30 miles is all we need in the Great Northwest
Here near Seattle, the distance to the 3rd largest city of Tacoma is 30 miles. From there to the state capitol of Olympia is another 30 miles.
So a HSR train, making these three stops, even at the ridiculously slow 110 mph, would allow people to travel between the biggest population and government centers in under an hour.
In my mind, this would be a better project than Cal-Rail if we could get our tracks up to +100 mph speeds and institute hourly service, day and evenings.