
A Texas-Sized Pavement Problem - oftenwrong
https://www.strongtowns.org/journal/2018/9/27/a-texas-sized-pavement-problem
======
komali2
>Collin County has traffic problems. Collin County's traffic problems are a
function of its land-use pattern—which spreads development extremely thin on
the landscape, and segregates uses, ensuring that people have to make lengthy
motor vehicle trips to accomplish pretty much every one of their day to day
needs.

The offered solution:

>For automobile flooding (congestion), the only way to deal with it and still
have a successful economy is to address it at the source. We need to absorb
those trips locally before they become a flood. Instead of building lanes, we
need to be building corner stores.

I'm thinking hard about this article - I'm an ex-Houstonian. I can't go back.
They worship the vehicle. They _brag_ about their hour+ commutes one way. It's
been wrapped up in machismo Texan pride. Because, inevitably when you bring up
how much it sucks that no matter _what_ we want to do, we've got a 20 minute
drive ahead of us at least, instantly everyone's anti-tax hackles are raised.
"Socialism" is on everyone's lips, you're getting suspicious glances.

So hell yea brutha, we drivin! At least we don't have state income tax or
zoning laws like those stupid Californians, just look at all the good that did
them! /s

If Strongtowns can find a way to start convincing Texans that cornerstores
(which sounds to me like, need zoning) can be built without increasing taxes,
I bet they could make the pitch. I remember as a real young kind in Green Bay,
WI and then Charleston, SC, we could ride our bikes around and go places. I
remember as a slightly older kid in Houston being tremendously bored on my
friend's couch, suggesting we bike somewhere, and then realizing we had
nowhere we could go. It was nothing but miles of suburbia encased in
impassable freeways. Life got fun again at 16 when I finally got a car.

~~~
nikhizzle
Out of curiosity, why do Texans dislike state income tax, but subject
themselves to 2% property tax? This was one of my family's reasons to choose
against moving there.

~~~
claydavisss
This tax structure simultaneously keeps housing cheap while putting more money
in the hands of workers.

~~~
xellisx
"Cheap"? Housing pricing in most of Texas have gone crazy in the last couple
years. I'm paying 2x more in property tax than I was 2 years ago because of
the "boom".

------
apo
I'm a fan of this blog and the way it develops the simple idea of the Growth
Ponzi Scheme, which is sucking the life out of towns everywhere in the US.

[https://www.strongtowns.org/the-growth-ponzi-
scheme/](https://www.strongtowns.org/the-growth-ponzi-scheme/)

I also like the way this post breaks down the numbers. for example:

 _Okay. So we 're talking about an amount [to be spend on roads] equivalent to
more than the county's entire budget right now, and a really sizable fraction
even if we add cities (which provide more services than the county itself, and
which are responsible for maintaining local streets) into the mix. _

For myself and other visual learners, it would be very helpful to see these
numbers presented graphically. Graphs for other data are presented in the
article, but not the numbers I reference above that clearly paint a picture of
program that will end in tears.

------
larrydag
I lived in Collin County for almost 20 years. I've seen the suburban sprawl
explode. I like the explanation brought forth in this article but I think its
much more complex than investing locally. There are so many reasons why people
choose their home, job, and transportation.

In my opinion the best way to change behavior is to make an incentive for that
behavior. Reduce taxes on urban areas and housing. Unregulate businesses that
promote local economy. Make small businesses more favorable instead of giving
large exemptions to big corporations.

Perhaps the biggest thing you can do is to participate in the local government
and municipalities. Find out who and what is driving the local economy and
make reasoned recommendations for change.

~~~
kodablah
> There are so many reasons why people choose their home, job, and
> transportation [...] best way to change [...] make reasoned recommendations
> for change

What if the citizenry is happy and doesn't want change? This option never
seems to appear in suburban sprawl discussions because so many of the
discussors think clearly it's not wanted.

