By Antonio D. French
Filed Wednesday, April 18, 2007 at 10:19 AM
According to the Belleville News-Democrat, more than two dozen members of the St. Louis political and business elite met downtown last week to talk over options for paying for a new Mississippi River bridge.
There is a new sense of urgency in reaching an agreement on the bridge before Missouri and Illinois miss their chance at $239 million in federal aid.
The day before the meeting, we asked Gov. Matt Blunt if after years of plans, new plans, negotiations, and renegotiations, will this bridge ever get built?
6 Comments:
"Will this Bridge Ever Get Built?"
Well, I guess the first question is "What Bridge is That?" Would that be the toll bridge or the free bridge? The big one north of downtown, or the MLK coupler bridge?
Some bridge will be built. St. Louis is too much a choke-point in the highway system to avoid it. Of course, that's what everyone thought before Chicago became the railway center and O'Hare became the big midwest hub. Maybe everyone will keep bickering, and Quincy will be the next Chicago. That would serve St. Louis right. Maybe I should move there and start buying up property around likely bridge sites. Or maybe Chester will play its cards right. Replace Highway 8 going over to Rolla with an interstate, and voila! St. Louis is no longer the only game in town...
t
4/18/2007 6:32 PM
This comment has been removed by the author.
4/19/2007 12:30 AM
239 million for federal aid which will only continue sprawl and offer nothing for the inner city ghetto poor. Perhaps we should be happy that during the highest point of urban aid, from 69-76, in which 59 Billion Federal dollars was being spent on urban aid through CDBG and Revenue Sharing, the Team Four Plan cut off all services to our African American Neighbors! The faucet was pouring and yet racism kept this aid from those that needed most. We are arguing over a paltry 239 million which clearly will not benefit the disadvantaged in any way, given that highways led to further suburbanization and the exodus of the tax base which enabled the capacity to provide relief. The real concern is why are we allocating Federal Dollars on the same old theory which clearly has been debunked. Highways have done nothing but erode the tax base of our city, and the community institutions which promote political mobilization! Perhaps this is the intent under the guise of increased interstate commerce? Highways have done nothing beneficial except vivisect our communities thus destroy solidarity and make it easier for former residents to live outside the City and use our services, while not paying into the system. Highways propagate free riders and a fragmented St. Louis.
4/19/2007 2:11 AM
Doug Duckworth writes:
> 239 million for federal aid
> which will only continue sprawl
> and offer nothing for the inner
> city ghetto poor.
Unless its a toll road. Charge $10 to cross the bridge. Long-haul trucks will pay it. Sprawled-out commuters won't. They'll live closer to where they work, most likely by moving their businesses closer to their homes, not vice-versa.
And who is it screaming about the evil of tolls? Oh yeah -- liberals who think democracy is fine and dandy, that they should be allowed to vote themselves a free bridge. Some good, authoritarian Progressives in power would put a stop to that nonsense.
We ought to charge $5 to get on the interstate highways at all. When I go to Columbia to see my brother, the trip will cost me $10 more unless I want to take Highway 100 out to 50 out to 63. I'm paying about $10 in fuel tax now, and we ought to take less (even nothing) from general revenue for the highways anyhow. Sounds like a plan to me.
> Highways have done
> nothing beneficial
Sure they have. We have much more responsive logistics with cars and trucks and highways than we could have with trains. These things also lower barriers to entry in all manner of businesses. These are benefits, and big ones. I'm sure there are more. But as you point out, there are burdens as well. The Progressive Public Policy trick is to balance them -- and not permit beneficiaries to externalize burdens. Some liberals might even get on board with that.
t
PS: Someday I want to talk about the Team Four plan. I think you're too quick to assume the worst of people, and that you do not consider historical context, especially the example of East St. Louis which has loomed large over West St. Louis. Advocacy and activism are a lot easier than governing.
4/19/2007 12:23 PM
I am not against tolls. I think a user fee is perfectly acceptable. True, highways are beneficial for commerce. Yet, especially in St. Louis, they have been mediums for sprawl and inefficient housing patterns that lead to duplication of services with increased pollution due to travel time by auto.
Regarding Team Four, the context is not understandable. The no strings attached nature of General Revenue Sharing and Community Development Block Grants gave local leaders great leeway in distributing massive amounts of Federal funding. Instead of spend this money in the needy areas, they chose to allocate these funds, along with local funds, in the more affluent areas. A Brookings Institution study found that a supermajority of CDBG funds are not spent in low income census tracts. The results are obvious.
I question even if these funds needed to be denied at all. Back then, as I point out, the Federal Government was spending almost 60 billion on urban aid. Today Community Development Block Grants are about 5.4 billion. So, I must question if the Rand Report, and recommendations by Team Four, simply served as justification to destroy their community capacity for political action? It is hard for me to believe that the triage method, of denying basic public services, was necessary. Yet, this disparity is still present today.
Even if their intent was not based upon racism, and perhaps a rational choice theory to save the City, the outcome is obviously a failure.
In public policy intent matters not.
4/19/2007 2:52 PM
We do need the bridge. St. Louis is too much bottlenecked.
It's nice to pontificate about how building a bridge will only lead to more sprawl, but without it, the popluation will go elsewhere.
St. Louis is not an island. There are too many cities out there that are luring businesses and populations away.
4/19/2007 9:40 PM
Post a Comment
<< Home