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Re: Fast

#231

Post by [deleted] »

bimguy wrote: post #197
carabiner wrote: post #73

Major one missing: China built 5,000 miles of high speed rail in 6 years. In California, it's been 15 years and we have 0 miles complete. Also built numerous hospitals during pandemic in a couple weeks. Demolished and replaced a bridge in 43 hours: https://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/infrastructure/a... . General pattern of completing infrastructure projects at a blistering pace - and they work. Also landed a…

At least California's infrastructure will last the test of time. If China's railways are anything like there global infrastructure then it will probably fall apart in less then 10 years. Autocracy gets shit work done.

[deleted]

Re: Fast

#232

Post by moneywoes »

crop_rotation wrote: post #23

Having worked at a top 5 big tech company from college hire to a high level position, I have seen many factors that contribute to things being much slower than a startup. Some of them might be valid, but others are just the result of tragedy of large organisations (a big tech company is surprisingly similar to governments in terms of internal bureaucracy). * Large number of people and orgs willing and fighting to tak…

May I ask what are these metrics

Re: Fast

#233

Post by systemvoltage »

climatologist wrote: post #227
systemvoltage wrote: post #226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is not a widespread opinion or pattern as I see it. This is first time I am hearing from someone that we in America "build things fast". I suggest reading Eli Dourado's blog: https://www.elidourado.com/ and his many blog posts on HN: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...

Just speaking from personal experience. The methods that I observed are very modern and very efficient. The parts for the entire building are pre-fabricated and then assembled at the construction site. So the stagnation narrative is more than likely overblown and the folks that think things are slower now should visit some of those Truebeck construction sites and observe for themselves.

I don't think so at all and the evidence points to a profound stagnation in our ability to build. So, if we can't even admit that we're terrible at building fast, there is very little hope. Step No. 1 is admission and introspection:

https://www.fullstackeconomics.com/p/why-america-cant-build-...

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/25/us/california-high-speed-...

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/02/05/opinion/economy-construct...

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/04/opinion/manufacturing-uni...

https://www.palladiummag.com/2022/06/09/why-america-cant-bui...

https://www.wsj.com/articles/infrastructure-us-costly-explai...

https://techcrunch.com/2019/02/19/why-cant-we-build-anything...

Re: Fast

#234

Post by systemvoltage »

rurp wrote: post #222
carabiner wrote: post #73

Major one missing: China built 5,000 miles of high speed rail in 6 years. In California, it's been 15 years and we have 0 miles complete. Also built numerous hospitals during pandemic in a couple weeks. Demolished and replaced a bridge in 43 hours: https://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/infrastructure/a... . General pattern of completing infrastructure projects at a blistering pace - and they work. Also landed a…

> Autocracy gets shit done. On certain high profile projects, sure. But autocracy typically embeds a lot of corruption at every level of the system which creates a drag in many ways. A system that prioritizes loyalty and obedience to your superiors more than anything tends to have a lot of waste.

Counter point: Autocracies are actually extremely efficient, but we don't like to admit that. So, we come up with various narratives.

Let's be honest, there is plenty of corruption in democracies and autocracies are pretty damn good at infrastructure. Just not an ideal governing structure for individual freedom and things like property rights which we value higher than efficiency of building things fast.

Re: Fast

#235

Post by typon »

bimguy wrote: post #197
carabiner wrote: post #73

Major one missing: China built 5,000 miles of high speed rail in 6 years. In California, it's been 15 years and we have 0 miles complete. Also built numerous hospitals during pandemic in a couple weeks. Demolished and replaced a bridge in 43 hours: https://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/infrastructure/a... . General pattern of completing infrastructure projects at a blistering pace - and they work. Also landed a…

At least California's infrastructure will last the test of time. If China's railways are anything like there global infrastructure then it will probably fall apart in less then 10 years. Autocracy gets shit work done.

I went from San Fransisco to Shenzhen. This is the kind of lies Americans tell themselves to make themselves feel better. Chinese infrastructure is 2-3 decades ahead of US in major cities - the only way you to deny this is to put your head in the sand.

Re: Fast

#236

Post by climatologist »

systemvoltage wrote: post #233
climatologist wrote: post #227

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just speaking from personal experience. The methods that I observed are very modern and very efficient. The parts for the entire building are pre-fabricated and then assembled at the construction site. So the stagnation narrative is more than likely overblown and the folks that think things are slower now should visit some of those Truebeck construction sites and observe for themselves.

I don't think so at all and the evidence points to a profound stagnation in our ability to build. So, if we can't even admit that we're terrible at building fast, there is very little hope. Step No. 1 is admission and introspection: https://www.fullstackeconomics.com/p/why-america-cant-build-... https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/25/us/california-high-speed-... https://www.nytimes.com/2023/02/05/opinion/economy-construc…

Have you personally seen those construction sites? Just go and observe, the stagnation narrative is overblown.

Re: Fast

#237

Post by _vertigo »

systemvoltage wrote: post #234
rurp wrote: post #222

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Autocracy gets shit done. On certain high profile projects, sure. But autocracy typically embeds a lot of corruption at every level of the system which creates a drag in many ways. A system that prioritizes loyalty and obedience to your superiors more than anything tends to have a lot of waste.

Counter point: Autocracies are actually extremely efficient, but we don't like to admit that. So, we come up with various narratives. Let's be honest, there is plenty of corruption in democracies and autocracies are pretty damn good at infrastructure. Just not an ideal governing structure for individual freedom and things like property rights which we value higher than efficiency of building things fast.

Is that true? I've heard that the build quality for new houses in China is terrible.

Re: Fast

#238

Post by gooseyman »

_vertigo wrote: post #237
systemvoltage wrote: post #234

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Counter point: Autocracies are actually extremely efficient, but we don't like to admit that. So, we come up with various narratives. Let's be honest, there is plenty of corruption in democracies and autocracies are pretty damn good at infrastructure. Just not an ideal governing structure for individual freedom and things like property rights which we value higher than efficiency of building things fast.

Is that true? I've heard that the build quality for new houses in China is terrible.

I also keep hearing this. I keep hearing the “American infrastructure is built to last 50-100 years” (I used to regularly pass a handrail at the Wall Street station that was over a hundred years old, so example of one).

But is China’s really so bad it is going to crumble in half of that?

Re: Fast

#239

Post by kfarr »

jljljl wrote: post #132
kfarr wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Great report except it missed the most obvious recommendation: "decouple transit improvement from utilities projects"

The issue was that in this case they couldn’t — a lot of the BRT benefits came from creating a center lane, and that center lane was infeasible unless they did the utility project first.

I'm not an expert but have served on BRT CAC for Geary. They could have done side running and defer utilities to another agency at a later date, after which point move to center running. Or any other of the plethora of options that didn't involve a transit agency running a utility project.
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