I think, especially compared to others, the county's situation is ideal for
most.

~~~
lotsofpulp
Because after the initial debt laden spending spree results in happiness, once
the bills for upkeep and debt service come due at the same time, the cuts in
quality of life will then result in unhappiness. And now you have a bunch of
wasted resources with not enough people to support them, and it causes more
pollution.

But it’s not reasonable to expect people to not be short sighted. If people
really want the future to be gated insular communities like in TX and FL, then
I guess that’s what they deserve, but I’ve been to Africa and India and Brazil
and the visual class divide it shows is unappealing to me.

~~~
kodablah
This has not been my experience, as I've seen many-decade old suburbs continue
to thrive thanks to not being so short-sighted to promote extreme density. The
ability to continually rebuild/improve with continual turnover is a great
benefit compared to often decaying urban sectors missing replenishment.

~~~
Pulcinella
The Texas model has been to keep growing to the point where the old suburbs
are now practically just part of their city.

Richardson (home of Texas Instruments) is literally* just another part of
downtown Dallas now. In another decade, Oklahoma City will just be the newest
suburb of Dallas.

*not literally. Though also not entirely a joke.

------
epakai
What is the counterpoint to this argument? I feel like I'm only getting half
an explanation here.

It's apparent from looking up Charles Marohn that he's contributing to a lot
of pieces on the web to push this idea, but I don't buy that infrastructure
expansion is a straight up ponzi scheme.

~~~
ip26
I think there isn't usually a _direct_ counterargument to be found. One of
ST's core points is, hey, you're deluding yourself because you're not
accounting for eventual repair costs of all the infrastructure you've already
got. There is either no reply- because, heads in the sand- or the reply is
that all the new people who will move there and the growth of the tax base
will make it affordable. Which, while not _exactly_ a classic ponzi scheme,
pretty much resembles one.

It's really common, the whole "ignore future repair costs" thing. I lived in
an HOA a few years ago that enjoyed low dues for many years, and everyone was
always really happy about that. Guess what, the roofs and siding was ten years
past due for replacement, and we had nothing in the bank. I want to say we
were looking at special assessments of $30-40k/unit.

~~~
closeparen
I'll try: Strong Towns' predictions of future maintenance-debt doom are
_already true today_ of the urbanist, transit-centric alternative. If any
group of Americans had sufficient motivation and resources to maintain a good
public transit system, it would be New Yorkers, and they empirically don't.
The MTA is deteriorating rapidly despite the best efforts of one of the
richest cities in the world. That's textbook "unsustainable." It may well be
true that America's freeways will meet a similar fate in the future, but that
doesn't tell you which one is better or worse.

The big roads Strong Towns despises have many lanes, road networks have many
paths from A to B, and vehicles that are resilient to low-quality roads are
readily available for purchase. On the other hand, the failure of any
component anywhere in a rail network can ruin the whole system until it's
fixed. If I have to live with a falling-apart transportation system, I'll take
crumbling roads over crumbling trains.

~~~
ip26
That is a good point, public transit is not immune to ignoring future costs.
However-

The real doom is when people abandon the town or city because property taxes
have to be hiked dramatically to pay for the bill come due. This drives people
to leave, which drives taxes higher, which drives people to leave... This
kills the city.

New York & the train system there has big problems. But because there are so
many people paying into it, nobody is leaving New York over the cost of fixing
it. It is troubled but not failed.

ST's core _raison d 'être_ is abandoned, decaying suburban sprawl. Growing up
in Silicon Valley, I didn't really get ST until I was walking through vast,
crumbling suburbs in the midwest.

~~~
closeparen
New York isn't so much fixing it as adapting to a long-term future with fewer,
slower, less predictable trains. Their only hope is a multi-decade-scale IT
project (positive train control) which is to say, they have no hope.

Adapting to worse mobility is also a thing you can do with roads. Drive slower
over the potholes, close the lanes that are too far gone, revert to gravel if
need be.

I guess you could say that dense cities are so singular and compelling, people
will be willing to put up with poor mobility in exchange for the other
opportunities they provide. Whereas exurbia is so abundant and generic, people
will flee to an equivalent municipality with better mobility.

Strong Towns' message is more compelling for _very_ small towns, which could
be _entirely_ walkable. Then there's no transportation infrastructure needed.
People can walk on anything. But for small and mid-sized cities, it has some
weaknesses.

