Crumbling Infrastructure....GOP - War or roads? - war.

[LeftHander]

Not like no one knew that bridges will start collasping....

A section of the Hoan Bridge in Milwaukee collapsed a few years ago. And the Marquette interchange HAD to be replaced as chUnks of concrete were falling off the 7 story spaghetti viaducts at the i45 and i94 intersection downtown.

http://www2.jsonline.com/news/metro/dec00/hoanarc.asp

http://www2.jsonline.com/news/metro/dec00/hoan17121600a.asp

Lets face it had we not been spending BILLIONS of dollars in Iraq that money would of been going to other projects long ago.

This administration and the GOP has turned its back on this nation choosing to spend hundreds of billions on a war in Iraq and trillions of dollars on defense. All the while we commute to jobs on bridges and roads that are on the verge of collapse.


http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/7137552/

We get a "D" in infrastructure.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2005-03-09-infrastructure_x.htm

In 2005 we slipped from D-plus to a D

"The report said $1.6 trillion should be spent over the next five years to alleviate potential problems with the nation's infrastructure. Transportation alone requires $94 billion in annual spending, the report said.

The House is to begin debate Wednesday on a six-year, $284 billion highway and mass transit bill, which stalled last year in a money dispute between the White House and Congress."

June 17

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Global_Economy/IF19Dj01.html

"Patch and Pray"

Snip fromm above -

"Last month, the Urban Institute and Ernst & Young LLP released a report, "Infrastructure 2007: A Global Perspective", stressing that the US has an emerging crisis in mobility that unless addressed will undermine the country's ability to compete internationally. In particular, there is a broad disrepair of transit, power and water systems. The study echoes an earlier American Society of Civil Engineers report in 2005 that graded as "poor" the condition of the United States' transit infrastructure as well as power grids, dams and systems for drinking water and wastewater.

US infrastructure policy is often described as "patch and pray". Accordingly, the country confronts an estimated US$1.6 trillion deficit in needed infrastructure spending through 2010 for repairs and maintenance. There is a real concern that inaction could lead to disasters on the scale of the levee failures during Hurricane Katrina, which left a major city flooded.

Among the big-money items are the $12-billion-to-$14.5-billion replacement of the Tappan Zee Bridge north of New York City and $6 billion of upgrading required to take Chicago's subways into good repair. On a nationwide basis, transportation alone is estimated to need $94 billion in annual spending, but receives only $59 billion.

Why has US infrastructure fallen into the current state of disrepair? The two key reasons are politics and an automobile-dependent society.

As to the first, there is a lack of political will due to a fear of raising taxes. No US politician wants to face the public wrath of daring to raise taxes. This mentality is evident in the reluctance to raise the federal gasoline tax, which threatens the viability of the Highway Trust Fund. According to the Urban Institute report, the lack of new funds could push the Highway Trust Fund into insolvency by 2009 and create a "train wreck" for funding improvements to the interstate highway network."

[sinkingfeeling]

1. First words out of my mouth when I heard about the I35 bridge... "we'd rather waster

hundreds of billions of dollars on the fake 'war' in Iraq than fix our own infrastructure."

[Ilsa]

2. Great post! K&R. What scared me was that 27% of bridges need

replacing or significant structural work/repairs. The number was 32% of bridges in rural areas, or did they say urban? Either way, it is really scary. Every time we go over an older bridge I think about it.

The Harbor Bridge in Corpus Christi Texas is very old, and if it collapsed, they would fall alot about 240 feet, and harbor traffic, including alot of petrochemical traffic of oil into refineries, would be affected (5% of nation's total, 67% of DFW's jet fuel). That harbor also ships out alot of vehicles and equipment from Fort Hood to military overseas (I've seen the yard stacked with vehicles painted tan).

Here's a website on the Port of Corpus Christi: http://gulliver.trb.org/conferences/2001SummerPorts/Session3Brogan.pdf
Can you imagine the economic effect on other ports that are alot larger if this happened to them?

[Supersedeas]

3. same issue was broached when the Powergrid was exposed; and then the floods

[Stalwart]

4. Blowback is Building