January 22, 201312 yr Once Amtrak starts making money (I'm going to guess within 10 years) Conservatives will complain that fares are too high and they are gouging riders.... They still wont be making money because that is only operating costs. Capital projects is where most of the losses come, as is expected. If airlines had to build their own infrastructure they would be in even worse condition.
January 22, 201312 yr Ah... good point. Hadn't thought about that. Once Amtrak starts making money on ops and can focus more on (capital) infrastructure, things could be very good for them as they could continue to make incremental improvements which could result in even higher revenues.
January 22, 201312 yr Once Amtrak starts making money (I'm going to guess within 10 years) Conservatives will complain that fares are too high and they are gouging riders.... They still wont be making money because that is only operating costs. Capital projects is where most of the losses come, as is expected. If the highway stats include capital expenditures (and I assume that they must, since basically all they do is build and maintain the fixed capital) and the Amtrak stats don't, then that obviously changes the equation significantly. What percentage of Amtrak's *total* costs were covered by fares? (And if there's some other accounting magic separating out actual, tangible highway costs from the figures already discussed, I'd want to see the total costs of highways as well--still limited to direct costs, because indirect costs are more exercises in politics than economics, but all direct costs.) If airlines had to build their own infrastructure they would be in even worse condition. True as far as it goes, but don't the port authorities charge the airlines for the use of the spaces at the terminal? If so, then the economics of that transaction are essentially airlines as lessors of space, not owners, but that's still a perfectly legitimate business arrangement and doesn't necessarily imply subsidization. The subsidization is only the amount of taxpayer dollars that are needed to pay off the bonds issued by a given port authority or whatever other entity actually issues the debt for the airport.
January 22, 201312 yr Airline "infrastructure" includes air traffic controllers and radar. The airlines (and passengers) pay for use of the airports, all taxpayers pay for the air traffic controllers. The public (port authority) also takes on the risk in building an airport in anticipation of airlines wanting to use it. Despite that support, every major airline has gone through bankruptcy at least once, and the entire industry was bailed out after 9/11. Amtrak also operates on privately-owned rail and pays "rent" for using those lines. Amtrak owns very little track of its own. The freight rail companies gladly sold their passenger business to Amtrak. The port authority also does not build passenger rail stations for Amtrak to rent...
January 22, 201312 yr In that case, for the sake of doing the comparisons, I'd simply make "air" into two separate line items (airlines and airports) so that they could be examined together or separately.
January 22, 201312 yr Once Amtrak starts making money (I'm going to guess within 10 years) Conservatives will complain that fares are too high and they are gouging riders.... They still wont be making money because that is only operating costs. Capital projects is where most of the losses come, as is expected. If the highway stats include capital expenditures (and I assume that they must, since basically all they do is build and maintain the fixed capital) and the Amtrak stats don't, then that obviously changes the equation significantly. What percentage of Amtrak's *total* costs were covered by fares? (And if there's some other accounting magic separating out actual, tangible highway costs from the figures already discussed, I'd want to see the total costs of highways as well--still limited to direct costs, because indirect costs are more exercises in politics than economics, but all direct costs.) If I am not mistaken, much of the capital infrastructure for Amtrak is built by freight companies. There is a big reversal in roads-to-railroads comparison, where most of the public expenditure for roads is capital and most of the expenditure for railroads is operations. (Edit: And, likewise, operations are largely a private expenditure for roads, while infrastructure is the private expenditure for railroads.) So it's hard to do an apples-to-apples comparison. The northeast corridor is the only track I know of which is actually owned by Amtrak. If it were separated from the rest of Amtrak's operations, I would think it makes money even when capital expenditures are factored in.