~~~
bobthepanda
> New York isn't so much fixing it as adapting to a long-term future with
> fewer, slower, less predictable trains. Their only hope is a multi-decade-
> scale IT project (positive train control) which is to say, they have no
> hope.

I think this is a gross exaggeration. New York's subway has pulled back from
the precipice before; in the '70s the subway was literally falling to pieces
on the ground, with routine derailments, trains running at 5MPH everywhere due
to the state of the tracks, and record levels of crime. It got to the point
where a triage plan suggested cutting out entire lines, including the L, which
is now one of the most congested.

Today's issues can mostly be attributed to neoliberal City and State
administrations (Giuliani, Pataki, Bloomberg, both Cuomos) that consistently
cut MTA funding to tell a future national electorate that they balanced a
budget. As a result the MTA took on debt, the interest of which is almost
entirely responsible for all the fare hikes in recent memory.

Add in a near-crippling focus on safety in operations above all else,
including speed, and it explains the current train unreliability.

------
bmurray7jhu
The premise of the argument is that Collin county needs to spend $12.6 billion
on roads over the next 30 years, but no citation is provided for that number.
The authors managed to have found citations for most of the other numbers. I
suspect the $12.6 billion figure was not calculated using the same set of
assumptions about inflation as the other numbers.

Edit:

Over 30 years, $230 million / year with a 4% annual escalator is about $12.9
billion in total spending. Lets assume that Plano's $343 million / year in
spending for 30% of county residents is consistent with other cities and add
in the $381 million / year spent by the county. Then the required local
highway spending is about 15% of the total ~1.5 billion spent by all local
governments.

Perhaps it is a large amount of money, but spending 15% of the local budget on
highways does not seem like an insurmountable burden on local taxpayers.

~~~
secabeen
It's in the linked Dallas News article:

> County Commissioner Duncan Webb told business leaders at a forum Wednesday
> that the county will need $13 billion for roads over the next three or four
> decades. Later Wednesday, former Commissioner Mark Reid, during a
> presentation to the Frisco Tea Party, said the figure is $12.6 billion.

So not malicious or misleading at all. ST is using the commissioners own
numbers.

~~~
Spooky23
So is it 30 or 40 years? Constant or future dollars? Capital or operational
spending? Local or Federal expense?

It’s a dumb number to quote and was cherry picked to make a point.

All local governments in New York combined spent around $3B in 2009 (
[https://www.osc.state.ny.us/localgov/pubs/research/snapshot/...](https://www.osc.state.ny.us/localgov/pubs/research/snapshot/highwayspending.pdf)
) as a comparison.

~~~
xyzzyz
$3B a year is $90B over 30 years, in constant dollars. Your point is?

------
everdev
The article seems to assume the reader knows about "strong towns". If they're
trying to make an argument about overspending on roads it's very poorly worded
and organized.

~~~
wmf
People new to the topic should probably start at
[https://www.strongtowns.org/journal/2016/6/14/greatest-
hits-...](https://www.strongtowns.org/journal/2016/6/14/greatest-hits-the-
growth-ponzi-scheme)

