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The US has forgotten how to do infrastructure

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Re: The US has forgotten how to do infrastructure

#471

Post by kalleboo »

Pharylon wrote: post #288
imgabe wrote: post #80

I don't know the answers, but as someone who works in the industry (on the design side). I think a big unmentioned factor is probably liability and the prospect of litigation. If you look at old blueprints for projects in the past, they are a LOT less detailed. They had to be, because it was physically more difficult to produce them since they had to be drawn by hand. A lot was left to the contractor to figure out in…

That's the American Way, though. America abhors regulations, and instead we allow the courts to sort it out. Europe is less litigious, mainly because they have massive government oversight and regulations.

I don't think I've seen any evidence that the US has any less regulations than Europe. On the contrary I get the impression that the US has far more detailed regulation than, e.g. Sweden. Americans seem to love being a NIMBY, and corporations have a lot of power to get regulation in place to lock out competition.

Re: The US has forgotten how to do infrastructure

#472

Post by int_19h »

jimmyk wrote: post #341
deong wrote: post #337

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They're implemented, but the rise of the SuperPAC after Citizens United more or less makes the regulations pointless. I can't contribute more than $2700 to a campaign, but I can contribute $27,000,000 to a PAC that requires only the thinnest imaginable separation from the campaign. Basically, as long as the candidate isn't on TV personally endorsing my check, we're good.

What is your alternative to the Citizens United ruling?

The exact opposite of it: money isn't speech, so restrictions on campaign financing aren't infringements on your free speech rights. Not letting you spend millions on campaign ads is not an equivalent of silencing your political opinion - you can still speak, write etc as a private individual, same as any other citizen.

Re: The US has forgotten how to do infrastructure

#473

Post by int_19h »

noonespecial wrote: post #51

I thought about this when I visited the Hoover Dam. The audacity of the thing and sheer impossibility of doing anything remotely like it in today's America makes it seem like a relic from an ancient civilization. It felt like visiting the pyramids in Egypt.

I get the same feeling even for smaller scale projects. I was looking at the I-90 at Snoqualmie Pass from below - it's effectively a very long bridge over the area there - and wondering whether I will see such infrastructure projects in my lifetime.

For the curious, here are some photos of that place:

https://pemco.com/blog/Lists/Photos/denny_creek_viaduct_capt...

http://static.panoramio.com/photos/original/36708233.jpg

https://scottsk.files.wordpress.com/2012/09/img_1674.jpg

Re: The US has forgotten how to do infrastructure

#474

Post by ianai »

vinay427 wrote: post #206
lghh wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And America's love affair with the automobile is a well-known abusive relationship that America will never have the courage to leave. It's pretty much impossible to leave this relationship unless you live in one of the larger US cities. If you live in a suburb, rural area, or city that's not in the top 10-15 in terms of size there's literally no other option that exists or that could easily exist.

This is an extremely simplistic view of the situation. In reality, many of the largest cities are almost entirely unusable without a car while many small cities (in the extreme case, most college towns) have excellent walkability and public transit because of their dense layout. I have personally experienced these. This is not a problem of urbanization to large cities, but of overall urban design.

One thing I miss about my college days is the commute. I lived about 300 feet from the math department. Sometimes I would refuel my car about as often as I would change its oil. (I still needed a car as I lived an hour from 'the city'.)

Re: The US has forgotten how to do infrastructure

#475

Post by int_19h »

truxus wrote: post #150

Am also a design engineer, I specialize in water and wastewater works. My clients are all municipalities, with tight budget and politics are a factor. Engineering productivity has climbed thanks to computers, but construction productivity continues to decline. In my experience on small jobs this has a lot to do with safety and regulations. It takes a team of 2-3 to enter confined spaces (manholes) for momentary inspe…

And yet, they can do this in Europe, where all these things are also considered important (so far as I know; but I've yet to see evidence to the contrary).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=btOE0rcKDC0

Re: The US has forgotten how to do infrastructure

#476

Post by ianai »

tooltalk wrote: post #406
deanCommie wrote: post #298

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have a source for any of that? Sounds like a completely made-up justification after the fact. Surely someone would have raised the point that the soviet union could just launch it's missiles in the middle of the work day. Also, Moscow is tremendously sprawled out.

