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Why isn't LA repaving streets?

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Re: Why isn't LA repaving streets?

#211

Post by lelandbatey »

doug_durham wrote: post #127
scoofy wrote: post #70

I have been a Strong Towns follower/member for about 6 years. I really don't think people realize the world of pain we're signing up for by not actually fixing the underlying problem of lack of density and walk-ability and their effect on the municipal budgets of American cities. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strong_Towns I know municipal finance is about as exciting socks for Christmas, but if the Strong Towns thesi…

You use the phrase "trivially fix". If your definition of "trivially" means several decades with the investment of billions of dollars, then perhaps. There are no "trivial fixes" in city infrastructure. Re-zoning only works if there are developers who want to redevelop the land. For existing neighborhoods this means buying dozens of SFH from people who don't want to move. This drives the price of any development up m…

If you change the zoning, people will build to take advantage of that more flexible zoning. I own land in the city, I'd absolutely pursue the financing and coordinate the redevelopment of that land if:

- I could make more money

- if the zoning allowed it.

As it is right now, it'd be profitable, but the zoning isn't there for it.

Re: Why isn't LA repaving streets?

#212

Post by alexpotato »

There was a great article a few years back that said the following:

- rank cities by size

- go down around the 150th on the list

- that's cities like Knoxville, TN

- in the 1950s/1960s they received tons of federal funding to build infrastructure

- now that infra is falling apart but the cities themselves don't have the money to fix it and the government is going to bail them out

Re: Why isn't LA repaving streets?

#213

Post by ndriscoll »

scoofy wrote: post #202
Spooky23 wrote: post #196

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s absolutely untrue. The only reason companies track depreciation as they do is because it allows them to defer taxation. Public works projects are not paid out of current cash. Strong Towns makes good arguments about certain things and are critical in a reasonable way of how civil engineering organizations rate the need for more civil engineering works. But the budget discussion makes zero sense. The biggest ex…

Yes, the problem is that our cities are already leveraged up to their eyeballs. At some point, the actual humans buying those bonds start becoming skeptical of the city’s ability to pay them back. LA currently has about a billion dollars of outstanding general obligation bonds (edit: but that does not include all their future liabilities). They're still rated AA, but I presume that is because the credit writing agenc…

Wikipedia says the GDP of the LA metro is ~1.5T. I think they could handle 1B in bonds. If they choose not to, it's not because it's some impossibility. Certainly not because roads are impossibly expensive.

Re: Why isn't LA repaving streets?

#214

Post by Spooky23 »

GorbachevyChase wrote: post #110
scoofy wrote: post #70

I have been a Strong Towns follower/member for about 6 years. I really don't think people realize the world of pain we're signing up for by not actually fixing the underlying problem of lack of density and walk-ability and their effect on the municipal budgets of American cities. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strong_Towns I know municipal finance is about as exciting socks for Christmas, but if the Strong Towns thesi…

I think Chuck Marone and his group make good points but their admonition by ASCE is also deserved. He really went too far with disparaging the profession because of differences in purely value judgments. Furthermore, the type of infrastructure you get is a political decision. Civil engineers don’t tell your mayor or your highway commission what to build, their only job is to figure out how it can be built. The “what”…

The engineers are a big part of the problem and drive regulations that featherbed themselves.

I got into a fight with my city over nonexistent crosswalks (the adhesive line strips wore off) near my home in an area where drivers have a hard time realizing where pedestrians cross due to a unique road setup.

You can’t just paint lines. The project ended up costing about $1.2M and required a traffic study, some stupid ADA assessment and accommodation that frankly any layperson could have figured out, and a complete streets assessment.

Basically, they sent out a few engineering technicians who make $20/hr, billed out 80 hours at $120 to count cars and people, and printed some boilerplate analysis (@$250/hr). The end result was they painted new crosswalks and added textured curb surfaces for ADA compliance, which allowed for the use of recovery act funds.

Re: Why isn't LA repaving streets?

#215

Post by stockresearcher »

TimorousBestie wrote: post #128
mystraline wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be fair, Indiana is now a Northern South state. MAGA governor, doing MAGA things to the state run universities, demolition of decency, acquiescence to federal power when it should fall to the state. And the AG is attacking doctors doing legitimate surgeries (abortion) with criminal harassing charges. Brain drain is also significant around West Lafayette, Marion county, and Bloomington due to anti-immigrant activit…

These are all factual things that Indiana state government has actually done over the past 10-15 years. Not to mention the crippling higher education reforms and the state seizing control over tenure review.

