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A Texas-Sized Pavement Problem

strongtowns.org

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Re: A Texas-Sized Pavement Problem

#41

Post by kodablah »

larrydag wrote: post #14

I lived in Collin County for almost 20 years. I've seen the suburban sprawl explode. I like the explanation brought forth in this article but I think its much more complex than investing locally. There are so many reasons why people choose their home, job, and transportation. In my opinion the best way to change behavior is to make an incentive for that behavior. Reduce taxes on urban areas and housing. Unregulate bu…

> There are so many reasons why people choose their home, job, and transportation [...] best way to change [...] make reasoned recommendations for change

What if the citizenry is happy and doesn't want change? This option never seems to appear in suburban sprawl discussions because so many of the discussors think clearly it's not wanted.

I think, especially compared to others, the county's situation is ideal for most.

Re: A Texas-Sized Pavement Problem

#42

Post by lotsofpulp »

larrydag wrote: post #14

I lived in Collin County for almost 20 years. I've seen the suburban sprawl explode. I like the explanation brought forth in this article but I think its much more complex than investing locally. There are so many reasons why people choose their home, job, and transportation. In my opinion the best way to change behavior is to make an incentive for that behavior. Reduce taxes on urban areas and housing. Unregulate bu…

The simpler thing would be to stop incentivizing undesired behavior. Stop giving tax breaks to everyone, start tolling all roads using license plate readers so people feel the actual costs of driving, require environmental costs to be included in manufacturing (I know this one is difficult, but at least we can attempt it and provide the environmental data openly to all to review it).

Re: A Texas-Sized Pavement Problem

#43

Post by lotsofpulp »

kodablah wrote: post #41
larrydag wrote: post #14

I lived in Collin County for almost 20 years. I've seen the suburban sprawl explode. I like the explanation brought forth in this article but I think its much more complex than investing locally. There are so many reasons why people choose their home, job, and transportation. In my opinion the best way to change behavior is to make an incentive for that behavior. Reduce taxes on urban areas and housing. Unregulate bu…

> There are so many reasons why people choose their home, job, and transportation [...] best way to change [...] make reasoned recommendations for change What if the citizenry is happy and doesn't want change? This option never seems to appear in suburban sprawl discussions because so many of the discussors think clearly it's not wanted. I think, especially compared to others, the county's situation is ideal for most…

Because after the initial debt laden spending spree results in happiness, once the bills for upkeep and debt service come due at the same time, the cuts in quality of life will then result in unhappiness. And now you have a bunch of wasted resources with not enough people to support them, and it causes more pollution.

But it’s not reasonable to expect people to not be short sighted. If people really want the future to be gated insular communities like in TX and FL, then I guess that’s what they deserve, but I’ve been to Africa and India and Brazil and the visual class divide it shows is unappealing to me.

Re: A Texas-Sized Pavement Problem

#44

Post by wemdyjreichert »

As someone who lives in Texas: I will never bike, but probably not for the reason you're thinking of. Rather, I won't because of heat. Days can hit 100 in high summer and 90% humidity. Many people supporting the "everyone should just bike" idea live in SF or New England. This means they don't realize quite how hot it is for much of the year. And though they may say it gets cold there, you can always add another coat. You can only remove so many.

Re: A Texas-Sized Pavement Problem

#45

Post by brohoolio »

claydavisss wrote: post #35

Texas is big, red, suburban, and growing. Texas is a success despite basically doing the opposite of what New Urbanists say at every turn. This must really burn up writers at StrongTowns. The big problem for New Urbanists is the fact that dense cities seem to end up with more and more expensive problems than the burbs. Looking forward to a wave of Medium posts and Atlantic articles in 2021 professing a newfound love…

The writers are highlighting a potential weakness with the Texas system. It’s not about identity politics or red vs blue. It’s about future costs that might be unsustainable.

NYC transit has it’s own issues, but if you look at the population there you’ll see on average they are skinnier than folks in Texas who drive around in cars. Are there costs associated with that obesity? Costs that everyone picks up instead of just those who are obese? Will that make Texas a more expensive place to live? Who knows?

As someone who lives in the suburbs and just got hit with a water rate increase to pay for the aging infrastructure i can say it’s good to have these conversations early before you rack up unexpected costs.

