When levees break and bridges fall
both Republicans and Democrats do a lot of finger pointing, but the reality is there are no votes to be had by shoring up the collapsing infrastructure of our cities. People expect good roads, sound bridges, clean water, working telecommunications systems and power lines that don't fail, but they lust after the pop and sizzle of arts centers, sports complexes, convention centers and riverfront toys.California is spending barely 3% of its state budget compared to 20% in 1960 on infrastructure. 80% of state transportation officials admit their 10 year plan will be inadequate. $1.6 trillion is needed to update our transit systems. More regions are having blackouts. Politicians, special interest groups, and environmentalists squabble over who brings home the pork and who will fry it. The highway system, for all the raging over polluting automobiles, has returned $6 in increased productivity for every $1 invested; sports stadiums return nothing, and often cost cities more than they invested.
Read the sad tale at Joel Kotkin's "Road Work."
An Op Ed in the WSJ last week (I think it was Aug. 28) pointed out: One group finding opportunity in New Orleans--maybe as many as 100,000--are Hispanic construction and clean-up crews, who are also branching out into small retail stores. If they are illegals, the author thought that was just fine. Because so many people have left, that would mean almost 40% the populace, if estimates are correct that the city only has about 273,000 with many residents deciding to start over in other states.
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1 comment:
One problem as I see it is that repairing infastructure gives no photo ops for the politicians. Build a new bridge or road, well then they're all for that, a good photo op.
Repairs to existing structures is boring and doesn't have much PR value to the average politician.
Consequently, the levees break, bridges fall into the rivers, etc.
THEN people start to point fingers and shout.
I'm sure Ohio is similar, but having grown up in Louisiana, levees are everywhere. The whole eastern border of Louisiana with the Mississippi River is one, hundreds mile long levee system. Most other rivers in the state are the same too. Nobody wants to spend the time or money to have the Corps of Engineers keep them all up to snuff, then something like Katrina happens and it's a racist conspiracy all of a sudden.
It could have just have easily been levees in another area that failed.
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