4 ms·

But it's not nearly as profitable…

• atoav 4y ago
  Profitable. For whom? For the municipiality a 6 lane street vs a two lane street with public transport and bicycle lanes can make the difference between neverending debt and prosperity. Places with good public transport and bicycle infrastructure and denser mixed use pay more tax revenue. Spread out urban sprawls and suburbs give the municipiality a lot of street surface to maintain, for very little tax revenue in return. A good introduction on that part is the strong towns playlist by the youtube channel Not Just Bikes: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=y_SXXTBypIg https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=y_SXXTBypIg
  • LtWorf 4y ago
    Municipalities are generally managed to dry the funds in favour of the friends of whomever is in power. Usually such considerations come last. For example in Italy many municipalities removed public transport so that FIAT could sell cars. And USA is at least just as corrupt.
    • atoav 4y ago
      > Municipalities are generally managed to dry the funds in favour of the friends of whomever is in power. Usually such considerations come last. I think you should strike the word generally here. Even in Italy there are many municipialities with great public transport (grew up not far from the Italian border). In Europe it is generally not rare to have municipialities with nice or even exceptional public infrastructure. Corruption is always a thing that can exist, but if your place becomes dysfunctional for it, maybe consider your might be missing some of the core ingredients that lead to good democratic decisions (education, will by common folk to participate in regional politics, a working system of law that works against corruption, etc.)
  • ClumsyPilot 4y ago
    well you see when the municipality is doing well, we don't call it profit, so you can't win the game by definition.