After many years of planning for California’s high-speed rail system to be born, the project’s officials said they are well on their way to putting their plan into effect.

Tom Tracy, regional project manager for the high-speed rail project visited Fresno State on Wednesday to speak to students about the opportunities it will bring to Valley residents in the future.

“We hope to get it built rather quickly,” Tracy said. “This project will employ many people for many years.”

In fact, the high-speed rail is projected to create 600,000 full-time construction jobs in a one-year span, and 5,000 permanent jobs once the system is completed.

“I feel that if it’s built, it will bring more opportunities to the Valley,” civil engineer major Miguel Aguilar said.

“Anything that will bring more jobs to the Valley is a good thing.”

Huda Munjy, a junior also majoring in civil engineering, is excited the project may actually go into effect.

“I definitely think it would be a gear opportunity to work on it,” Munjy said.

California’s High Speed Rail Authority will get it’s funding from Proposition 1A that passed in 2006, along with funding from the federal government. However, they are relying on the investments from local and private companies in order to succeed completely.

According to the plans of the high-speed rail authority, phase one of the plans will build the rail from San Francisco to Los Angeles, making several stops in between. The system will be approximately 800 miles when it is finished. Once construction begins, they plan on beginning to build the rail in Fresno.

“[The Central Valley] is the backbone of the system,” Tracy said. “We had to start with matching logical pieces of the puzzle to the funding.”

Because Fresno will be one of the first stations under construction, this gives benefits to the Valley economically, not only because of the addition of mobility, but also as a revamp project for Fresno.

“The people in Fresno are looking to renovate downtown,” Tracy said. “We are so excited about the Fresno station and we are looking into making it a model globally.”

The location of the first station is planned to be set across from Chukchansi Park in downtown Fresno.

After phase one is completed, they plan on beginning phase two, which extends the rail to San Diego and Sacramento.

Of course, the plan is still years in the making. If everything goes according to planned, the testing of the first prototype won’t begin until the year 2015, and the official launch of the rail won’t be until 2018-2020.

Tracy said he is very confident that everything will fall into place, but still has a “Plan C” in case they don’t get all the funding they need. He added that this project in no way plans to put companies like Amtrak out of business.

“Amtrak is still going to operate and will still be an important feeder system for the high-speed rail,” Tracy said.

“We still see Amtrak as a partner.”

The rail, which will run at approximately 220 miles per hour on 100 percent electrical power, is also expected to improve the environment. According to the project’s projections, it will save the United States 12.7 million barrels in oil and 12 billion pounds of greenhouse emissions every year.

The train will also be fenced off with an intrusion detection system to prevent against terrorist attacks or any other accidents that may occur if there is an obstacle on the tracks.

“These trains are so smart, they know if there’s a problem before the operator knows,” Tracy said.

In addition, Tracy foresees the high-speed rail as being a means for Valley residents to travel even when the budget it tight.

“We haven’t settled on ticket prices yet, but we certainly expect it to be an economic option,” Tracy said.

For more information on the high-speed rail project, visit http://cahighspeedrail.ca.gov.