Place Based Investment: The Case of California's High Speed Rail

Over the next couple of decades,  California will try to use national tax payer money to construct a high speed north/south train that will connect San Fran to LA to San Diego.  I would guess that the train will stop every 10 miles and won't actually be a quick train but merely a fast train when it is moving.  The LA Times discusses an interesting initial conditions issue.  Should early $ be invested in track infrastructure in the "middle of nowhere" as the Obama Administration wants or should it focus on improving infrastructure where people current live?    It would interest me if real estate developers have bought up large speculative positions in land in Central California (cheap) locations where the railroad may stop.  Are these Don Trumps predicting that future cities will grow like mushrooms around the station stops?  For an economic history example of what I'm thinking about read the intro of this paper.