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Comment by citilife | Hacker News Reader

Idk... I'm pretty sure US has solid infrastructure on average. In Illinois the roads / bridges have to withstand temperatures ranging form 110F to -20F every year. My house withstands the same temperatures, hail, winds 70+ mph 3-4 times a year. A foot of snow in the winter.

"U.S. Infrastructure" is some of the best of the world and also varies WILDLY between states. Each state manages its own infrastructure, so it's unfair to compare the US as a whole vs individual states.

The weather in Illinois is much more robust than say, Germany or the UK. The UK is much closer to the weather of Portland than that of Illinois.

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I have this exact gripe with anything and everything that compares the US with other countries, some states are huge, bigger than multiple European countries, imho all charts and metrics should include each state, whether it’s part of a union or not. It would squash a lot of the otherwise unfair comparisons of the US vs other countries which are often used for politically motivated framing which is why I am extra cynical about this topic.

Yeah - in the same way the worst US stats are always compared to the best or average EU stats - it's interesting you don't often see the reverse.

Why is no one comparing gay rights in Massachusetts to Hungary? But everyone is comparing gay rights in Mississippi to Norway?

There's a lot of variance in the US and the EU. There's even a lot of variance in a single state like California!

The US - by design - is supposed to be pretty similar to the EU - in that the states have A LOT of rights and autonomy.

Frankly, I'm willing to let Mississippi and Alabama do what they want if that means they don't get to tell New York and California what they can and can't do.

The vast, vast majority of the US does not live in ultra conservative counties. Even within a state like Texas that has some crazy laws, a lot of that is undone in the metros where everyone lives - Houston, Dallas, Austin, San Antonio, & El Paso are all decently liberal and make up >50% of Texas's population.

The idea that Texas is "a 3rd world country" is laughable. But you'll hear this from the "left" that wants to take states rights away so they can tell the "right" how to live. They never really think about what it would be like if the "right" got the say to tell them how to live...

Considering Texas is usually one of the culprits leading the charge on repressive laws that steer the country further in that direction, and reliably elects far-right conservatives to statewide positions, I think it's fair to label Texas a very conservative state on the whole.

I don't think you live in Texas. Considering I do, and Texas has been telling people how to live for as long as I've been here, I'd say my experience stands in stark contrast compared to your ideas of what Texas is or does. Especially as Texas has been specifically waging war against the metros and enacting state laws to supercede any local laws that might be passed.

Texas is something of an outlier in US statehood assertiveness. When I go to NM to visit family, if my rental car has TX plates, the locals run me off the road.

If the argument goes “The US is the world greatest at …” there is not much of a point to compare it to the worst countries in the world* and then pat yourself on the back that the US, say, has better infrastructure than Ukraine during a war.

*whatever that means for the US Greatest du jour

> "left" that wants to take states rights away so they can tell the "right" how to live

I suppose "stop bullying/oppressing" is a type of telling people how to live.

> I have this exact gripe with anything and everything that compares the US with other countries, some states are huge, bigger than multiple European countries

And a lot of those huge states are filled with a whole lot of nobody. The US population is fairly concentrated: one-third lives in a county on a coastline:

* https://www.census.gov/library/stories/2019/07/millions-of-a...

And two-thirds live with-in 100 miles (160 km) of the border:

* https://www.aclu.org/other/constitution-100-mile-border-zone

80% lives in urban areas:

* https://www.census.gov/programs-surveys/geography/guidance/g...

Yes, the US and particular states are big, but where people actually live is in a much smaller area. Concentrate infrastructure spending there.

I was curious about this, so I looked at one source. The World Economic Forum's 2019 Global Competitiveness Report[0] lists the US as 13/141 in terms of transport infrastructure, and 23/141 in terms of utility infrastructure on page 583.

[0] https://www3.weforum.org/docs/WEF_TheGlobalCompetitivenessRe...

Are we trusting the World Economic Forum now? Half the country is convinced they're lizards, but even if not, they have an agenda.

""U.S. Infrastructure" is some of the best of the world". Is this actually true? I mean, at one point it certainly was but much of that infrastructure is quite aged at this point. Also, compared to the world at large, sure, but when compared to the developed world I'm really not sure. I think when we upgrade and fix things we do a good job and are amongst the best but again, we have some extremely elderly infrastructure in huge parts of the country.

Again it varies wildly by states; but yes by most measurements the US has some of the best infrastructure in the world

https://www.statista.com/statistics/264753/ranking-of-countr...

Broken down by state is also interesting

https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/rankings/infrastruct...

Just to put it into perspective -- Illinois gets >60% of it's energy from clean sources (nuclear, solar, wind) - compare to germany (85% fossil fuels). You can travel around the state going 70+mph and hit any major city. You can take public transit from the suburbs of Chicago down town and get around easily. You can also take trains from the southern cities to Chicago in 2-3hrs (I've done this regularly). There are multiple airports, and one of the largest hubs in the world. Some of the tallest buildings in the world, massive bridges all over the place, there's almost never blackouts (very stable energy grid), fiber is available in most places at this point, clean water is abundant, etc, etc.

https://certasun.com/illinois-energy-generation/

That's just Illinois.

