this post was submitted on 06 May 2024
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Electric trains might, but we're even worse at building them than cars.
They can be built from acorn and twigs.
Are we? Diesel-ev hybrid is fairly effective and proven. Making a pure ev would just mean taking the diesel out, adding more batteries and installing electrical rail or over head trolley cables to charge them. Trains run on a schedule, so logistic planning should be straight forward.
Recently, yes. California's spent 16 years not building rail. The Gulf Coast states have been tearing their rail out and replacing it with highways for over a decade. The Upper Midwest has just kinda given up on doing anything useful, and just watched its transit infrastructure collapse.
My point is is that the tech is there. There's just an unwillingness.
In the states, certainly. Elsewhere, its wildly popular.
The problem is that highway advocates don't solve the problem of "who's going to pay for all this?". The reason infrastructure in America is in disrepair is that funding for highways is supposed to be gotten from tolls and road taxes. But since everywhere in America is a freeway... there's no funding for repairs.
Expecting the Government budget to cover maintenance of infrastructure is wishful thinking... unless you're also willing to agree that the military is allocated too much money.
Regressive taxation leads to overfunded main roads and underfunded side streets.
Roads are fundamental to the operation of any government. It isn't simply that states need to maintain roads. It is that states need roads in order to exist.
Is it right to say then, that the users of the roads pay for maintenance? Do you expect the government to print more money to pay for maintenance?
Edit:
As opposed to both main roads and side streets being underfunded without tolls and road taxes? Do you expect Government to print money to pay for all this?