Re: A Texas-Sized Pavement Problem

#46

Post by claydavisss »

dangjc wrote: post #40
claydavisss wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Despite allthis, Texas roads are in much better shape than those in California despite the endless wave of bonds, Propositions, fees, and taxes that Californians impose upon themselves (monies all silently diverted into the general fund to shore up public employee pensions)

Yeah, the hijinks with the general fund are a problem. I think we need an electoral system that will allow multiple parties, because single party rule makes it hard to hold anyone accountable. But Republicans aren’t viable here and we’d need multiple left parties. Also the general fund is starved partially because of propositions like 13 that unfairly limits taxation on people whose houses have appreciated tremendous…

California liberals will never accept that the Democratic "arrangement" with unions is corruption, because only Republicans can be corrupt

Re: A Texas-Sized Pavement Problem

#47

Post by claydavisss »

brohoolio wrote: post #45
claydavisss wrote: post #35

Texas is big, red, suburban, and growing. Texas is a success despite basically doing the opposite of what New Urbanists say at every turn. This must really burn up writers at StrongTowns. The big problem for New Urbanists is the fact that dense cities seem to end up with more and more expensive problems than the burbs. Looking forward to a wave of Medium posts and Atlantic articles in 2021 professing a newfound love…

The writers are highlighting a potential weakness with the Texas system. It’s not about identity politics or red vs blue. It’s about future costs that might be unsustainable. NYC transit has it’s own issues, but if you look at the population there you’ll see on average they are skinnier than folks in Texas who drive around in cars. Are there costs associated with that obesity? Costs that everyone picks up instead of…

There are dozens of articles on the web about "fittest cities"....not one even put NYC in the top five

Re: A Texas-Sized Pavement Problem

#48

Post by apo »

I'm a fan of this blog and the way it develops the simple idea of the Growth Ponzi Scheme, which is sucking the life out of towns everywhere in the US.

https://www.strongtowns.org/the-growth-ponzi-scheme/

I also like the way this post breaks down the numbers. for example:

Okay. So we're talking about an amount [to be spend on roads] equivalent to more than the county's entire budget right now, and a really sizable fraction even if we add cities (which provide more services than the county itself, and which are responsible for maintaining local streets) into the mix.

For myself and other visual learners, it would be very helpful to see these numbers presented graphically. Graphs for other data are presented in the article, but not the numbers I reference above that clearly paint a picture of program that will end in tears.

Re: A Texas-Sized Pavement Problem

#49

Post by quotemstr »

pixl97 wrote: post #33
quotemstr wrote: post #30

> $12.6 billion: The amount Collin County says it needs to spend on new roads in the next 30 years. Why should we accept that roads should be that expensive? [1] is an article that provides a good overview of the rise in construction costs that eventually stalled new highway construction projects. One can imagine this trend in costs being reversed: in particular, 1) we should be able to reduce labor requirements thro…

Labor is more expensive. Materials are more expensive. Property is more expensive. Lawsuits from poor civil engineering are more expensive. And all are getting more expensive all the time. Your "let's make things cheaper by sacrificing quality" seems to smell of a very deep ignorance of how this stuff works.

Yes, these inputs are more expensive now. The article I linked goes into some detail. I'd like us to find ways of reducing the costs of these inputs. Do you have any ideas for doing that? Suggesting that my post "seems to smell of... ignorance" is both hostile and unproductive. Thanks.

Re: A Texas-Sized Pavement Problem

#50

Post by GavinMcG »

conductr wrote: post #19
komali2 wrote: post #13

>Collin County has traffic problems. Collin County's traffic problems are a function of its land-use pattern—which spreads development extremely thin on the landscape, and segregates uses, ensuring that people have to make lengthy motor vehicle trips to accomplish pretty much every one of their day to day needs. The offered solution: >For automobile flooding (congestion), the only way to deal with it and still have a…

The corner store solution is so bogus. Plano has tons of under utilized commercial space. Practically every intersection has 4 corners of partially vacant huge strip centers. People here choose to frequent the newer nicer always hip and usually chain oriented strip centers near the freeways (shops at legacy, legacy west) at the expense of supporting the interior commercial districts. So, I would say until traffic get…

"Corner store" doesn't mean a store at the corner of an intersection. It means the store you can walk to from your home, with many of the things you might need day to day.

The term implies more density, rather than just being closer.

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