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Nine months after announcing that China would help build a high-speed rail line from Los Angeles to Las Vegas, the private U.S. company behind the plan said late Wednesday that the deal was off.

A bullet train stops at the platform before it travels to Lanzhou from the Urumqi south railway station in Urumqi, northwest China's Xinjiang region on December 26, 2014. (Credit: STR/AFP/Getty Images)
A bullet train stops at the platform before it travels to Lanzhou from the Urumqi south railway station in Urumqi, northwest China’s Xinjiang region on December 26, 2014. (Credit: STR/AFP/Getty Images)

XpressWest said the decision to terminate the relationship with China Railway International was based “primarily upon difficulties associated with timely performance and CRI’s challenges in obtaining required authority to proceed with required development activities.”

XpressWest indicated that its “biggest challenge” was a federal government requirement that high-speed trains must be manufactured in the United States to secure regulatory approvals.

“As everyone knows, there are no high-speed trains manufactured in the United States,” the company said in a statement. “This inflexible requirement has been a fundamental barrier to financing high-speed rail in our country. For the past 10 years, we have patiently waited for policymakers to recognize high-speed rail in the United States is a new enterprise and that allowing trains from countries with decades of safe high-speed rail experience is needed to connect the Southwest region and start this new industry.”

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