Sprawl
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The Columbia River Crossing: A Highway Boondoggle in Disguise
The Columbia River Crossing is a mega-project by any standard. A bridge replacement, a highway widening, and light rail project wrapped into one, the CRC is a proposal to span the distance between Portland, Oregon and Vancouver, Washington. With a $3.2 billion price tag -- by conservative estimates -- it would be the largest public works project the region has ever undertaken.
April 14, 2011
A Metro Detroit Business Owner on the Talent-Repelling Effect of Sprawl
The owner of a patent law firm in recession-battered metro Detroit may have to leave Michigan, and it's not because of the taxes, says Andrew Basile, Jr. His firm, which employs 40 people in the city of Troy, spends "more on copiers and toner than we do on state taxes." The problem, Basile says, is that the firm can't attract talent to Michigan because of the "poor quality of place" and "car culture" that prevails in the region.
March 14, 2011
Charleston Highway Plan, Back From the Dead, May Finally Meet Its Maker
In the 1970s, engineers drew a horseshoe around Charleston, South Carolina — the planned route for Interstate 526, also known as the Mark Clark Expressway. The highway was to extend from Mt. Pleasant in the north to James Island in the south. It was to be a traditional highway bypass, the kind that were being built across the country in those days, changing the nature of cities in profound ways.
February 3, 2011
Outside Milwaukee, Water Policy May Drain Cities and Destroy Rural Towns
Waukesha, Wisconsin is a city whose identity has always been tied to water. In the late 1800s, the town was known for its natural springs. So fresh-tasting was the water that people traveled from around the country to share in its purported medicinal properties. Among those who sought its healing powers was first lady Mary Todd Lincoln.
January 26, 2011
“Gravity Always Wins”: How the U.S. Can Face the Crisis of Unsafe Bridges
If you left your grandma’s old wicker chair out on the porch all winter – and the next, and the next, and the next for 20 years – would you still trust that chair to hold you if you sat down?
December 20, 2010
Deficit Commission Pushes For Anti-Sprawl Reforms
If political pandering and bad economic policies have encouraged sprawl and an autocentric transportation system, better incentives can start to correct past mistakes. Here’s one place to start: the National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform report, released this Wednesday.
December 3, 2010
Our Stagnant Gas Tax Rate Is Making the Deficit Worse
Despite the anti-tax rhetoric of this round of elections, there's been a little flurry of support for raising the gas tax lately. Two senators just proposed bumping it by 25 cents to replenish the highway trust fund. And the National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform included a gas tax hike in its proposal for reducing the deficit by $3.8 trillion. Their proposal [PDF] is simple.
November 12, 2010
Report: Want to Ease Commuter Pain? Highways and Sprawl Won’t Help
Imagine two drivers leaving downtown to head home. Each of them sits in traffic for the first ten miles of the commute but at that point, their paths diverge. The first one has reached home. The second has another twenty miles to drive, though luckily for her, the roads are clear and congestion doesn't slow her down. Who's got a better commute?
September 29, 2010
Without a Plan, Sprawl Will Continue to Hollow Out Cleveland Region
If you want to get a sense of how devastating sprawl has been to the urban areas of northeast Ohio, head over to Woodlawn Avenue in East Cleveland. Between the rows of boarded up buildings, a house collapses onto itself. Graffiti pays homage to dead loved ones — “R.I.P. Fife.” Nearby, stuffed animals have been stapled to a telephone pole in a memorial, presumably, to a dead child.
September 13, 2010
Will GOP Senators Acknowledge the Fiscal Sense of Livable Communities?
Last week, the Livable Communities Act cleared the Senate Banking Committee, a milestone for legislation that would fund local efforts to plan for growth while curbing sprawl. But the 12-10 party line vote raised the prospect that the bill might also encounter unified Republican opposition in the full Senate, where the threat of a filibuster has become the norm.
August 10, 2010