Eigth and State

Many private and public utilities have a policy that lets develpers build new utilities on new streets or commercial sites, and the utility will maintain them. So, a new utility costs nothing in capital costs to the utility. What happens is 100 years later, the pipe in the ground has degraded to the point where it needs to be replaced, and the utility is stuck with the bill. The original development may or may not still be around at that time. Ohio cities have an awful lot of infrastructure built before 1920 that is still in service. Yes, the logical thing to do is first stop building new infrastructure in greenfields, and renew what we already have instead, but that's not what's happening. Developers don't really make any money rebuilding what was already there. They make money developing greenfields. Why this happens is the subject of another topic, but it is the heart of the sprawl concept. Ohio's population is barely growing, but our cities are losing population. It is conceivable that if developers were not adding new infrastructure in sprawl areas, our central cities would be stable instead of declining.

"We're looking at a future of closer to 250 million electric cars." Dreaming of a future maybe, but looking at it? You seem awfully confident of future electric car technology. Electric cars have been with us for over 100 years. Henry Ford's own wife drove an electric car, because she prefered the quiet ride. Electric car technology is very well developed; we have electric golf carts, electric locomotives, and even some mass-produced electric cars. We even had an electric car on the moon. The fact is that, after 100 years, electric cars are not cost-competitive with conventional cars. What makes you think that this will suddenly change? Note that average number of miles driven in this country, both in absolute and per-capita terms, has already began declining. If there was an economic demand for it, don't you think that drivers would be buying electric cars now?

Think about this problem from the point of view of the local utilities. Suppose you have a water main break, so you go out and fix it. Then it breaks again, and you fix it. Then again. Then you decide that it's really better to just replace the whole main with a new one. The old water main is the original one for the street, which was built in 1910. So, your water main is 101 years old. All of the houses on the street were built between 1910 and 1915. The gas main and the sewer date from the same year. All of the original infrastructure as well as the houses were built by a developer, and the city took over the infrastructure for maintenance. But here's the catch: Of the 35 original houses on the street, 15 have been torn down, 10 are abandoned, 5 are well maintained but vacant, and 5 are occupied. The estimated cost of replaceing the water main is $350,000. You look up the assessed value of all the properties from the county auditor, and the sum is $250,000. Thus, it will be cheaper to buy the property than to replace the water main. You certainly will not gain enough money from the customer rates to replace the water main. You only have 5 paying customers on a water main designed for 35! Sure, the "ideal" solution is to redevelop all the lots, increase property taxes, and take in more user fees. But this simply isn't happening. In fact, it's getting worse. There are 100 more streets like this one. Your revenues are declining every year - there is no realistic hope that things will get better next year. What do you do?

I'm not sure whether this proves that kids are more shallow or not, but the average age of first marriage for Americans has risen by 5 years in the last 20 years. That is definitely a big change.

^There are not enough young, educated adults to go around.

Not as old as Rob. :-D In my neighborhood, cable TV came around in 1981 if I remember correctly. I can't remember anyone having a VCR earlier than 1984, though I'm sure they were invented before then. Before those two things, we had channels 5, 9, 12, 19, and 64, and that was it. Oh, and the Atari 2600 came out about the same time. This wasn't that long ago, really.

^For that matter, ADA rules say that new developments have to have accessible paths with ramps of no more than 8%. New residential streets with sidewalks that are publicly maintained often have slopes greater than that, but I don't think it's ever been challenged.

When I was in school, everyone basicly watched the same shows on TV - because there were only 5 channels, no videos to rent, and no internet. Today's kids must be much more diversified from a media perspective. I never thought about that until just today. "The problem is not the quality of television, though most television is of low quality. The problem is the quantity of television."

Almost by definition, the suburbs are the domain of the middle and upper classes. The lower classes cannot reach the suburbs because they do not drive. Some suburban residents realize this, and want to keep it that way. One way to exclude the poor is to prohibit public transportation. This is often explicitly written into zoning variances and conditions. Another way to exclude the poor is by exclusionary zoning - minimum lot size, minimum house size, etc. Still another way is to harass them for loitering, panhandling, jaywalking, or a number of other non-violent crimes. Some suburban communities are more blatant about this than others. It also happens in cities; for example, the closing of hillside steps in Cincinnati.

^-Naw, a Marathon is 26.2 miles.

