I-35 Bridge Collapse: New Orleans II Conservative Economics in Action.

You might be right, however you might also be horribly wrong. When you build a product that has extremely high fixed costs and little to no marginal costs, (a bridge is almost a textbook example) that is where the exercise of monopoly power would be an issue. So you could have 120 k toll takers instead of 60 k toll takers.

 

Or let the state governments handle it. Reduce the highway commission down to an advisory board. Get rid of (or significantly reduce) the federal fuel surcharge and let the states' set their fuel taxes where they need them.

 

For purely control reasons, if the federal government does this, they lose almost all leverage over the states. The only reason uniform federal mandates on the states exist is because of highway funding and the threat of removing it from states.

So nope, it'll never happen.

 

Except the interstate highway system is just about the one thing that the federal government has done that is unreservedly a success, and was instrumental in the economic development of the country.

I believe that doing what you suggest would be an unmitigated disaster. I appreciate and understand the idea to reduce federal government and give options at the state level, but no solution is correct for every answer, and I think you are trying to fit a square peg into a round hole by applying that idea here. And the easy flow of goods between various states is a federal concern.

If you want to see the difference between the federal highways and state, drive to Dallas on 45 and zip over to Kilgore and come back on 259/59. I find it hard for someone to argue that they find 59 to be a more efficient transport corridor.

 

But it's up to the STATE to inspect and state that the bridge is in need of fixing. They did not do that. They did not request money. They did not even know that the bridge needed to be repaired this decade.

 

I would put TXDOT miles ahead of Federal Highway ADmin- in technical know how on road and bridge construction. The State of Texas is extremely efficient in managing state projects-with very little waste. The only highway contractors in Texas that make any money are very large ones like Zachry, Williams Bros and Webber -and for them only on very large projects-small margins. The State of Texas is currrently using very sophisticated scheduling programs to track progress- like Primavera.

My point is that the State can design, manage and build it efficiently if it has the funding.

There is a railroad overpass that was built near my house that is a real waste of money - more than 8 mil. I do not have a solution on resource allocation, but this one was stupid.

There was recently another study on cost of building a high bridge and causeway over Galveston Bay to connect Bolivar penisula to Galveston- would be nice for access to and from Galveston. The cost is prohibitive-due to the long distance and span height needed at the shipping lane. I really do not see this being built due to cost, but there has to be some consideration for hurricane evacuation. These decisions would be easier if you could take the human factor out, but you cannot.

The bridge collapse in Minnesota should never have happened-but it did. There are many measures like cathodic protection to protect the integrity of steel bridges. There is technology available to do sophisticated metalurgical analysis of steel to determine it's integrity.

The technology is there, but I do not know about funding. I would rather have TXDOT spend my money than Fed Highway Admin.

 

I truly don't know on the managerial level so I will take your word for it.

But if the federal government hadn't gotten involved in the construction of roads there would be no interstate highway system, just a bunch of states cobbled together poorly.

It would be analogous to 'The Problem of the Commons' in that people wouldn't devote resources to projects that would benefit outside their own states. Roads between, say, Austin and Dallas would be great, but roads from Houston to Shreveport? or the path from Chicago to Pittsburg? or the 45 coridor which connects Mexico to the greater US through Texas? These are truly vital economic pipelines and without a central plan would be disjointed and haphazard.

For comparison, look at Russia where roads between the different oblasts all are dirt and mud:





Without a structure planed on a national, collective level the US economy would be much worse than it is now. People don't appreciate what a vital thing the Interstate Highway System is to the economy of the USA.

 

I really respect your perspective-I just do not have much confidence in the Federal government doing things efficiently. Yes they did build the interstate highway system-it is vital to the economy. There has never been as large a construction effort. It is heavily over -utilized and costs tremendous resources to maintain.

The federal government also created NASA and flew to the moon. Outstanding achievement. You cannot put a price on that.

This nation has limited resources to maintain very expensive capital projects like bridges. The amount of political trade offs to get funding is much more than I know.

We agree-I just think the state can make a dollar go farther......

 

How about sometimes accidents just happen? Its not a perfect utopian world.
And I sure don't the federal government trying to solve all the problems. The roads are supposed to be managed by the state they are in. Its a terrible accident that happened no doubt but lets not try to make any more out of it then that.

