The red lines you see will not all be built with the immediate stimulus money. Those red lines are competing for the same $8b, and it won't do a fraction of them. The red line from Louisville to Indy is a nod to an official designation made long ago. However, its just a line on a map, there is nobody at any level of government acting on this leg of the network.

Obama's speech makes clear, that the system will be built on merit. That means the dense corridors will be first. That means Cincinnati will be before Louisville, and even that will probably take a back seat to the even greater densities to be plucked elsewhere. That's not to say we can't butt ahead in the line, but to do that Kentucky would need to put up some local matching funds, and have a dazzling proposal with local commitment, like in California where a super-majority of their populace recently voted to fund High Speed Rail. You can hear this if you listen carefully to the speech.

Indiana is not going to pay for 99% of the rail line just because the red line occurs on their side of the Ohio River. Much of that burden, if not most, will fall to Kentucky, since Kentucky will reap the major benefit. So the moral here is: no High Speed Rail for River City for the foreseeable future.

Still, this is a great start. We're pleased, bordering on "giddy".