Hacker News Reader

> has huge ongoing costs in terms of resource and energy use

TxDOT (government organization responsible for road maintenance) has a budget of $30B/year or about 10% of the total state's budget. Not that big of a deal for Texas.

View on HN

Do they pay for the streets in low density suburbs or do local towns and cities? Also, water infra, electrical infra, etc.

That figure includes every single government-owned street, AFAIK. Total infrastructure costs are higher but don't seem that much higher than in Germany?

TxDOT does not maintain local or county roads which are a massive portion of cost in sprawl.

To add specifics: Dallas does not cover road maintenance with its budget and must sell bonds to cover the $10b in "deferred maintenance".

https://www.dmagazine.com/frontburner/2024/04/a-voters-guide...

OK so what % of the GDP goes towards roads in Texas vs Germany?

Reply on news.ycombinator.com