Ah, I just did Google on it, and lo and behold: "... While it is true that various factors contributed to phenomenal growth of the suburbs between 1945 and 1960, historians have thus far paid little attention to policymakers' fears of atomic attack as a significant factor in population dispersal. ..." The Reduction of Urban Vulnerability: Revisiting 1950s American Suburbanization as Civil Defence K. Tobin, Pages 1-32…

I'm going to recount this in person someday and get the "he's a nutter" response.

Re: The US has forgotten how to do infrastructure

#477

Post by int_19h »

jonknee wrote: post #302
goodcanadian wrote: post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Switzerland might be a good example ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Healthcare_in_Switzerland ): Healthcare in Switzerland is universal and is regulated by the Swiss Federal Law on Health Insurance. There are no free state-provided health services, but private health insurance is compulsory for all persons residing in Switzerland (within three months of taking up residence or being born in the country).

It's privatized, but not private like you would think of in the US. For example, insurers aren't allowed to profit off of the basic insurance everyone is required to get, they can only profit off of expanded coverage. They also have Medicare-style price controls which is obvious, but not private in the sense we use in the US.

So basically the big reason why it succeeds where ACA does not is because it regulates the prices?

Re: The US has forgotten how to do infrastructure

#478

Post by dilemma »

taurath wrote: post #331
deanCommie wrote: post #296

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don't think people in Europe live in suburban or rural areas? The difference is networks of buses and trains that the countries and cities invested in over decades. America went in another direction, and looks no closer to changing it's mind.

Most of Europe doesn't live in what Americans would call suburbs, but villages. They're dense where people live and have train and bus service conveniently, because in postwar Europe there were a lot fewer cars. They also zone such that there's a dense living area surrounded by farmland - when that farmland becomes all housing thenyoull have American style suburbs, but few in Europe want that because it's harder to g…

Post-war Europe didn't have cars and cities are surrounded by farmland? Nope.

Re: The US has forgotten how to do infrastructure

#479

Post by fulafel »

lghh wrote: post #180
deanCommie wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anecdotally, having moved to Western Europe, I get the sense that this is the major factor as well. If I walk down the street and there is a group of workers excavating a road, there's a lot more of a relaxed attitude about fencing, walking underneath construction equipment, etc. After all - use your common sense - don't fall into the hole. If you do, isn't it kind of your own fault? Nobody's going to sue anybody. Ad…

> And America's love affair with the automobile is a well-known abusive relationship that America will never have the courage to leave. It's pretty much impossible to leave this relationship unless you live in one of the larger US cities. If you live in a suburb, rural area, or city that's not in the top 10-15 in terms of size there's literally no other option that exists or that could easily exist.

It can be changed by collective action lke rezoning and legislating incentives. People can move.

Re: The US has forgotten how to do infrastructure

#480

Post by jimmyk »

int_19h wrote: post #472
jimmyk wrote: post #341

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is your alternative to the Citizens United ruling?

The exact opposite of it: money isn't speech, so restrictions on campaign financing aren't infringements on your free speech rights. Not letting you spend millions on campaign ads is not an equivalent of silencing your political opinion - you can still speak, write etc as a private individual, same as any other citizen.

>same as any other citizen.

Hardly. Some citizens own media outlets and can hire and fire journalists based on their political leanings. Some citizens pay millions of dollars to media outlets for non-political advertising and can adjust their purchases depending on the reporting of the media outlet. Are you going to tell media outlets they can't talk about politics? Or do you disagree that media outlets have influence over elections (at least, more than I do)? I'd guess they have more influence than paid advertisements.

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