I forgot to say that the survey was completely open. The question was something like: "What is the most important issue in this community" or something like that and responders wrote in answers. The answers were then divided into categories by the local government, but they also published the raw data. I looked over the data myself and found no problem with it. Also, the survey was mailed to residents randomly selected by telephone number in order to avoid selecting based on home ownership.

I remember one of the comments about the Metro Moves proposal: "In order for me to get to work on this system, I'll have to transfer twice, and it's going to take me an hour and a half to get to work. I can drive in 25 minutes." One of my friends said, "Sure, I'd be happy to use it. I would even use it if took 10 minutes longer, because I could read while riding. But it has to come to my house."

In my community the local government performed a survey to see what people of the community were interested in. The results were: 30% wanted more parks and/or greenspace. 30% wanted the local government to do something about traffic. 30% wanted the local government to do something about crime. 10% everything else put together. As a result, the local government purchased some land for parks, initiated a couple of road projects, and made a concerted effort to reduce crime in two problem areas.

I came across an ad from the 1910 era claiming that the horse and buggy was more economical than driving a car. We know what happened in that debate. Incidentally, the population of horses in the United States peaked around 1915 according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. What all these cost calculations ignore is the user's time. People drive to save time, plain and simple.

"$0.55 per mile does not represent the true cost of driving, blah blah blah...." I know that and you know that, but it doesn't matter. What the cost per mile discussion illustrates is that no one really knows what it costs to drive, when considering all the factors. The $0.55, I think, represents the cash outlay for the cost of the car, fuel, repairs and parts, license, and insurance. It does NOT count an hourly rate for the driver, whether he be driving or maintaining the car. It certainly does not count anything for road construction, police & emergency, parking garages, etc. The typical voter who drives will say, "Why should I pay for someone else's ride in addition to my own? I won't use it." He is being given a choice to vote for transit, but not for highways.

It's interesting that the AAA puts the cost of driving a regular passenger car at about $0.55 per mile, which falls between heavy rail and light rail on KJP's scale.

I noticed one time that snow melted from sidewalks over steam tunnels before it melted on other sidewalks. I don't know if public square has any steam or heated utilities, but if it does, some of the lost heat could be put to good use. It is unlikely that heated sidewalks could be economically powered by solar photovoltaics. A more likely possibility is that water heated by a solar collector could be pumped under the sidewalks, or made to flow by convection. Even better yet, some materials absorb more heat than others. Red sandstone is one of the most heat absorbant materials, and red brick is pretty high on the list. This is another good reason to use red brick instead of concrete for walks.

Well done. Thanks for posting.

Speaking of the Ezzard Charles overpasses, I find the traffic pattern with a square of one-way streets interesting.

^But population is projected to peak soon in Ohio and then decline. Besides that, population in itself does not gurantee the ability to construct or maintain roads.

The signs allow drivers to have the latest trafific information so that they can alter course and take a different route if they choose. According to ODOT, the system is cost effective in terms of time saved from sitting in traffic.

Yes, the Mt. Adams incline was what led me to the right neighborhood. The precise location is East Fifth Street at the intersection with Eggleston. The horses are heading south on Eggleston. The building on the corner is The C. C. Aler Company. The building with the awning is on the corner of East Fifth and Lock Street. I had a blast looking for this, and then exploring the neighborhood through old photos, maps, and directories. One again, I am blown away by the changes that have occured in a little over 50 years - and most of those changes happened in the 50's, 60's, and 70's with highway construction. Besides an almost unbelievable number of residents listed in the directories - sometimes hundreds of people per block - there are a huge number of businesses listed, many of them manufacturers and also quite a few services such as bakeries and groceries. The building on the left with the curved windows was apparently a cotton mill. Eggleston Avenue is obviously still there, but all of East Fifth Street east of Eggleston is gone. The section of East Fifth Street behind the camera is still there. Rookwood Pottery is still there. A few of the hillside buildings might still be there, but it's hard to tell because the photo is not very clear. All of the buildings in the foreground are gone. I wonder if the photographer captured the front end of the parade? I wonder if there are more photos from this photographer? Can you imagine what people would have said in 1938 if you told them that by Cincinnati's bicentennial in 1988 almost everything in the photo would be gone?

Found it. Woo hoo! Where do I go to claim my prize?

^ But that's not necessarily the way it works. When given a list of projects and limited funds, a politician will tend to rank projects by popularity.

Nice. Thanks for posting.