Dig, baby, dig

Our systems for funding new infrastructure are stuck in the 1950's. Our systems for funding maintenance of existing infrastructure are not serious. Combined, these approaches create outcomes that can't be justified by people considering themselves rational, let alone great.

Transportation for America has released a report on the state of bridges in the United States. It should be eye-opening for anyone even mildly engaged in the debate over the future of America's infrastructure. Titled "The Fix We're In For: The State of Our Bridges", the report details, in a state-by-state, county-by-county breakdown, exactly where we stand. 

For example, in my home state of Minnesota, we have 1,149 bridges that have been determined to be structurally deficient, meaning they require significant maintenance, rehabilitation or replacement. According to Transportation for America, the cost to address all 1,149 bridges is $500 million. But we're not going to focus on this sad fact; others have that covered just fine. Today we're going to look again at the Old Economy Project that Refuses to Die, also commonly called the St. Croix Bridge.

The St. Croix bridge is a proposed $670 million crossing of the St. Croix, a river forming the border between Minnesota and Wisconsin. The city of Stillwater has long advocated for the new bridge as a way to address their congestion problem (the current bridge, which is deficient, runs right through town), to the point where their council gave money to a group promoting the bridge, a contribution which turned out to be illegal. The nearest high-capacity bridge is eight miles away to the south. 

The Stillwater Bridge (B) crosses the St. Croix river about eight miles north of the I-94 bridge near Hudson (A).

Let's stipulate for the sake of this conversation that the new St. Croix bridge is a worthy project (it's not, but let's pretend that it is). At a time when Americans are being forced to make some really difficult financial decisions, particularly about infrastructure spending, the reason why this project is likely to proceed while 1,100+ of our deficient bridges receive little funding is important to understand. Understanding that reason will illuminate why we are in such a dire financial situation, why our infrastructure is failing and why nothing we are likely to do will make the problem better.

The St. Croix bridge is a very expensive project. It is projected to cost more than the estimate for fixing ALL of the 1,149 structurally deficient bridges in Minnesota.

Without knowing the numbers, it would be fair to assume that the St. Croix bridge is really critical in terms of traffic volume. Not so. The bridge is projected to carry 16,000 vehicles per day. For comparision, Minnesota's 1,149 structurally deficient bridges carry a combined 2.4 million vehicles per day.

This seems insane, and it is. Why would a state full of rational people spend $670 million on one bridge to carry 16,000 cars when we already have 1,149 bridges carrying over 2.4 million cars that are in a state of critical disrepair? Why would we not spend the money first on maintaining the bridges that we have? What business do we have adding more bridges to the inventory when we do not have the resources to maintain our existing ones?

The answer is so simple and it is the key to understanding why our national infrastructure systems are in such miserable shape.

We can get money from Washington to build new infrastructure, but it is really difficult -- if not impossible -- to get money from Washington to maintain existing infrastructure.

Put simply, maintenance is a local issue. Building new -- expansion -- is something we fund out of Washington D.C. through any number of programs or appropriations. But the catch is always that the drudgery of maintenance falls lower on the government food chain. In other words, it is up to Minnesota to maintain its bridges. There is some federal money there that it can go after, but largely the existing bridges are the states's financial responsibility. The fact that there are 1,149 bridges in critical disrepair points out that this system is not working real well.

Minnesota can say no to the St. Croix bridge money, but in doing so it will not receive an equivalent amount of money that it can use to maintain its existing bridges. If Minnesota says no, the St. Croix bridge money will just go to some other state. Neither the congestion problem in Stillwater nor the problem of the 1,149 deficient bridges will be solved. A pragmatic local politician, understanding that a new bridge solves Stillwater's problems and won't create any significant liabilities for the state for 50 years or more, makes a rational decision and supports the project. Only a handful of people reading this blog right now will be around to bear the financial burden of fixing this bridge when it someday becomes deficient.

Think that through for a second and put yourself in the place of the person fifty years from now. There will be a deficient bridge in Stillwater that will then be in need of maintenance. It will serve only a small number of cars, but the cost will be astronomical -- far more than can be afforded or that can be justified by the traffic volume. Do our grandchildren and great grandchildren put up the money to fix this bridge or do they just ignore the problem?

Well, if they follow in our footsteps, they will ignore the problem. Today we have 1,149 bridges just in Minnesota that were built generations ago that are now ours to maintain. We're not maintaining them.