… and don’t forget about the new law they’re rolling out to lure the Bears from Chicago. Read the actual drafts so far… Absolutely nothing about the Bears being required to pay a dime for the stadium, but a whole bunch of new taxes for which the revenue is “redirected” into making the Bears’ lease payments. LOL, it’s such a huge money giveaway the Bears would be crazy not to take it.

Re: Why isn't LA repaving streets?

#216

Post by GorbachevyChase »

hn_acc1 wrote: post #129
GorbachevyChase wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

I think CA has bigger issues to tackle than repealing Prop 65 (IIRC, that's the one about carcinogen warnings). The other, may be happening in some places, but having lived here 20+ years in the Bay, I haven't seen even one example of either.

I saw all of these things driving through Sacramento twice. I think you’re probably just being dishonest or maybe you are in an are in an area where undesirables are priced out and you don’t leave your house.

Re: Why isn't LA repaving streets?

#217

Post by ibejoeb »

jojomodding wrote: post #201
ibejoeb wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I still don't get it though. Am I right that the proposition is: voluntarily accept a lower quality of life, or we'll either take your property or let it the neighborhood go to pot until you decide to give it up? People are not going to accept that. Look at the fiasco at defunding the fire department. I'll just patch my own sidewalk. I'm not vacating so that the next guy gets a deal. There's plenty of land. Develop t…

The three options you presented are the three available options. There is no fourth. Make a choice. You might think there is option 4--municipal bankruptcy--but that is just option 2 and 3 combined. Building buildings somewhere else will not fix your neighborhood.

I'm not giving you a hard time. I'm saying that I made my choice. I'm going to stay in my home.

I don't really think those are the only three choices, though. The government can fail and be replaced with a new one that will shape things up. Then it'll be replaced by another that thinks it's too big and well off to fail, squander it, and fail. That's the typical cycle.

Re: Why isn't LA repaving streets?

#218

Post by Spooky23 »

scoofy wrote: post #202
Spooky23 wrote: post #196

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s absolutely untrue. The only reason companies track depreciation as they do is because it allows them to defer taxation. Public works projects are not paid out of current cash. Strong Towns makes good arguments about certain things and are critical in a reasonable way of how civil engineering organizations rate the need for more civil engineering works. But the budget discussion makes zero sense. The biggest ex…

Yes, the problem is that our cities are already leveraged up to their eyeballs. At some point, the actual humans buying those bonds start becoming skeptical of the city’s ability to pay them back. LA currently has about a billion dollars of outstanding general obligation bonds (edit: but that does not include all their future liabilities). They're still rated AA, but I presume that is because the credit writing agenc…

LA County has a bigger economy than many European countries, and would displace Illinois by GDP if it were a state.

LA is fine.

Re: Why isn't LA repaving streets?

#219

Post by bruckie »

georgefrowny wrote: post #6
streptomycin wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The article says the city claims the biggest issue is federal regulations (the ADA) not city regulations. My neighborhood in NJ just got those fancy ADA compliant curb ramps last year, along with a repaving. It did take them much longer to install the curb ramps (like a week or two?) than it did to pave (one day) so I can imagine there is a significant cost, even if it's a smaller amount of materials.

One wonders if you could prefabricate kerb ramps and drop them in, rather than (I assume) casting them in place. Maybe they'd settle badly if vehicles drive over them, kick up in the opposite corners and become a trip hazard. The UK mostly skirts this by using tarmac and paving slabs instead of concrete.

Very few sites are going to be flat or square. I suspect prefabbed parts mostly wouldn't fit without custom adapters around the edges.

Re: Why isn't LA repaving streets?

#220

Post by varenc »

scoofy wrote: post #107
csdreamer7 wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> California cities could trivially fix their budget problems by satisfying the demand for housing by adding density, but it seems they are determined to do nothing until the wheels finally fall off, and the city's budget crisis spirals out of control. The state of California already mandated certain density improvements: https://calmatters.org/housing/2025/10/newsom-signs-massive-... There is another law that mandat…

I live in CA. My state senator is Scott Wiener. We are making some progress. Your argument might be plausible if it weren't for the fact that this issue is happening -- predictably -- in every major sprawling city in America. Strong Towns has literally built a tool to effectively convert cities' cash-accounting budgets into accrual-accounting budgets. You can see it happening over time... you just need to account for…

Any examples of the Strong Towns finance decoder already filled in for major cities?

edit: nevermind, found lots of example here! https://www.google.com/maps/d/u/0/viewer?mid=1iV3NEJqsY0y8N1...

sadly lots of the big cities I was interested not included. Guessing with these it's more difficult to get the input numbers.

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