making the final call on the $536 million in fear if federal funds dried up for at least the next four years it would derail the project, they could short-circuit efforts to provide California with a viable intercity passenger train system.

This column is the opinion of editor, Dennis Wyatt, and does not necessarily represent the opinions of The Bulletin or 209 Multimedia. He can be reached at dwyatt