And why would we? I don't ask that lightly, but simply point out that few of these bridges are high-return investments. The same thought process that is pushing the St. Croix bridge project forward was used to justify all of these other investments. We've not created any systems to ensure that these investment could be financially justified or to capture any value out of them once they were built. With the gas tax, our only incentive at the federal level is to encourage people to use more gas. Building more bridges whenever there was a congestion problem, regardless of whether or not it could be financially justified, responded to this incentive perfectly.

We're two generations into this folly. Look around and see what we've created. We have failing infrastructure everywhere. The cost to maintain it all far outstrips our ability to pay, let alone any amount we could justify spending based on the value created. We've put ourselves into enormous debt not only in government but especially at the household level just trying to keep this system going. So what do we do now?

Apparently, at least for the time being, we just keep digging the hole deeper. Dig, baby, dig.

Related Reading

• The ridiculous old economy project that won't die (November 29, 2010)

• Michele Bachmann and the St. Croix Bridge (March 18, 2010)

• Victory on the St. Croix, but over what? (March 15, 2010)

• The Fix We're In For: The State of Our Nation's Bridges by Transportation for America

• Podcast: The emperor has no clothes (November 10, 2010)

[Note correction: I made a mistake and took a number from the wrong column for the amount of traffic on Minnesota's structurally deficient bridges. The correct number as reported by Transportation for America is 2,436,031. The post now reflects the correct number. My apologies for that mistake. -Chuck Marohn]

Michelle Bachmann and the St. Croix Bridge

This morning I am getting ready to go on the air for my weekly segment on KAXE (I am their Republican commentator on the "Making Sausage" segment Thursday AM) when I stumble across this bit of news regarding Minnesota's Michelle Bachmann, Republican from our 6th Congressional District, regarding her support of the $668 million bridge over the St. Croix. A quick Google search and I confirmed, from Bachmann's own website, that she is backing the project.

"The time for the Bridge to be built has come.  Special interest groups have been invited to participate in discussions and instead chose to stop progress at any cost.  I’m here to let you know that I will be sending a letter to Interior Secretary Salazar and Director of the NPS Jonathan Jarvis calling on them to immediately appeal this court decision.  Also, I will be introducing legislation later this week that would permit the construction of the Bridge. If passed, this would render Thursday’s ruling irrelevant.

Bachmann is a lightening rod for controversy. We are not writing about her to get a cheap jolt of energy but to illustrates just how deep our national problem is here.

This past Monday we detailed just how financially wasteful this project is. At $668 million, it generates no financial return to the taxpayer. It is another mindless DOT project oblivious to the cost and benefit but proceeding under the assumption that curing congestion - at any cost - is a good thing. At over $6 per crossing, the project is tremendous mis-allocation of resources.

The day after we wrote about the bridge, Bachmann, champion of the Tea Party movement protesting government spending, posts her own blog entry titled "Stop the Spending". In it she laments that the cost for servicing the national debt is rising and we need to quit borrowing so much money. She concludes by indicating:

For the sake of our country's economy, we must get our fiscal house in order and stop the reckless spending. 

Reckless spending?

Here is what is remarkable, and it is both frustrating and hopeful. The St. Croix bridge project is the epitome of wasteful spending. Yet, an outspoken, fiscally-conservative member of the U.S. House of Representatives representing a fiscally-conservative part of the state can support it wholeheartedly.

The frustration is that we are so oblivious to the waste - the perceived benefit of fighting congestion is so pervasive - that even those that preach fiscal prudence believe this to be a sound project.

The reason I am hopeful is that, time and again, when people grow to understand the financial implications of this wasteful pattern of development, they stop supporting it. Strong Towns is truly the way out of the mess we are in. The St. Croix bridge project is a key opportunity to unite fiscal conservatives opposed to wasteful spending with environmentalists opposed to degradation of the landscape. 

We build on that, and we can not only dramatically cut spending, we can make our towns financially stronger, make our neighborhoods more livable and improve all of our lives in the process.

That is what Strong Towns is all about.

Strong Towns is a non-partisan organization. This posting does not, directly or implied, endorse or oppose an individual or party. You can continue this Strong Towns conversation by posting a comment or by joining us on Facebook. You can also follow Strong Towns on Twitter. We appreciate all of the feedback and support.

