And when I found this out, I lost a lot of respect for him. All his talk of sustainability is junk when you see words like this.
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/jul/15/elon-musk...
When he admitted he built a staged rail company to subvert public high speed rail and encourage more sales of his cars, it strikes directly at the heart of his "mission" and "values" that are so adored by the auto & tech industries.
The goal of the project is to go where people want to go. The CAHSR project took in a lot of feedback as well as local political involvement to get to its alignment. Because of this process, it hits many major population centers and destinations throughout the state. It eventually will connect all three major metro areas (SD, LA, SF) as well as the capital city (Sacramento). Once complete the HSR will be the fastest door-to-door mode of inter-city transit for many of these destinations.
There are no concrete plans to do anything related to Phase 2 since the active scope was narrowed, so the SD and Sacramento connections are really wishful thinking at this point; the Authority still says that planning is happening on Phase 2, but lists no Phase 2 related progress (even planning) in their annual reports and similarly has no Phase 2 related progress goals in those reports.
Its an SF to Anaheim project.