Mass transit is a wonderful solution for highly urbanized areas, like London or New York.
Doesn't work worth a damn in agrarian areas.
Y'know, flyover Red State places like Montana or Alaska.
In the rest of the US, the interstate highway system is more efficient than a bureaucratic mass transit authority.
10 ton bus, making 50 different stops, to everyone's destination - or 50 2 ton cars going
just to the places they need to go.
My solution for improving the US highway infrastructure?Spend more on initial construction of highways to begin with. Current US practice is a fragile thin asphalt layer smeared over a marginal aggregate fill, that needs to be replaced/repaired every 5 years (by US Union workers... gee, go figure...doing a shitty job this time insures they get to come back and do it again 5 years from now, ad nauseum.)
Instead, go more towards the best German highway construction methods. 2x the asphalt, over 6" concrete, over a 3' to 5' flexbase aggregate foundation (properly layered, proper gradation of aggregate, properly compacted, etc)
As an added bonus, if your aggregate base layer is below the regional frost line (i.e. it's a sane 3' to 5' aggregate base, and
not a bullshit 18" like current practice), you
magically don't get frost heaves, and your road doesn't destroy itself every winter.
Put 2x the initial work and 4x the materials into the project, to make it 8x to 16x as durable.
That is real economy.
Build the road correctly the first time, then move on to build
another road correctly elsewhere. You end up with better roads, happier & safer drivers, and
more good roads supporting a healthier national infrastructure & economy. Spend 4x the initial cost, build a road that only ever needs minor resurfacing for the next 50 years. Let me reiterate the previous point, as it is
the point:
You will eventually have more safe, reliable, uncongested roads, than you would with the "rebuild the same shitty road every 5 years" model. By going with the initally more expensive, but long-term more durable road, You either end up with 2.5x the roads, or 40% of the total end cost for the same amount of roads (4x cost / 10x the lifespan = 4/10 = 40%. 10/4 = 2.5)It is a false economy to build a road for 1/4 the cost, when you're going to have to completely tear out
and rebuild that shitty road 5 years from now. The only people that benefit are the union highway workers,
not the taxpayer,
not the driver,
not the national infrastructure,
not the private companies that depend on reliable efficient mass transit for goods and employee mobility.
Oh, bonus round: with proper highways, you don't end up with terminal traffic jams
every summer, when the same old highway construction crew is tearing up 1/2 the highway at some point along your commute.
Side Note: The above implied cancer is what is killing the US. We have become so fixated on
creating value for the stockholder through cost-cutting on cheaply made products, that we have forgotten about
creating value for the customer in a durable lasting product.
Think about it for a minute; would you rather have just the things you need, but have dependable quality things, in a well build house that was just the right size -or- have a McMansion made of shoddy material filled with disposable junk toys.
I have a steel perkolator coffee pot,
at least 40 years old, that is still in the same good working order as the day I first remember seeing it on my grandmother's stove. I have also had a long line of modern coffee makers, each failing within 6 months to 5 years of purchase. One good durable, dependable, quality piece of gear is a better buy than a landfill pile of crappy gear that will randomly fail at usually the worst possible moments.
Put it another way -
Ford or Mercedes?
2006 Boeing 767 maintained by Lufthansa or 1976 Ilyushin Il-86 maintained by Libyan Airlines?
Last edited by rdx-fx (2010-10-11 14:36:12)