January 22, 201312 yr I know that; that's why I'd want to see total costs for the highways vs. Amtrak. The total cost is the most important number in most laypeople's minds, anyway--and dealing with the costs at that level also eliminates the comparative effect of that imbalance between capital and operating costs. Of course, to the extent that Amtrak uses other companies' rails, those capital costs might properly be excluded from Amtrak's total costs, leaving only any fees it pays the freight rail companies that actually own the lines. If those freight rail companies' construction of those lines was partially government subsidized, however, that would allow Amtrak to disguise a subsidy that it gets to enjoy (along with the freight rail companies who were actually the direct recipient of the same, of course). I actually don't know how much we subsidize the freight rail infrastructure, but I'm sure we do. (I know that the Heartland Corridor at least got an earmark in at least one FY budget, probably more than one, and that's just one line.)
January 23, 201312 yr Freight rail gets very very little subsidy at all. It's the least subsidized transport system in the US. To get to any meaningful subsidy you have to go back to the mid 1800s when the right-of-way for many railroads (mostly west of the Mississippi, but not entirely) was simply given to to the railroads by the US government. The exchange for that of course was the government's ability to tax the railroad land and the newly valuable land of the towns and villages that sprang up along them. The thing to remember though is that railroads still pay property taxes on their land today, more so if it's better maintained and equipped, while streets and highways do not. I figure that airports probably don't either, but I'm not 100% positive on that one. Either way, it's one of the perverse disincentives to improving the country's rail system, because those improvements increase the tax burden on the railroad company. This is why extra tracks are abandoned or scrapped, same with overhead electrical systems, and why even busy lines can be rather ramshackle affairs.
November 22, 201311 yr So when roads are priced at market rates, few want to use them? SHOCKER Investors Take their Licks from Toll Road Projects Posted on November 21, 2013 by James A. Bacon| 30 Comments by James A. Bacon Private investors have pumped about $27 billion into toll-road deals in the United States since 2003, estimates the Wall Street Journal in an article today. Many of them have gone bust. The root problem: Not enough drivers. During the go-go years of the 2000s when traffic counts were soaring and real estate development in resorts and on metropolitan peripheries portended ever-increasing traffic, private investors made a lot of bad bets. After peaking at three trillion miles in 2007, Vehicle Miles Traveled in the United States embarked upon their steepest and most prolonged decline since World War II. Many of the hoped-for real estate projects stalled or went belly up and the anticipated traffic never materialized. The WSJ points to the example of the Foley Beach Express toll bridge in Alabama. American Roads LLC banked on 10 million drivers in 2012. The actual number: 2.3 million. American Roads filed for bankruptcy protection in June. The article also mentions the Pocahontas Parkway outside Richmond, for which Transurban Ltd. paid the Commonwealth $600 million only to write off its investment several years later. Some commentators may cite these numbers as evidence that public private transportation partnerships are a bad idea. I draw the opposite conclusion. The system is working exactly the way it should. READ MORE AT: http://www.baconsrebellion.com/2013/11/investors-take-their-licks-from-toll-road-projects.html "In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage." -- John Steinbeck
November 22, 201311 yr So when roads are priced at market rates, few want to use them? SHOCKER Investors Take their Licks from Toll Road Projects Posted on November 21, 2013 by James A. Bacon| 30 Comments by James A. Bacon Private investors have pumped about $27 billion into toll-road deals in the United States since 2003, estimates the Wall Street Journal in an article today. Many of them have gone bust. The root problem: Not enough drivers. During the go-go years of the 2000s when traffic counts were soaring and real estate development in resorts and on metropolitan peripheries portended ever-increasing traffic, private investors made a lot of bad bets. After peaking at three trillion miles in 2007, Vehicle Miles Traveled in the United States embarked upon their steepest and most prolonged decline since World War II. Many of the hoped-for real estate projects stalled or went belly up and the anticipated traffic never materialized. The WSJ points to the example of the Foley Beach Express toll bridge in Alabama. American Roads LLC banked on 10 million drivers in 2012. The actual number: 2.3 million. American Roads filed for bankruptcy protection in June. The article also mentions the Pocahontas Parkway outside Richmond, for which Transurban Ltd. paid the Commonwealth $600 million only to write off its investment several years later. Some commentators may cite these numbers as evidence that public private transportation partnerships are a bad idea. I draw the opposite conclusion. The system is working exactly the way it should. READ MORE AT: http://www.baconsrebellion.com/2013/11/investors-take-their-licks-from-toll-road-projects.html So when roads are priced at market rates, few want to use them? SHOCKER That isn't what I read in the article. Drivers did not avoid the toll, they didn't take that road (as much as investors hoped for) because of real estate developments that never got off of the ground or failed completely. Driving went down due to a really bad economy.
