trains take 37 years of committees
If you go back and watch the second season of True Detective.
spoiler
a major plot point is gangster Frank Semyon buying up land in the desert that's supposed to be transformed into the California HSR project. But because the plans for the train line fall through, he's stuck with a bunch of worthless real estate. The season ends with him dying in the desert, having traded away his family, his fortune, and his dignity in pursuit of an opportunity to scam the government.
This TV show was filmed in 2014 and released in 2015. Over the subsequent 12 years, the project has been repeatedly scaled back and still hasn't been completed.