I’m not saying there’s not waste (there’s plenty of that in China too), but roads are way cheaper to build and maintain than rail (and the roads are already built). In CA, it’s usually more realistic to assume incremental changes that don’t require massive infrastructure changes. If you decide to build a greenfield new city in the central valley connected by HSR, then yeah, plan for high density core with mass transit.

An updated 2016 Reason Foundation study shows California spent about $420,000 per mile in 2013 compared with the national average spending of about $160,000 per mile in the same year.
https://www.politifact.com/california/statements/2017/nov/01/john-cox/does-california-spend-nearly-five-times-much-build/
I don’t understand why it costs $56M/mile to lay down 2 parallel pieces of metal…. it should be way cheaper.