4 ms·

Car infrastructure is far, far too expensive. The U.S is already deep under water in its maintenance, and as this problem continues to be ignored, the lower the

by occz 5y ago

Car infrastructure is far, far too expensive. The U.S is already deep under water in its maintenance, and as this problem continues to be ignored, the lower the viability of cars will be. It's actually pretty interesting to see people on the economic right being so staunchly in favor of this incredibly socialized waste of money - it's a testament to the marketing and lobbying efforts by the car industry for sure.

cinntaile 5y ago
This depends on the region. In the EU some countries have such high gas taxes that the infrastructure could be entirely paid for, maintained and there would still be money left. In practice that money isn't earmarked for road infrastructure though. But the end user could in theory pay for it all, so that it's not socialized to everyone. It's also possible that there are tax reductions for driving a car or tanking fuel, so it's definitely not the whole picture and this would need to be accounted for.
seer 5y ago
Hah I still remember watching one of the TopGear specials in Africa, and them comparing domestic roads (pothole ridden) to ones made by chinese apparently “uk quality”. Looking at that “shitty african road” I was like “hey thats a normal second grade road in Eastern Europe where I live. Moral of the story - cars are tough and can handle much (much) worse roads that US and eastern europe think of “normal” roads. I prefer cycling myself and don’t really like cars, but “failing US road infra” just sounds so naïve…
- mschuster91 5y ago
  > Moral of the story - cars are tough and can handle much (much) worse roads that US and eastern europe think of “normal” roads. And here we come to the old saying of "poverty is expensive". A modern, well made and maintained asphalt road is no issue for a modern car, it will require its usual scheduled maintenance and that's it. But put the same modern car on a poor or dirt road and the maintenance expense for the car will explode: tires, springs, O-rings and other seals, rust, the list goes on and on. Pot-hole repairs in particular can get really expensive.
  - alamortsubite 5y ago
    Somewhat ironically, this sounds like the perfect application of the American conservative political strategy of "starving the beast."
  - jabl 5y ago
    I recall some story about the 90'ies after the fall of the Soviet Union when all the mobsters got loaded and bought fancy German sport cars, which promptly broke down due to the poor state of the roads. Whereas the local simple but rugged cars continued working just fine.
elzbardico 5y ago
Don't you americans have taxes on vehicle ownership and fuel? Toll Roads? That's how a lot of countries pay for their roads.
- jabl 5y ago
  Americans seems to abhor car/fuel/etc. taxes to the point that they vote out any politician who dares suggesting anything even approximating that, and as a result they have a huge infrastructure maintenance backlog waiting to pop. Not helped by the fact that suburban sprawl is incredibly expensive to maintain (per the tax revenue the municipality gets) compared to more densely built environments. The "Not Just Bikes" youtube channel has a series of videos on the strongtowns, uh, thingy, that goes into more details. In particular this one describes the financing of suburban infrastructure: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7IsMeKl-Sv0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7IsMeKl-Sv0

by occz 5y ago

cinntaile 5y ago

This depends on the region. In the EU some countries have such high gas taxes that the infrastructure could be entirely paid for, maintained and there would still be money left. In practice that money isn't earmarked for road infrastructure though. But the end user could in theory pay for it all, so that it's not socialized to everyone. It's also possible that there are tax reductions for driving a car or tanking fuel, so it's definitely not the whole picture and this would need to be accounted for.

seer 5y ago

Hah I still remember watching one of the TopGear specials in Africa, and them comparing domestic roads (pothole ridden) to ones made by chinese apparently “uk quality”. Looking at that “shitty african road” I was like “hey thats a normal second grade road in Eastern Europe where I live. Moral of the story - cars are tough and can handle much (much) worse roads that US and eastern europe think of “normal” roads. I prefer cycling myself and don’t really like cars, but “failing US road infra” just sounds so naïve…

mschuster91 5y ago
> Moral of the story - cars are tough and can handle much (much) worse roads that US and eastern europe think of “normal” roads. And here we come to the old saying of "poverty is expensive". A modern, well made and maintained asphalt road is no issue for a modern car, it will require its usual scheduled maintenance and that's it. But put the same modern car on a poor or dirt road and the maintenance expense for the car will explode: tires, springs, O-rings and other seals, rust, the list goes on and on. Pot-hole repairs in particular can get really expensive.
- alamortsubite 5y ago
  Somewhat ironically, this sounds like the perfect application of the American conservative political strategy of "starving the beast."
- jabl 5y ago
  I recall some story about the 90'ies after the fall of the Soviet Union when all the mobsters got loaded and bought fancy German sport cars, which promptly broke down due to the poor state of the roads. Whereas the local simple but rugged cars continued working just fine.

elzbardico 5y ago

Don't you americans have taxes on vehicle ownership and fuel? Toll Roads? That's how a lot of countries pay for their roads.

jabl 5y ago
Americans seems to abhor car/fuel/etc. taxes to the point that they vote out any politician who dares suggesting anything even approximating that, and as a result they have a huge infrastructure maintenance backlog waiting to pop. Not helped by the fact that suburban sprawl is incredibly expensive to maintain (per the tax revenue the municipality gets) compared to more densely built environments. The "Not Just Bikes" youtube channel has a series of videos on the strongtowns, uh, thingy, that goes into more details. In particular this one describes the financing of suburban infrastructure: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7IsMeKl-Sv0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7IsMeKl-Sv0