Victory on the St. Croix, but over what?

Last week it was announced that a Federal judge ruled in favor of the Sierra Club in their opposition to the construction of a new bridge over the St. Croix river near the town of Stillwater, Minnesota. For environmentalists, this is a huge victory. For DOT's, local politicians and bridge advocates, this is a temporary setback. For Strong Towns, this entire thing is bizarre.

For environmental activists, this is a tremendous "process" victory. We use the word "process" to indicate that the ruling seems to have been made on process grounds, not overall environmental grounds. The judge simply indicated that the Parks Service had not done all the dotting and crossing it needed to in order to satisfy Federal law. From the St. Paul Pioneer Press:

[Chief Judge Michael] Davis ruled that the park service arbitrarily reversed its decision when it signed off on plans for the new bridge. The agency's approval of the bridge proposal in 2005 ignored its 1996 position that a massive bridge south of Stillwater would have a "dramatic and disruptive" impact to the river's scenery, he wrote.

The park service's "failure to acknowledge its previous contrary position, let alone explain why, in its opinion, a change is justified, is the hallmark of an arbitrary and capricious decision," Davis concluded.

So once the Park Service hires a P.R. firm, gets a couple lawyers to draft a new brief and holds a couple of public hearings, the project is back in business. That is obviously the view of the project advocates. From the same article:

"That's the history of this project; it's just one delay after another," said Stillwater Mayor Ken Harycki. "This is going to set us back five years. ... Just think of how many millions of dollars have been wasted on something that has been needed for over 50 years; it started with President Truman."

This is where a Strong Towns analysis is important. Let's start that by focusing on the Mayor's word, "needed". This project "has been needed for over 50 years." Really?

Here are some project facts:

• Total Cost: Estimated at $668 million
• Total Traffic: 16,000 vehicles per day
• Cost per Vehicle: $41,750

If we were to finance the cost of this bridge at 4% over 40 years and then charge a toll for everyone that crosses, the toll would have to be $5.74 just to pay the debt (not counting the cost of collection, which one report indicates would be an additional 20%). For a person that commutes from Wisconsin to the Twin Cities five-days a week, 46 weeks a year, that is an added cost of at least $1,320 per year ($1,580 if the cost of collection is included).

But if this project is so desperately "needed" - since the days of Truman no less - is anyone talking about asking the people who live along the eastern banks of the scenic St. Croix to pay for it? Is anyone asking those that escape the "city life" to live on a nice, wooded estate in rural Wisconsin to kick in a dime for this project? Are the local residents, anxious to have this essential improvement move forward, stepping up with some of their own revenue sources to make the project go?

Of course not. As usual, the Federal no-car-left-behind transportation policy is again tapped to pay for the entire project. That formula:

Congestion + DOT = Taxpayer Dollars

This equation holds true regardless of whether or not a project makes any economic sense, whether it is the best use of our tax dollars and whether or not it will actually generate any return on the investment (not to mention whether or not it actually will "solve" congestion, because it never does that either).

This project is ridiculous. For a country going trillions in debt annually, facing ongoing, massive budget shortfalls and monumental liabilities for maintaining the infrastructure we already have, why are we even pondering this project?

But apparently, even the Sierra Club believes a project should happen.

“We’re not against a new bridge,” said Jim Rickard, vice chairman of the Sierra Club’s St. Croix Valley Interstate Group. “We just don’t support the current design. We would love to partner on alternative designs.”

This may just be a P.R. line from the local Sierra Club spokesman, but unless the "alternative design" would be a pay-per-trip barge, we would oppose it.

Strong Towns opposes the Stillwater Bridge project because it is a massive waste of taxpayer money, would generate little to no return on the investment and displaces resources that would be better used to strengthen our existing towns and neighborhoods.

Oh and, Sierra Club, if you find this logic compelling and believe it would resonate with the millions of unemployed Americans, the millions of business owners struggling to make payroll and the millions of families that sit at the kitchen table every night and try to figure out how to pay their bills, all of whom may or may not support your (in our opinion, compelling) environmental positions on this project, we release to you any copyright we hold over this article and these thoughts.

We also invite you to join us in building Strong Towns for America.

You can continue this Strong Towns conversation by posting a comment or by joining us on Facebook. You can also follow Strong Towns on Twitter. We appreciate all of the feedback and support.