Forget about funding for a moment, if you can.

Let go of your dollar signs and cost-per-miles and "this-law-says-this" and "that-law-says-that."

Without using dollar signs and municipal codes and so forth, answer a simple conceptual question for me:

WHY are you so eager to build new roads? Why are you so eager to pave?

Is it because you honestly think that roads relieve congestion? Is it that you need a more direct route from point "a" to point "b"? Is it because you've just bought a shiny new SUV and need someplace to drive it? Is it because you want to be able to drive your Honda directly to the summit of Mt. Rainier without getting your feet dirty? Is it because you've chosen to live 50 miles from your office, so the rest of us have to pay for your bad planning?

Tell me why you want new roads. I'm curious.

-- Common Sense (1@hotmail.com), January 20, 2000

Answers

Simply because current capacity requirements have far exceeded the initial design requirements of the system.

I'm not saying that building roads will be cheap either, but it can be done. Take a look at what Boston is doing to fix their capacity problem (www.bigdig.com)

-- Gene (gene@gene.com), January 20, 2000.

"Is it because you honestly think that roads relieve congestion? "

Common sense. You need to understand a little historical perspective. The need for roads predated automobiles. Roads became a necessity when we gave up our hunter-gatherer existence, settled down in fixed communities, took up agriculture or other trades, and began to specialize. When you are a mountain man or a bushman, you can wander all over and gather your food and spread your feces without impacting the environment any more than any other comparable sized animal, but that's not the case once you settle down to fixed communities. If you evver visit Naples Italy, take the opportunity to tour Herculaneum, an archeological site excavated from the ash of Vesuvius. Theie were broad roads, well worn from the cart tracks that supplied the city. Many of the cities in Europe date back to before the automobile. I once lived in a 500+ year old city in Germany. It had ROADS, even in the old ink drawings from the early days (1500s) available under glass in the city hall.

So once you stop living the natural hunter-gatherer existence for which our bodies were evolved, and start increasing population density, logistics becomes an issue. Autos have replaced animal drawn conveyances, for obvious reasons. Roads serve to allow commerce, provide access for utilities (in particular getting water in and feces out, without which concentrations of human beings DIE LIKE FLIES (see Medieval Europe), and permit interaction between people in different locales (for good or bad).

So if you aren't going back to a Ted-Kazynski like unheated cabin in Montana, you ARE going to be dependent on roads. Now the issue seems to be HOW MUCH in the way of roads you need. I will concede that if people would really use transit there would be less need for roads in areas with high population densities. You'd still need roads, because you can't do bulk commerce or utilities maintenance on transit (and transit has to run on something too), but you could probably make do with fewer roads. But the reality is that even in areas with high population densities, a very small fraction of the transportation is carried on transit because there isn't any demand. People LIKE their cars. If given any sort of a reasonable choice, they CHOOSE their cars. I realize that isn't what YOU would do, but that is what the vast majority of the public does.

So we have to decide. Build more roads to cope with this demand, or change the nature of our society to force these recalcitrant people to use transit or travel less. And even if we do the latter, the percentage of area in the US with a population density that will support transit, is small.

I think we have forced people as far as we can without compromising the nature of our country. I believe that some of the road rage today is cauased by intentionally under building roads, in a social engineering effort to make people use transit. I believe this is backfiring, and will lead to further backlashes against transit.

So, what you got against roads? Ready to do a Ted Kazynski and go to an unheated unlighted no plumbing cabin in Montana to avoid requiring roads? Although even he rode his bicycle to the local store on (you guessed it) a road.

-- (craigcar@crosswind.net), January 20, 2000.

"Simply because current capacity requirements have far exceeded the initial design requirements of the system."

Oh I see. So you would prefer that we keep patching the damn rather than shutting off the water?

Or to use another analogy:

"Building more roads to 'fix' congestion is like trying to hide your own obesity by buying a bigger pair of pants. Neither address the real problem: it's time to go on a diet."

-- Common Sense (1@hotmail.com), January 20, 2000.

Criag:

I agree (shriek!) with SOME of the points in your last posting, but perhaps I wasn't clear about my own opinion:

I'm not against roads, per se. Certainly they are needed to some extent. My point is that we should not build MORE roads until we make sure we're making the most efficient use of EXISTING roads. And on that point, we have failed miserably.

-- Common Sense (1@hotmail.com), January 20, 2000.

"Oh I see. So you would prefer that we keep patching the damn rather than shutting off the water? " To use your own "damn" analogy, (I assume you mean "dam"), when you increase the population density of an area to the point that the local groundwater sources will not support it (ie., MOST CITIES) do you:

a) Tell people to drink less water? b) Bring in more water supplies? c) Don't allow anymore people? Disperse existing excesses into the wastelands. d) Draw lots and randomly kill off people to offset new growth? e) All of the above? f) Other?

CS- the problem is a function of population density. Do you support SmartGrowth? The goal of SmartGrowth is to INCREASE population density.

-- (craigcar@crosswinds.net), January 20, 2000.

Everybody builds roads... Even the Mayans built a comprehensive highway system and they didn't even have the wheel!!! Yes they had the wheel but it was a sacred symbol that was only used in their religion and it would have been sacrilege to use one of their sacred artifacts on vehicles.....so they had only litters to use....no wagons or wheelbarrows

-- maddjak (maddjak@hotmail.com), January 20, 2000.

"My point is that we should not build MORE roads until we make sure we're making the most efficient use of EXISTING roads. And on that point, we have failed miserably. " And HOW DO WE DO THAT IN A DEMOCRACY?

Are you willing to give up Democracy to make this work? This will work only in a totalitarian country. Are you willing to go that far.

I learned long ago that "keep off the grass" signs don't work. It's easier, cheaper, and more popular with the customers, to let people walk on the grass and then PAVE where the grass gets worn out. If our elected officials had that attitude, there wouldn't be a problem. But they really believe philosophically that people ought to obey the wisdom of the "keep off the grass" signs. And the British really believed philosophically that the Stamp Tax was no big deal philosophically, and a small price to pay for protecting the colonials interests throughout the world. Most still believe that. They learn slow too.

-- (craigcar@crosswinds.net), January 20, 2000.