If you want to talk about money the whole damn system is broken. There is more money then they know what to do with but no accountability for where it goes. They can't seem to cut costs only add to them. Taxes keep going up every year at all levels and all I hear politicians trying to sell us is how we need more government programs like health care. This approach form politicians is certainly not in the best interest of the country and will eventually lead us to a total collapse financially as the funds are not infinite. The majority of them are guilty of this regardless of political offilation. There are a few good ones left out there but not many.

 

Fortunately - IMHO it is feasible to inspect, maintain, and plan for needed new bridges and roads. We have the know how to do this. IMHO- health care and human issues are much morre complex. I will assure you that TXDOT - Texas Highway projects do not waste much money. What the Federal system lacks is an efficient way to distribute the resources.

 

BTW... Love your sig. Never heard that quote before.

 

You are correct. To use Texas as an example, historically, the Texas Highway Department managed the state's highway system, determined road and bridge improvements, new road construction, new bridge construction, did surveying, inspected the various components of the system, and took bids on particular projects. If they weren't built on time and within budget, that firm would have a tough time getting new contracts. In theory, anyway. (we know the power of campaign contributions and lobbyists... Brown and Root, before it destroyed itself with the South Texas Nuke Project, didn't get to be one of the world's largest contruction companies simply because they did good work, which they did, BTW, more often than not) The infrastructure was built by state gas tax dollars, as well as Federal money. (our tax dollars coming back to Texas... less than the amount that left the state, BTW) The system was managed by TexDot.

That is not what we should be talking about here when we refer to privatization. (and I don't think you are) That would be selling a planned state road and bridge project to a large corporation, who promises to build it for X number of dollars, within a certain time frame, and then has the franchise to levy tolls for travel on the project. This is NOT how Texas traditionally constructed it's great highway system. By giving foreign companies 50 years to collect tolls, with little restriction on the tolls levied, in return for building the roads, the state is in effect taxing Texans twice. Once, with the gas tax, as inadequate as it is, and again by allowing tolls for profit to go to giant corporations, in this particular case, in Texas, to a huge European company. They are only interested because they see this as a cash cow for decades. And the only reason they are getting this cash cow is because of contributions to Perry and company. It is a corrupt system, to say the least.

Privatization of traditional state functions (not the highway system) has been a disaster. As you pointed out, highway and bridge building is not where the privatization controversy exists, except in cases like the one I pointed out, where toll roads, if they must be built, are not being built and managed under the aegis of TexDot, but by huge foreign companies looking to have highly profitable monopolies, for several decades, of traditional state services.


D&D. Impeach Bush and Cheney.

 

Bingo

Rocket River

 

Lack of money wasn't the problem. How they budgeted the money they had was the problem.

 

The Roman Arch.......we should never abandon the Roman Arch.

DD

 

Unfortunately, I could see us spending $1.6 trillion to fix roads, and then having someone else complain that we're not spending it to fix health care, welfare, social security....Maybe politicians need to be more honest about what things cost. If I borrowed $20,000 for a Cougar High diploma, I can definitely part with the $10,000-15,000(?) in taxes to not die on a freaking overpass.

 

Actually the FEDS conducted many of the inspections.

 

Just to follow on my previous point.
Most of the inspections where conducted by the Feds
http://minnesota.publicradio.org/display/web/2007/08/02/bridgehistory/?rsssource=1

And while they did rate in structurally deficient they didn't recommend replacement or major repairs at the time. I will completely agree that the Minnesota State government deserves a lot of blame and I have some particular ire towards the Pawlenty Admin. especially Carol Molnau the Lt Governor and head of MNDOT. That given though the Fed. isn't blameless in this matter either and given the nature of our Interstate highway system it is impossible to say that the Fed. has no role in the management and maintenance of that system.

 

There might be something to that. The Stone Arch bridge nearby the 35W Bridge has lasted more than a 100 years.

 

Of course, MSNBC reported that Minnesota Gov. Jim Pawlenty had the bridge inspected in 2005 and 2006. The inspectors stated that there was no structural problem with the bridge, and it would need to be replaceds in 2020 or beyond.

So...who do we believe?

Minnesota Governor talks to MSNBC on day of the tragedy.