November 22, 201311 yr Maybe the real estate developments didn't happen because the traffic didn't materialize? Usually the road comes first, then the real estate development follows in the decades thereafter as a publicly funded road can survive the bad times too. But that's when roads are built by governments. With privately funded roads, how many investors are willing to wait decades for a return on their investment? "In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage." -- John Steinbeck
November 22, 201311 yr That isn't what I read in the article. Drivers did not avoid the toll, they didn't take that road (as much as investors hoped for) because of real estate developments that never got off of the ground or failed completely. Driving went down due to a really bad economy. Today's economy is actually pretty normal. The sprawl machine running at full steam regardless of demand or people's ability to afford it was not.
November 22, 201311 yr Well, part of the question is the elasticity of demand, which when it comes to physical infrastructure takes the form of people taking alternate routes. In practice, for as long as remotely reasonable alternatives exist that do not involve passing through toll booths, people have shown a remarkable (even irrational, I'd say) willingness to travel farther in order to avoid paying tolls. Granted, not all tolls are created equal. But for example, when I go from Akron to Cleveland-Hopkins, I almost always take the Turnpike. The toll to get from I-77 over to I-71 is tiny ($0.75) and I easily save that much in gas, time, and hassle because the alternative means looping up to I-480. Yet I really feel like I'm in the minority. When I first told my wife that I intended to take the Turnpike when I was driving her to the airport, she looked at me like I was crazy and was about to bankrupt the household. I know many others who feel similarly ... I almost feel like they get a sense of personal accomplishment out of having avoided the toll booth even if it means they took a longer (and thus costlier) way around.
November 22, 201311 yr If I can find an equal (in distance and/or time) alternative to the toll road, I also find it to be a sense of accomplishment. For example, I drove to New Jersey last July via Harrisburg. The natural thought would be to take the Ohio and Pennsylvania turnpikes, right? Nope. I found that if I took US 422, SR 82, SR 11, I-80, US 220, SR 144, and US 322 (which took me to I-81 and I-78), I avoided more than $30 in tolls yet my distance from Cleveland to Harrisburg was 249 miles. How far was the "more direct" turnpike route? 249 miles. And my travel time from Cleveland to Harrisburg was about four hours because most of the distance was via interstates or at least interstate-quality roads. The only two parts that weren't were via fast 50 mph roads (US 422 in Geauga County) and SR 144 over Bald Eagle Mountain around State College (a very scenic route!!). "In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage." -- John Steinbeck
January 6, 201411 yr Love it! Had to share...... "In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage." -- John Steinbeck
January 6, 201411 yr I had an ancien neighbor with an ancient tractor & he would frequently plow before the city would. and, heck, one of the city plow drivers lived across the street.
