We caused the Metro shutdown when we decided to let our cities decay

[KamaAina]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/arts-and-entertainment/wp/2016/03/16/metro-closed-shutdown-dysfunction-infrastructure-decay/

It isn’t, of course, just the Metro system. As you walk the city today, take note of the urban landscape — the broken benches, crumbling curbs, rusting light posts. If you drive, suffer the pot holes one by one, cross your fingers and hope you’re not on one of the country’s more than 70,000 structurally deficient bridges, and remember: We made this landscape, through neglect and dysfunction. It represents our loss of faith in ourselves, our contempt for beauty and, ultimately, our anger and our pessimism....

But above all, it is closed today for the same reason that much of what was built during the Great Society era now looks ugly to us: years of underfunding, disinvestment and deferred maintenance, a neglect that comes of a deeper social and political dysfunction. We have learned to tolerate decay, and ugliness....

Even more frightening: We are learning to adapt. In Flint, Mich., residents use bottled water, just as people all across the Third World drink bottled water. And today, in Washington, the city walks, bikes and hitches a ride, just as billions of residents of impoverished cities throughout the world regularly improvise their commute.

Mid-century infrastructure is reaching the end of its useful life all across the nation. But much of that Great Society infrastructure was a response to an earlier infrastructure that was, by the 1950s, reaching the end of its life. And the response then was to say: Let’s rebuild it, and let’s make it as beautiful as we can.

[greymattermom]

1. I was visiting DC on business a couple years ago.

I always take public transportation when I can. I'm old, and I'm carrying a suitcase. I had to walk down to the platform, it seemed about 5 stories of straight downstairs, because the escalator wasn't working and I couldn't find an elevator. Downstairs is hard on old knees. I just kept thinking, "this is DC, the capitol of the ???? country in the world."

[elleng]

6. Sorry you couldn't find an elevator.

They are around, but takes familiarity to locate them sometimes.

[kacekwl]

2. Gee,

do you think we could get a few people a job fixing this kind of thing ?

[KamaAina]

4. Dunno. I'll have to think on that.

[1939]

5. They have the people

They just hate to hear four letter words like "WORK".

[elleng]

7. 'They' who?

[1939]

10. The government agencies responsible for the problem

Unfortunately, "friends and family" hiring in our cities has resulted in a class of drones. Any work to be done has to be contracted out with extra money for further friends and family in the contracting process.

[ananda]

3. I was going to obect to "we" but..

.. as you say, I guess "we" are not fighting
the corporate oligarchs and the powermongers
they control.

[elleng]

8. 'The truly terrifying thing about our slow acculturation to decay

in the built environment is that it’s reaching crisis at the same moment that many Americans are entranced by one of this country’s most serious flirtations with authoritarianism. The response to earlier crises in the man-made world was: Everything is falling apart, so how do we fix it? Today, there is a more ominous question lurking in the background: Can no one make the trains run on time?'

[global1]

9. It's Too Bad We Can't Get The U.S. To Go To War With The U.S.....

with their massive military - they would beat the U.S. and then when peace is declared - with their money they will re-build the U.S. just like they re-built other countries in the world that they destroyed in war. Think Japan.

[LiberalElite]

11. - and they even have oil! nt

[kacekwl]

18. That is the

BEST idea ever.

[madinmaryland]

12. Sadly it is not just the large cities, it is also small communities.

All communities are hurting, except for those that happen to be graced with billionaires, like Greenwich, CT, Westport, CT, Darien, CT. Shall I go on?

[KamaAina]

14. Of course.

New Canaan, CT, Wilton, CT, Weston, CT.

[madinmaryland]

15. Don't forget Ridgefield, CT and Simsbury, CT.

Meanwhile, Hartford, Waterbury, Bridgeport, New Haven, and New London are starving.

[KamaAina]

16. Simsbury?

There's a Hartford suburb that compares to Fairfield County (where the others are, commuting distance from NYC)?!

[Dont call me Shirley]

13. Not We, the Slumlords decided to let our cities decay.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

17. If you really want to weep over the state of our built landscape...

visit Western Europe, especially Scandinavia, Japan, or South Korea.

No, I take that back. The UK looks kind of shabby after 23 out of 37 years of Conservative government, with the rest of it being Blairite Labour.