That quote comes from Rep. John Mica (R-Florida), chairman of the House Transportation Committee, reacting to the Obama administration’s high-speed rail proposal — a six-year, $53 billion boondoggle waiting to happen. Here’s hoping the House Republicans can the idea. From the Washington Examiner’s editorial page:

Contrary to the claims of high-speed rail and mass transit enthusiasts, the presence of such systems does not lure drivers out of their cars and into trains. Between 1980 and 2009, for example, U.S. Census Bureau data cited by Wendell Cox in a recent Heritage Foundation study showed a 12.7 percent increase in the number of drivers in cars in three large metropolitan areas that are considered prime markets for mass transit – Baltimore, San Francisco and Washington, D.C. The same data showed a 19.5 decrease in the number of people using mass transit rail and bus systems. Transportation will improve in every respect when Washington stops trying to force people to do what they don’t want to do.

You can find out why high-speed rail would be folly for North Carolina in this 2009 policy report produced for the Locke Foundation by transportation expert Randal O’Toole. JLF’s Michael Sanera discusses the false promise of rail in this brief interview. He also explains who really benefits from rail.