January 8, 201411 yr Anybody see this? A couple of years dated but real. http://abcnews.go.com/WNT/video/us-bridges-roads-built-chinese-firms-14594513
January 10, 201411 yr We all know roads get a pass on subsidies while rail/transit subsidies take a beating. So share your road subsidy example that may be news to you. Here's mine. Yep, NS directly subsidizes its competition.... Selling railroad system could boost pension fund, but is it worth it? Railway sale may help fund retirement program, but critics worry about losing constant revenue stream Jan. 9, 2014 Written by James Pilcher The idea of selling Cincinnati’s most unique and perhaps most valuable asset is being raised again, this time as a way to help the city get out from underneath its massive pension problems. ...Rail company Norfolk Southern now pays more than $20 million annually to lease the line that runs from Cincinnati to Chattanooga, Tenn. Since the lease was renegotiated in 1987, the railroad has paid the city $432 million in lease payments, all of which go directly into Cincinnati’s capital budget. The lease runs until 2026, although Norfolk Southern has an option at that time to extend it another 25 years. ...That continual stream of revenue is just one of the reasons Mayor John Cranley listed when voicing opposition to the idea in an interview with The Enquirer. The revenue is set aside for capital projects such as maintaining roads and bridges, Cranley said. READ MORE AT: http://news.cincinnati.com/apps/pbcs.dll/artikkel?NoCache=1&Dato=20140109&Kategori=NEWS01&Lopenr=301090134&Ref=AR "In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage." -- John Steinbeck
January 14, 201411 yr Should we raise the cost of driving in Ohio 44% so that passenger #rail doesn't have to be subsidized? How would you live differently if you had to pay nearly 2 times more to drive? Transportation Insider By Rick Rouan The Columbus Dispatch • Monday January 13, 2014 5:03 AM Money raised from Ohio’s gas tax has been flattening for years, but a recent report by the Tax Foundation has found that the state raises a greater share of money for roads from fuel taxes, user fees and tolls than about three-quarters of the country. The Washington, D.C.-based tax-research group analyzed 2011 data from the U.S. Census Bureau to find that fuel and license taxes and road tolls make up about 56 percent of road funding in Ohio. That ranks Ohio 12th in the United States and is higher than the 50 percent national average. READ MORE AT: http://www.dispatch.com/content/stories/local/2014/01/13/freeze-puts-bike-share-ridership-on-ice.html "In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage." -- John Steinbeck
January 14, 201411 yr That's not actually the way it would work, of course. Increasing the cost of driving 44% would not actually increase revenue received by 44%. But perhaps that's part of the point.
January 14, 201411 yr That's not actually the way it would work, of course. Increasing the cost of driving 44% would not actually increase revenue received by 44%. But perhaps that's part of the point. My point is there needs to be a level playing field, and don't tell me "life isn't fair." We at least try to be fair, not try to pick winners and losers and then lie that transportation modal choices are the result of the free market. If I'm a store owner and I see my competitor nearby running a retail business from a building owned by the city where the business owner has to pay only 56 percent of the cost of using that building while I'm being asked to pay 100 percent, then I'm going to be mad. I either want the same deal he's got, or I want him to have the same deal I've got. "In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage." -- John Steinbeck
January 15, 201411 yr Should we raise the cost of driving in Ohio 44% so that passenger #rail doesn't have to be subsidized? How would you live differently if you had to pay nearly 2 times more to drive? Transportation Insider By Rick Rouan The Columbus Dispatch • Monday January 13, 2014 5:03 AM Money raised from Ohio’s gas tax has been flattening for years, but a recent report by the Tax Foundation has found that the state raises a greater share of money for roads from fuel taxes, user fees and tolls than about three-quarters of the country. The Washington, D.C.-based tax-research group analyzed 2011 data from the U.S. Census Bureau to find that fuel and license taxes and road tolls make up about 56 percent of road funding in Ohio. That ranks Ohio 12th in the United States and is higher than the 50 percent national average. READ MORE AT: http://www.dispatch.com/content/stories/local/2014/01/13/freeze-puts-bike-share-ridership-on-ice.html Bizarre column. In terms of public perceptions, this is a man-bites-dog story that turns conventional wisdom on its head: auto use does not come anywhere close to paying for roads. Yet it's buried beneath a dog-bites-man story about fewer casual bicyclists riding when it's 10 below zero. And then it makes it sound like positive news because Ohio's record isn't as abysmal as those of other states.
