So, this post was supposed to be finished MONTHS AGO. Being a person of many moods, I let this drop off my radar. But here it is, finally – my rebuttal to Scott’s empty gas tank & infrastructure post:
For the sake of argument, lets say I did let the gas tank get low because I was hunting for cheap gas. I come from driving people, trooping people, people who take pride in how good they are at finding deals. Add that to my general desire to put off filling the oddly finicky gas tank on our shared vehicle and you get a wonderful excuse to not fill it. Despite this, I’m also pretty certain, though, that the gas gage works, and is accurate enough that someone sitting in the driver’s seat could, in fact, see at a glance that the gas tank was not as full as one might like, and thereby prompt that someone to get gas in a less inconvenient part of town.
Just sayin’.
But infrastructure, now, that’s an interesting topic. There are a lot of good reasons to worry about infrastructure these days. Scott’s post got me thinking about infrastructure and how to get people to get excited or invested in it.
For the deniers among the bytegeist, just suspend your disbelief for a bit and pretend that global climate change is really a thing. I’m not going to talk about whether or not humanity is responsible, or can do anything, or even if it’s just a cyclical process that the global climate just… DOES. Instead, let’s all just agree that it’s getting weird out there and talk about how that relates to infrastructure.
Even before climate change became the buzz-phrase on every hipster’s lips, the United States was too large and too climatologically diverse to utilize a one-size-fits-all infrastructure. The infamous “Galloping Gertie” suspension bridge across the Tacoma Narrows, with its bone-chilling failure caught on film, has become an engineering cautionary tale.[1] It was not, however, a bad idea for other regions, and the suspension bridge model has been deemed unequivocally successful in Michigan, where the Mackinaw Bridge allows approximately 4,000,000 vehicles a year to cross from the Mitten to the UP.[2] Road materials and techniques that are successful in California will not be effective in Minnesota, where annual snowfall in some regions can exceed 70″ in a season.[3]
(http://wetlands-preserve.org)
You don’t have to be an eco-activist to care about infrastructure, or to notice that some things are changing, weather-wise. Those changes, though, whether (heheh, see what I did there?) your region is hotter or colder or wetter or dryer are going to directly impact the regional infrastructure. Pipes aren’t insulated? If your region is colder now you risk burst pipes. I’m not talking about the pipes on your house, which would be bad enough. I’m talking about the water mains buried under Main Street USA. The same goes for air conditioning – if your region was more temperate before and is now getting significantly warmer during the summer months, public buildings and transportation might need upgrades. What about the regions that are experiencing drought? If those regions were previously flush with water (heheh, see what I did there? heheheh), they may have to change crops, install more or better irrigation, change how they store crops. The infrastructure that supports those farms? That infrastructure is going to require piping water out to the farms, replacing electricity lines or running more to offset the new loads, and so on.
Infrastructure isn’t just about roads. It’s about so much more than that. Infrastructure is what keeps your world lit, your whistle wet, your bus at a tolerable temperature, and there is no one-size-fits-all solution. Finding ways to pay for it is just one part of the equation. Public acknowledgment of the importance of the infrastructure is key, and will help with getting legislature passed to not only fix things, but fix them correctly and effectively.
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[1] Washington State Department of Transportation. “”Galloping Gertie” Collapses November 7, 1940.” http://www.wsdot.wa.gov/tnbhistory/connections/connections3.htm.
[2] Mackinac Bridge Authority. “Mackinac Bridge Authority Fact Sheet.” http://www.mackinacbridge.org/mackinac-bridge-authority-brochure–fact-sheet-65/.
[3] Minnesota Department of Natural Resources. “Climate frequently asked questions.” http://www.dnr.state.mn.us/climate/faqs.html.
Politically Skewed 