311–320 of 327 posts
Now that the California refineries are shutting down, where does LA get asphalt to do the paving? Has the price gone up due to having to import it from the Gulf Coast?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm not sure I understand your argument. You can defer maintenance but school, police, firefighter, etc spending is constant. If your infrastructure is in trouble and your budget can't pay for the maintenance, you can limit the costs to 5% or 10% of the budget, but your infrastructure will continue decaying. Los Angeles has about 7500 miles of roads. At a reasonable cost of $5 million per mile that is 37.5 billion US…
Sure, if you treat all other things as impossible to tweak except the thing you want to argue is the problem, I guess. But taking a quick look at the city budget, I see they spent $200M on overtime for police. So there's a place where they could save like $70M with no change to service with correct staffing? I'm sure there are other places where they are not currently 100% efficient. Or, since they have ~4M residents…
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…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I designed highways. This is correct, and this is why weight restrictions exist. Noncompliance is not that much of an issue, and there are occasional permitted loads anyway when there’s a need to haul industrial equipment or unusually large objects. The most important thing to remember about flexible, pavement lifespan is that asphaltic pavements are not designed to last forever. The asphalt binder will eventually ox…
Thank you. What about concrete pavements? I assume they can last longer, but I often see badly cracked concrete. Regular (expansion?) cracks also don't increase riding comfort.
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”…
This is actually generally the opposite of true. SFV is heavily Republican. Given the choice, self-made individuals prefer to live in or near blue cities despite the high taxes, because the lifestyle is objectively better than it is in the areas around red cities.
Indeed, a not-so-hidden secret of Fox News is that almost all of their anchors and personalities actually live in LA or NYC. (This is why Fox News personalities are so familiar with and obsessed with LA's problems. They're locals.) The Murdochs, for all their money prefer Los Angeles and NYC as their U.S. bases over no-tax states like Florida and Texas.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
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 AD…
I love a good rant, but you just have no idea what you’re talking about. First, real engineers (the kind with, education and experience requirements and personal liability for their work) have labor markups that are maybe 2 to 3 times raw rate. I don’t know if 6X margins are normal for people who collect a check to “maintain” a finished product. Second, any civil engineer will tell you that complete streets complianc…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Oh it's quite practical, many cities have done it. It just requires standing up to a bunch of selfish assholes who would rather pave over every bit of available space so they can drive around really fast in their giant SUVs while pedestrians and cyclists scurry about on the broken pavement of the 5% of the street right of way given to them, and get run over when they don't get out of the way of the SUVs fast enough.
this attitude really helps improve cyclists' reputation.
If you think I'm exaggerating or something, I'm really not. You were born into a world already bulldozed for cars so you literally can't imagine an alternative reality. You're broken — can't see the world for what it is objectively.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
To be honest with you I really don't give a shit about my reputation when it comes to this, I care about me and my kids not getting splatted by a speeding SUV when we dare to use the street, because I face this situation daily.
You'll never succeed with this attitude.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's interesting that you frame building bike lanes and reducing car speeds as "punishing drivers", seemingly ignoring that such changes enable micro-mobility users to commute to work safely.
That’s what it is . Remove capacity, increase travel times , increase driver frustration and in theory increase cycling and public transit. But the second part never happens . Travel times have been increasing for 40 years and cycling is still a fringe hobby
That you think cycling is a hobby is exactly the issue. I don't get to work by bike as a hobby, I do it to get to work, and get all the benefits of cycling at the same time. Win-win.
It's also quite deluded to think the USA has been putting non-negligible effort towards improving cycling for the last 40 years, to the point that you'd notice any difference in car traffic. Hate to bring it to you, but the reason traffic's getting worse is there are more and more cars, but there's only so much space and cars scale horribly. Hence, bikes and public transportation. Those scale exceptionally well and are the perfect solution for 95% of all city trips.
The USA is in 99.9% designed for cars. You're essentially complaining that the most dominant mode of transport is getting mildly deprioritized and is on the path to being only 99% dominant. Cry me a river.
Oh, and the reason you drive a car and not say, use public transport, is that for the last 50+ years the USA has invested into car infrastructure instead of public transport. So the car is not a mode of transport that you have chosen, that you prefer, that you like, it's one that was forced upon you. That you can't see it is somewhat hilarious, but really — just sad.
Just ask yourself: Do you have any other real choice than to own a car and drive everywhere?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
To be honest with you I really don't give a shit about my reputation when it comes to this, I care about me and my kids not getting splatted by a speeding SUV when we dare to use the street, because I face this situation daily.
You'll never succeed with this attitude.
Try to bike to work sometime — it's good for the soul. And your health of course.