January 17, 201411 yr Miles-driven per capita is falling. Gas tax revenues are falling. So what are we doing? Yep, adding more roads! And the federal highway fund has already been bailed out multiple times since 2008 with general tax subsidies to keep the roadbuilders a-building! http://www.taxadmin.org/fta/meet/11_mf/pres/lee.pdf January 15, 2014, 03:23 pm Highway funding will run out in September By Keith Laing Federal funding for road construction projects will run out in September unless Congress appropriates additional money, the Department of Transportation said on Wednesday. The department released a Highway Trust Fund tracker that showed the fund has about $8.5 billion left. The figured included $9.7 billion that was transferred from the federal government’s main funding account at the beginning of the 2014 fiscal year in October. The agency said “surface transportation program continues to outlay at a greater pace than receipts are coming in.” Read more: http://thehill.com/blogs/transportation-report/highways-bridges-and-roads/195563-dot-highway-funds-will-run-out-in#ixzz2qcCVE3t0 "In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage." -- John Steinbeck
January 18, 201411 yr Why does the Lancaster bypass jump into my head upon reading this. Lancaster? Or Portsmouth? "In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage." -- John Steinbeck
January 23, 201411 yr The U.S. government keeps predicting we’ll drive more than we actually do Vehicle miles traveled, forecasts vs. actual: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2014/01/22/the-u-s-government-keeps-predicting-well-drive-more-than-we-do-thats-a-problem/
August 27, 201410 yr :whip:What if roads were run by private-sector like rail infrastructure? The results aren't anywhere as good: http://blog.mysanantonio.com/terrihall/2014/06/the-real-story-behind-cintra-teetering-on-edge-of-bankruptcy-on-sh-130/ http://www.ibj.com/indiana-toll-road-operator-facing-debt-woes/PARAMS/article/48208 "In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage." -- John Steinbeck
September 16, 201410 yr Private sector (even partially in this case) don't seem to work well. Yet we continue to demand that the rails be uniquely free enterprise from the dirt they set on to the GPS-based dispatching systems....... Indiana Toll Road operator weighs bankruptcy, sale September 12, 2014 3:30 pm • Joseph S. Pete [email protected], (219) 933-3316 The Indiana Toll Road operators are looking at filing for bankruptcy to get out from under $6 billion in debt and selling the right to operate the road, according to media reports. Citing anonymous sources, the Wall Street Journal reported the road's operators, Spain's Cintra and Australia's Macquarie Group Ltd., have reached an agreement with their largest creditors to restructure debt in bankruptcy court and to sell a new party the rights to operate the road under the remainder of a $3.8 billion, 75-year lease. The Indiana Toll Road Concession Co. would file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, which involves the reorganization of debt and not liquidation, sell the right to operate the road, and funnel most of the sales proceeds to secured creditors, which are mostly hedge funds. READ MORE AT: http://www.nwitimes.com/business/local/indiana-toll-road-operator-weighs-bankruptcy-sale/article_a0ddecd7-ce7a-5449-88a1-2baf0f7e1f76.html "In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage." -- John Steinbeck
September 16, 201410 yr I can certainly see how a privately operated toll road is at a disadvantage when surrounded by highly subsidized "free" roads. Rail of course has the same problem. There's two ways to deal with a situation like this. Add subsidies for the travel modes that have been put at a disadvantage, or remove the subsidies for the mode that's being given an unfair advantage. Generally we as a country have only done the former, which helps a little bit to level the playing field, but which continues to distort the market for transportation as a whole. Few seem to be advocating for the latter with any seriousness (it's a total blind spot of cognitive dissonance for the libertarian/tea party types), with the exception of Chuck at Strong Towns http://www.strongtowns.org/journal There's also a very relevant analysis of the subsidy situation at http://urbankchoze.blogspot.com/2014/09/are-transit-subsidies-justified.html
December 4, 201410 yr And they call mass transit social engineering?? "A modern highway system would extend a city's commuting radius 6 times." —Norman Bel Geddes, Futurama, 1939 "In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage." -- John Steinbeck
December 4, 201410 yr And they call mass transit social engineering?? "A modern highway system would extend a city's commuting radius 6 times." —Norman Bel Geddes, Futurama, 1939 ...and all you have to do is spend 20% of your life trapped behind the wheel of a car!