Places like Tennessee, Georgia, Texas, etc. you can get 10Gb/s fiber for $70/month; there's massive dams, again very high quality roads interconnecting most towns and cities, air conditioning is available everywhere that wants it, etc.

Yes, the United States is the richest and easily one of the most advanced countries in the world by almost any measure (including infrastructure).

> Places like Tennessee, Georgia, Texas, etc. you can get 10Gb/s fiber for $70/month;

Where specifically can you get that and via which carrier? Mine is $70 for 1Gb/s in central Austin, via Google Fiber.

Given Texas's own "very stable energy grid", could that bargain-price fast fiber plan possibly be, in reality over time, just an expensive plan for slower fiber? (I.e., looking at actual amounts of data transferred interleaved with downtime, rolling blackouts, etc.) /s, although you do make Illinois sound pretty cool!

> "U.S. Infrastructure" is some of the best of the world…

Is it? At best it seems average, on average.

https://infrastructurereportcard.org/

ASCE has a dog in this hunt

If you're nudge-nudge-wink-winking that this is biased, in which direction is it biased and why?

The American Society of Civil Engineers might have some bias towards ensuring Civil Engineers have jobs, seeing as how that's part of their mission statement. This might additionally bias them towards suggesting that infrastructure needs improvement more often than strictly necessary.

It might also bias them towards reporting the work of their members is of a quality that justifies their continued employment and thus avoid suggesting that recent or ongoing improvements were inadequate.

Next you will tell me the American Medical Association says we should pay doctors more, and prevent nurses from performing procedures. Or you will tell me the the Teachers Unions give American schools a poor report card, and we need to double our spending on Education

An alternative data-driven evaluation would be welcome, I'm sure!

Everybody complains that the potholes are worse than ever. Not sure if it's actually true or they've always had the same complaint, but I've definitely adapted my driving pattern to get around the ones that I know.

Half the world doesn't have pavement... And potholes are almost always created due to extreme weather (very hot -> very cold -> repeat).

My parents recall potholes so bad it'd destroy your car in the 80s. Concrete and the ability to fill potholes have improved over time. There's little reason to assume it's any worse than before, except some roads need replacement... but if you don't replace it (or prior to building the road) it was clearly worse.

In regions with colder winters, it's typically a function of freeze/thaw cycles. Water gets inside cracks, freezes, and the expansion breaks up the pavement. Then it thaws and softens, and traffic knocks bits loose. Then more water gets in the now bigger cracks, it freezes again and the cycle repeats, but a little worse this time. Then again and again.

Saying "Half the world doesn't have pavement" is like saying "Eat your broccoli, because some children halfway around the world are starving." It doesn't change the fact that we used to be able to do routine maintenance that covered this, and now we don't.

Did you read the rest of the comment? It's not clear it's worse than before.

> It doesn't change the fact that we used to be able to do routine maintenance that covered this, and now we don't.

When you first build a road you don't need to do said maintenance. So as we expand the number of roads and convert them from gravel to concrete, you'll have more potholes. It's not clear it's any worse per-mile of concrete road than before. But even if it was "worse" we have significantly more road than say 30 years ago.

Maybe I'm zeroing in on a much shorter term; the potholes, winter reflectors, and other various road items are clearly worse than say, five years ago. 30 years, maybe not; expectations in the world of phone booths were way different.

I've lived in Illinois my whole life (Im in my 40s). I've heard how the potholes are terrible and getting worse as long as I can remember. They aren't particularly bad, nor do they seem to be getting worse.

Observations I've made:

* Snow plows have 2 functions: moving snow and making potholes. The frequency of pothole complaints starts climbing in November and peaks around April (when construction season gets started).

* "that pothole has been there 20 years" typically actually means "that pothole is near where a different one was located at some point in the last couple decades", or "that's a spot where the plows often can tear up the road"

* The people who often complain about potholes on some stretch of road tend to suddenly be the people who complain about how re-doing that stretch of road is a waste of money because "it was just fine before".

* 10 years after a re-pave when some street gets it's first new pothole - "ugh they just redid this road and it's already got potholes? typical $city_name"

I wonder if this is more correlation than causation. The pot holes are result of freezing/thawing cycle. And this happens when there is need for snow plows. Though snow plows certainly can make them worse.

The freeze/thaw cycles put cracks in the road. The snowplows (basically a fast bulldozer) excavate those into potholes (when the blade catches the crack, it tears up a chunk of asphalt with it, starting a feedback loop because theres more space for freezing to exert force causing more cracks...).

It varies wildly within states too.

A useful reference for that: https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/rankings/infrastruct...

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