Yes they can tell people to move in the name of public development. But it’s not like they just kick people out without compensation. My wife’s grandparents’ and parents’ had to move. The government provided them with new housing. The new houses are more modern, with toilets and running water, which they didn’t have before. The new houses are located in better places. Oh, and they have houseS now — previously they only had 1. Their standard of living improved.
That is a completely different scenario than what would be the case in many areas of the US.
In 2012, Amtrak estimated $151 billion to upgrade the Northeast Corridor (Washington DC to Boston). Adjusted for inflation that is about $168 billion now. I would assume that the actual price if we proceeded would be much more as I've never heard of a large project like that in the US coming in at the budgeted number.
It is a huge amount of money that can't realistically be recovered by train fares so you have to ask yourself is that the best way to allocate tax dollars? There are lots of other things I would choose to spend $168 billion on and one of them would be not collecting those tax dollars in the first place...