January 30, 201510 yr Study: Roadways don’t yield sufficient gas tax revenue to cover upkeep costs By Ashley Halsey III January 28, 2015 Understanding the traffic congestion that smothers Washington and most major cities is a simple numbers game: Since 1960, the U.S. population has grown by 135 million and the number of motor vehicles on roads has increased by 179 million, traveling almost 2.2 trillion miles farther. Yet the network of roads to handle those burgeoning numbers grew by just 15 percent during those 55 years. Already lagging behind the demand, and with hundreds of thousands of miles in need of repair, the roads will be asked to absorb a population expected to swell by an additional 100 million in the next 50 years. “Highways are incredibly important, but we have spent decades trying to solve every mobility need with big roads, and it hasn’t worked,” said Kevin DeGood of the Center for American Progress (CAP). “What we need is a system that provides people with real choice.” DeGood co-wrote a report, released Wednesday, that challenges the status quo in transportation thinking and debunks the belief that highways can pay for themselves while public transit cannot. MORE: http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/trafficandcommuting/study-roadways-dont-yield-sufficient-gas-tax-revenue-to-cover-upkeep-costs/2015/01/28/c9c0a92e-a585-11e4-a7c2-03d37af98440_story.html "In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage." -- John Steinbeck
March 20, 201510 yr What happens when you privatize a road? Most do poorly financially or even go bankrupt. And it doesn't help when the executives of a bankrupt road company take $25 million bonuses.... Bankrupt Toll Road operator's executives to share $2.5M bonus once purchase deal closes Published March 18, 2015 Associated Press MUNSTER, IND. – Top executives from the bankrupt operator of the Indiana Toll Road will split $2.45 million in bonuses once an Australian company closes on a $5.72 billion deal to buy the lease-holding business. ITR Concession Co. CEO Fernando Redondo and four other company executives will share the bonus money when IFM Investors completes its purchase of the company, The (Munster) Times reported (http://bit.ly/1FBEs1O ). That deal is expected to close within months. ITR Concession will use the $5.72 billion to pay off its creditors. MORE: http://www.foxbusiness.com/markets/2015/03/18/bankrupt-toll-road-operator-executives-to-share-25m-bonus-once-purchase-deal/ "In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage." -- John Steinbeck
August 21, 20159 yr "In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage." -- John Steinbeck
November 13, 20159 yr Asphalt Socialist -- love it! City Observatory @CityObs 17h17 hours ago When it comes to driving, everyone's a socialist! http://cityobservatory.org/a-helicopter-drop-for-the-asphalt-socialists/ "In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage." -- John Steinbeck
March 3, 20169 yr Should failed private-sector roadways be abandoned, torn up and turned into bike paths like failed railroad routes? Aman Batheja @amanbatheja texastribune.org 47m47 minutes ago Big news: Private Texas toll road SH130 has filed for bankruptcy. Story coming. #txlege "In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage." -- John Steinbeck
April 8, 20169 yr "In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage." -- John Steinbeck
May 6, 20169 yr Private railroads pay property tax on their right of way. The owner of the highways and roads do not pay property tax, but instead pull property tax money out of people who live in the same country, state, county, municipality, (and thin air) to cover expenses. Amtrak doesn't pay property tax on its stations and amtrak-owned rail, but the majority of routes are run shared over freight track, which is taxed, and I'm assuming that freight lines then factor their costs into whatever they toll Amtrak for crossing through. What happens when cities privatize their toll roads, does the toll operator pay property tax on all of their highway? For a back-of-the-envelope calculation, anyone want to count up how many acres of land ODOT owns for highways, and then also local roads, and then pick a rate to charge them? If highways paid property tax, I'm pretty sure that would keep them out of downtowns. It would probably also encourage just slowing down to make an interchange, as opposed to humongous "cement mixer" / cloverleaf / figure 8 / fly-over-under-in-and-out. Some highway entrances/exits in Los Angeles remind me of this. They were designed prior to "modern" guidelines, and you've got to go 0-60 in the blink of an eye to merge on. (Probably the sole impetus behind Tesla's ludicrous mode). I also wonder if any NIMBY movements we able to galvanize their opposition, claiming hey, put this highway in the edge of that district, so we don't lose out on future property tax revenue. Lastly, what-if, a city had a super road diet, shrank the number of lanes, and then gave the store-fronts more space in front of their property (i.e. room enough for outdoor seating). They could then charge property tax on that land?