------
wemdyjreichert
As someone who lives in Texas: I will never bike, but probably not for the
reason you're thinking of. Rather, I won't because of heat. Days can hit 100
in high summer and 90% humidity. Many people supporting the "everyone should
just bike" idea live in SF or New England. This means they don't realize quite
how hot it is for much of the year. And though they may say it gets cold
there, you can always add another coat. You can only remove so many.

~~~
Pulcinella
Yeah I also live in Texas and can confirm this. Unless your work has a shower
and everything, your coworkers will hate being around you if you bike to work.
And even then it’s a miserable experience.

------
quotemstr
> $12.6 billion: The amount Collin County says it needs to spend on new roads
> in the next 30 years.

Why should we accept that roads should be that expensive? [1] is an article
that provides a good overview of the rise in construction costs that
eventually stalled new highway construction projects. One can imagine this
trend in costs being reversed: in particular, 1) we should be able to reduce
labor requirements through relaxation of work rules, 2) streamline community
and environmental review to reduce administrative costs of construction, and
3) raise revenues with direct usage fees instead of relying on increasingly
precarious fuel taxation, decreasing the amount of highway funding that needs
to come from the general budget.

I feel like a lot of people are too eager to declare that new roads are no
longer feasible and that we should adapt society to the degraded transit
infrastructure of the future, but this attitude is defeatist and will impose a
burden that will fall on everyone in society. Roads are good. Transportation
is good. We should be devoting our energies to making roads cheaper, not
finding elaborate ways to justify inaction.

[1] [https://www.accessmagazine.org/fall-1993/why-california-
stop...](https://www.accessmagazine.org/fall-1993/why-california-stopped-
building-freeways/)

~~~
pixl97
Labor is more expensive. Materials are more expensive. Property is more
expensive. Lawsuits from poor civil engineering are more expensive. And all
are getting more expensive all the time.

Your "let's make things cheaper by sacrificing quality" seems to smell of a
very deep ignorance of how this stuff works.

~~~
quotemstr
Yes, these inputs are more expensive now. The article I linked goes into some
detail. I'd like us to find ways of reducing the costs of these inputs. Do you
have any ideas for doing that? Suggesting that my post "seems to smell of...
ignorance" is both hostile and unproductive. Thanks.

~~~
pixl97
These inputs are made in the billions of tons per years. Everyone wants them
to be as cheap as possible, and they are. But you neglected the other side of
the demand curve. These components are in high demand. China, for example has
been producing huge amounts of concrete. Demand reduction is really the only
feasible way of price reduction. Reducing demand means getting people out of
cars.

------
vondur
Are these just county roads or does it also include State and Federal
highways? I’d imagine there may be multiple sources of funding available.

~~~
toomuchtodo
Usually just county roads. State roads and federal highways receive federal
tax dollars.

That’s not to say you can’t get federal or state grants for some roadway
related local projects, but these roads described would be primarily county
roads built with borrowed money (or local tax dollars if they’re available,
which they usually aren’t, hence the bond issue kicking the can down the
road).

------
martyvis
Maybe we'll all need to have flying cars in 30 years ...

------
claydavisss
Texas is big, red, suburban, and growing.

Texas is a success despite basically doing the opposite of what New Urbanists
say at every turn.

This must really burn up writers at StrongTowns.

The big problem for New Urbanists is the fact that dense cities seem to end up
with more and more expensive problems than the burbs.

Looking forward to a wave of Medium posts and Atlantic articles in 2021
professing a newfound love for suburbia as Millennials get sick of paying the
bills for broken boondoggles like HSR and the dead-on-arrival Transbay hub

~~~
brohoolio
The writers are highlighting a potential weakness with the Texas system. It’s
not about identity politics or red vs blue. It’s about future costs that might
be unsustainable.

NYC transit has it’s own issues, but if you look at the population there
you’ll see on average they are skinnier than folks in Texas who drive around
in cars. Are there costs associated with that obesity? Costs that everyone
picks up instead of just those who are obese? Will that make Texas a more
expensive place to live? Who knows?

As someone who lives in the suburbs and just got hit with a water rate
increase to pay for the aging infrastructure i can say it’s good to have these
conversations early before you rack up unexpected costs.

~~~
claydavisss
There are dozens of articles on the web about "fittest cities"....not one even
put NYC in the top five

