For 15 years, the California High-Speed Rail Authority and its backers have discussed, planned, studied and lobbied for the kind of fast trains seen elsewhere around the world.

Doctors in the Capital Region aren’t just checking your temperature and blood pressure when you come in for a checkup these days; in growing numbers, they’re also checking your mood.

A Sacramento software startup has launched an iPhone application for runners that picks music to go with a workout and can add customized coaching instructions along with the beat. When users pay to download the coaching data, a donation goes to a nonprofit of the coach’s choice.

If everything goes as planned, the newest phase of the K Street redevelopment effort will open for business late next month off 10th Street, bringing a pizza place, dance club and  “dive bar” stocked with costumed mermaids and mermen to the downtown mix.

In a growing cluster of offices and labs south of downtown Davis, researchers at Novozymes Inc. are building better microbes.

Fifty years after the VIII Olympic Winter Games in 1960 brought the world to the slopes of Squaw Valley USA, and after years of toil and dashed hopes, a two-state effort aimed at bringing the games back to the Reno-Tahoe region in 2022 is gathering steam.

California will need close to a million new medical assistants, lab techs, respiratory therapists and other skilled health workers in the next 20 years in addition to new doctors and nurses, a recent study estimates. But the state doesn’t have enough educational capacity to train them all.

San Joaquin County needed 3,000 more unemployed workers like it needed a hole in the head, but that’s what it got with the closing of the NUMMI auto plant in Fremont and the related layoffs at its major suppliers.

The credit crunch and a wave of foreclosures swept the Capital Region housing market like a wildfire, turning the landscape into a scorched ruin with many familiar features gone, including some well-known names in home building and residential development.

The economy and state budget woes have slashed millions of dollars from public transit, forcing hundreds of layoffs, service cuts and fare increases that have pushed the price of a bus ride in Sacramento to among the highest in the nation.

Stop me if you’ve heard this one: A lawyer dies young and arrives at the Pearly Gates. 

“There must be some mistake!” he wails. “I’m only 31!”

St. Peter consults the records and disagrees. “Judging by the number of hours you’ve billed, you’re at least 73.”

Asset-based lending can be more expensive than a bank loan or line of credit, but for some it may be the best choice, providing flexibility and cash flow when others won’t. 

The question of value is crucial in business, whether it’s how much you should pay to acquire a competitor, the fair price for that new piece of equipment or how big a share of your company you can pass along to your heirs.

Red Hawk Casino opened in December, just weeks after economic woes sent the stock market plunging. The launch of the new venue just off Highway 50 coincided with a sharp drop in gross gaming revenue at Nevada’s Lake Tahoe casinos, and California casinos also felt the sting as gamblers gave Red Hawk a try.

If there was a soundtrack to banking this summer, it sounded something like the theme from “Jaws” — tense, ominous and hinting at unknown dangers below the surface.

The new-home market in Solano County soared even higher than that of California as a whole, and it fell harder too.

The cost of lumber, steel, asphalt and other construction materials has been on a wild ride since the early part of this decade, but don’t be fooled by the relatively placid prices in 2009. Industry players say it’s likely just a brief respite before the roller coaster starts climbing again.

The credit crunch and other broad changes in economic conditions cut a wide swath through the ranks of potential buyers. Those who are left are biding their time, lining up cash and waiting for a sweet deal, probably a distressed property at a bargain price. But far fewer multifamily properties are facing the default notices that helped drive down prices for single-family homes, and many landlords are trying to ride out the storm. The result is very few deals.