September 12, 20168 yr US cities were densely developed by pre-New Deal capitalism until automakers/big oil began a campaign to encourage government-funded sprawl and more car ownership & driving. Shell and GM hired modernist Norman Bel Geddes to plan the postwar city of tomorrow. And read the quote of Studebaker's Paul Hoffman: http://tinyurl.com/j4hlg9l "In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage." -- John Steinbeck
June 29, 20177 yr Highways sliced through cities in the 50s and 60s, demolishing and isolating entire neighborhoods. Here's why: https://t.co/sKHOEdK7r1 "In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage." -- John Steinbeck
July 20, 20177 yr Why Americans drive too much from @LitmanVTPI. It's the bottom 2 (or 3 depending on your perspective) that are the problem https://t.co/8q9OcsZqNP "In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage." -- John Steinbeck
July 20, 20177 yr Highways sliced through cities in the 50s and 60s, demolishing and isolating entire neighborhoods. Here's why: https://t.co/sKHOEdK7r1 I have read articles about this topic for years. Another interesting tidbit along this topic is that post WWll with the interstate highway system, and the creation of the suburb it made the USA much less ethnic. Poles, Irish, Italians, Greeks etc all had their own hoods (depending on the city). With the suburbs people clustered around economic/income status, not country of origin or religion.....not nearly as much. My Mom grew up in Northside/Cincy. For the Catholics the Germans went to St. Boniface and the Irish St. Patricks. Seems silly today. Suburban flight was going to happen but it required a perfect storm, ending of WWll, infrastructure going to the burbs, a good economy, affordable autos. It really was not "White Flight". Black Americans move to the burbs as soon as they can, and most do today. Ironically Black Americans are getting pushed out of places like SF, Oakland, DC, NYC, LA. Heck look at OTR. The mass gentrification movement of urban America always has some controversy attached to it, nonetheless virtually anyone can participate in it and sometimes you do not need a lot of money, sometimes you do. Regarding the urban hoods getting demoed for interstates, that happened to all kinds of hoods. If you are going to get married and have kids most couples want to be able to stretch their legs and have a yard, sometimes you can do that in the city but often a nice suburb is the best place. I think what is happening now is that the older suburban ring is looking pretty shaky or dicey. Some of those homes and streets are looking pretty bad. When I was in HS I lived in a burb called Devonshire in NE Indianapolis. It was really nice. Over the past 10 years, when I go back, a lot of the homes there are in bad shape, lawns look like crap. Everyone moved north to Fishers.
July 20, 20177 yr You conveniently left out the fact that during the post war white flight, African Americans could not get FHA loans.
July 20, 20177 yr You conveniently left out the fact that during the post war white flight, African Americans could not get FHA loans. And you forgot to mention red lining in lending. :roll:
January 24, 20187 yr Highways were meant to connect American cities, but in some glaring cases, they also cut right through them – splitting apart neighborhoods and communities. https://t.co/sfzuQOcz0J "In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage." -- John Steinbeck
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