4 ms·

its not like the reverse problem doesn't exist. Environmentalists and policymakers shy away from obviously good policies because they're too capitalist or dont

its not like the reverse problem doesn't exist. Environmentalists and policymakers shy away from obviously good policies because they're too capitalist or dont let them have political controls (carbon auctions a la SOX or NOX auctions, privatized transport like hong kong, singapore, tokyo come to mind)

epistasis 2y ago
> Environmentalists and policymakers shy away from obviously good policies because they're too capitalist or dont let them have political controls Those sorts of argumets are definitely made at the fringes, but they definitely are not the voices of policymakers, and rarely if ever make it into final policy, fortunately. The extreme leftists hate Democrats for it. See for example, this popular leftist Carl Beijer's view of trying to work with Democrats: https://www.carlbeijer.com/p/political-allies-dont-have-to-like https://www.carlbeijer.com/p/political-allies-dont-have-to-l... They can barely bring themselves to work with liberals, but try to at times.
- throwawaymaths 2y ago
  how many us cities have public transport that is run by a private entity?
  - epistasis 2y ago
    SF had private shuttles for mass transit a few years ago! I'm not sure if it was a pandemic casualty or something else made them go away. And to this day large employers in the Bay Area run private shuttles for their employees, to get around the terrible balkanization of transit systems in the US. I would definitely like to see more. But the biggest impediment to that are the cultural and legal status quo of car-dependent urban design, which mightily resists change. At the state and local levels I'm advocating for massive change to planning laws to make density possible, which makes mass transit possible, but it's a long slog and slow and not making much progress.
    - throwawaymaths 2y ago
      neither of those is public transit though. For example of well-run systems with inecntive structures aligned with the public interest see ComfortDelGro or MRT
      - vlovich123 2y ago
        From Wikipedia about MRT: > making the network one of the world's costliest on both a per-kilometre and absolute basis. The system is managed in conformity with a semi-nationalised hybrid regulatory framework; construction and procurement fall under the purview of the Land Transport Authority (LTA), a statutory board of the government that allocates operating concessions to the for-profit private corporations SMRT and SBS Transit. These operators are responsible for asset maintenance on their respective lines, and also run bus services, facilitating operational synchronicity and the horizontal integration of the broader public transportation network. Privatization doesn’t work for infrastructure that has no competition. That’s why the cheapest broadband is when the city runs and maintains the fiber & companies pay for access to the customer base.
        throwawaymaths 2y ago
        MRT was only nationalized recently. and even so it competes with comfortdelgro. The ~only parts that are not privatized are land acquisition and expansion. That makes sense. Like if you haven't been to singapore (or Tokyo or Hong Kong) you just don't understand how different public transit is, and you don't understand the scheme behind how it's privatized, and why that creates alignment between the commuter and the company (and how the US fails to do this in every city), then you should go there and see for yourself.
  - anarticle 2y ago
    Philly is one

epistasis 2y ago

> Environmentalists and policymakers shy away from obviously good policies because they're too capitalist or dont let them have political controls Those sorts of argumets are definitely made at the fringes, but they definitely are not the voices of policymakers, and rarely if ever make it into final policy, fortunately. The extreme leftists hate Democrats for it. See for example, this popular leftist Carl Beijer's view of trying to work with Democrats: https://www.carlbeijer.com/p/political-allies-dont-have-to-like https://www.carlbeijer.com/p/political-allies-dont-have-to-l... They can barely bring themselves to work with liberals, but try to at times.

throwawaymaths 2y ago
how many us cities have public transport that is run by a private entity?
- epistasis 2y ago
  SF had private shuttles for mass transit a few years ago! I'm not sure if it was a pandemic casualty or something else made them go away. And to this day large employers in the Bay Area run private shuttles for their employees, to get around the terrible balkanization of transit systems in the US. I would definitely like to see more. But the biggest impediment to that are the cultural and legal status quo of car-dependent urban design, which mightily resists change. At the state and local levels I'm advocating for massive change to planning laws to make density possible, which makes mass transit possible, but it's a long slog and slow and not making much progress.
  - throwawaymaths 2y ago
    neither of those is public transit though. For example of well-run systems with inecntive structures aligned with the public interest see ComfortDelGro or MRT
    - vlovich123 2y ago
      From Wikipedia about MRT: > making the network one of the world's costliest on both a per-kilometre and absolute basis. The system is managed in conformity with a semi-nationalised hybrid regulatory framework; construction and procurement fall under the purview of the Land Transport Authority (LTA), a statutory board of the government that allocates operating concessions to the for-profit private corporations SMRT and SBS Transit. These operators are responsible for asset maintenance on their respective lines, and also run bus services, facilitating operational synchronicity and the horizontal integration of the broader public transportation network. Privatization doesn’t work for infrastructure that has no competition. That’s why the cheapest broadband is when the city runs and maintains the fiber & companies pay for access to the customer base.
      - throwawaymaths 2y ago
        MRT was only nationalized recently. and even so it competes with comfortdelgro. The ~only parts that are not privatized are land acquisition and expansion. That makes sense. Like if you haven't been to singapore (or Tokyo or Hong Kong) you just don't understand how different public transit is, and you don't understand the scheme behind how it's privatized, and why that creates alignment between the commuter and the company (and how the US fails to do this in every city), then you should go there and see for yourself.
- anarticle 2y ago
  Philly is one