Remember how the collapse of the I-35W bridge in Minneapolis proved we had to invest in infrastructure? And then it turned out that the bridge collapsed because of a design flaw, not a lack of maintenance?
I guess cities got the message, because instead of using their stimulus funds to replace dated and defective infrastructure, they are building new infrastructure that will immediately be obsolete and soon be defective. Specifically, many cities have decided to blow hundreds of millions of dollars of their stimulus funds on streetcars.
Washington, DC’s rail transit system has frequent outages and is in desperate need of repair. So naturally, Washington is going to spend $45 million putting down streetcar tracks so it can actually run streetcars it foolishly bought several years ago but didn’t have anywhere to run.
Cincinnati wants to spend $69 million on a new downtown streetcar system. Milwaukee and Tuscon are also talking about spending stimulus funds on streetcar lines.
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Instead of relying on stimulus funds, Portland is going to build a new streetcar line with funds earmarked in the recent omnibus appropriations bill. Not to worry: Portland is still going to spend most of its stimulus money on transit. Similarly, Salt Lake City was thinking of using stimulus funds on a streetcar line, but is going to pour them down the commuter rail drain instead.
All of these streetcar plans come from the carefully crafted myth that streetcars will stimulate local economic development. Let’s make this clear: no U.S. streetcar in the last 20 years has stimulated a single dollar of economic development that wasn’t subsidized by TIF or some other support. Of course, the people supporting this myth are the ones who expect to profit from it. At best, the construction of a streetcar line has been an excuse for providing such subsidies.
Meanwhile, the U.S. still has nearly 72,000 bridges that are considered “structurally deficient.” At least three out of four of these bridges are owned by rural counties, while all of the stimulus funds are going to states or metropolitan areas. This means it is unlikely that much, if any, of the funds will be used to fix those bridges.
So much for solving the so-called infrastructure crisis.
Of course, like light rail, streetcars cost too much and do too little.
Thanks
JK
And then it turned out that the bridge collapsed because of a design flaw, not a lack of maintenance…
Sigh. Human nature conveniently ignored by certain ideologies aside, Randal ignores the litany of transportation engineers saying for year that Randal’s precious auto infrastructure is crumbling.
But this is the powah! of The Internets: a tiny op-ed on a blog refutes all the reports of professionals. I guess this is the best some ideologies can do – pretend.
DS
Meanwhile, the U.S. still has nearly 72,000 bridges that are considered “structurally deficient.â€Â
Does “structurally deficient” relate to (1) design flaws, (2) lack of maintenance, or (3) both?
Dan said: And then it turned out that the bridge collapsed because of a design flaw, not a lack of maintenance…
Sigh. Human nature conveniently ignored by certain ideologies aside, Randal ignores the litany of transportation engineers saying for year that Randal’s precious auto infrastructure is crumbling.
But this is the powah! of The Internets: a tiny op-ed on a blog refutes all the reports of professionals. I guess this is the best some ideologies can do – pretend.
THWM: Dan, O’Toole as with Karlock have a political agenda to push.
THWM:“Dan, O’Toole as with Karlock have a political agenda to push.”
ws: Naw…really? You can’t be serious.
The “design flaw” was layers and layers of new expansion on a bridge that was originally designed for no such capacity. If the money hadn’t been handed to the highway industry in the first place, these expansions may not have taken place at all and could have been used to fund more stable ventures.
ROT:“At least three out of four of these bridges are owned by rural counties, while all of the stimulus funds are going to states or metropolitan areas. This means it is unlikely that much, if any, of the funds will be used to fix those bridges.”
ws: Should they? Metropolitan areas overwhelmingly pay more taxes than rural areas, and are often subsidizing them (rural electrification, rural broadband, roads, farm bills to grow certain crops / none at all).
Are you sure you’re libertarian?
THWM: Dan, O’Toole as with Karlock have a political agenda to push.
JK: In my case it is personal freedom and fiscal sanity.
You have a problem with that?
Thanks
JK
re: “U.S. still has nearly 72,000 bridges ”
just to keep you straight…
we had highway money for years and years and they chose to spend it on guess what?
new highways… instead of fixing the bad bridges…
so .. when a bridge falls.. it become an excuse for more highway money…. which then is used for – not fixing bridges…
so it works both ways… and in fact, in terms of highways, the amount of money involved has been substantially higher over the years – and still they chose to build more roads and not fix the old ones..
JK: In my case it is personal freedom and fiscal sanity.
You have a problem with that?
THWM: I don’t, though you seem to have one.
debhenry said: The “design flaw†was layers and layers of new expansion on a bridge that was originally designed for no such capacity. If the money hadn’t been handed to the highway industry in the first place, these expansions may not have taken place at all and could have been used to fund more stable ventures.
THWM: Transport policy in America is kind of a political parodox.
People on the political Right tend to act like Socialists.
Mean while people on the political Left tend to act like Capitalists.
What expansion on this bridge occurred? When?
For the record, I have a problem with unqualified personal freedom. Perhaps that’s because I have a son who I have to teach how to conduct himself in public. Perhaps that’s because I have co-workers who don’t want to listen to my rock and roll on the radio. Perhaps that’s because I have neighbors who have invested their lives in their home and should reasonably expect me to not light my own on fire, endangering theirs.
Call me crazy, but where do you get off thinking you should have personal freedom?
More on freedom. (Blog, no data, all perspective. But it highlights the ahistorical tendency of some who promote moral philosophies which have no basis in the human past and even less in nature).
This is all interesting by way of debate. As a general proponent of transit I am generally in favor of transit funding, at least such that it is given subsidies similar in amount to cars. A few things that I would argue are not being considered in these arguments are the following:
– Local subsidies for roads and transit (property taxes dedicated to maintenance of local roads vs. subsidization of buses and trains via dedicated transfer of funds)
– Cultural/Neighborhood impacts of roads and transit (sprawl vs. dense development – neither is better & arguably both has its place but without mass transit dense development may not be developed by developers and there will be no competition to sprawl development)
– Environmental impacts of roads & transit (discussed but difficult to measure for both. For example, what shall we include?)
My point is this: there are externalities to both road building and transit building that are ignored by proponents of either side. Municipalities try to steer development through transit rather than top-down zoning, etc. – this seems like a reasonable thing for municipalities to do (and certainly better than the top-down approach). Also, it is so easy for players to shift costs of externalities to other parties in the case of roads/cars – but the benefits are tremendous. I would love to hear some responses to these concerns.
– Jason