# How is the Infrastructure in Your City???



## Kolony (Jan 20, 2012)

Please comment how well infrastructure in the place where you live is developed and what could be better develped. 

For Example - Edmonton: 

Excellent Infrastructure in Roads, Buildings, Homes, and Businesses. The only things may need further development is Transportation (Roads and Busses great, Urban Rail not so good) and Homes (slight housing shortage).


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## the spliff fairy (Oct 21, 2002)

On paper London's infrastructure looks perfect, with huge tube, bus, rail, light rail, riverbus and tram networks that extend far into the suburbs. Even a cable car now. - But in reality its a real pain in the arse, enough to make someone leave the city.

The corruption is what eats at you. The upgrade plans for the tube lines is costing billions more than it should and taking multiple times longer than the initial 2 year plan for the entire network (it's 7 years and counting, for only 2 lines done so far) - thanks to private companies taking part in a festival of free, public cash. The more things break down, the more money they get. The more long, winding interchanges through stations that often involve going up to ground level before descending once more to a few metres from where you started, the more you even out the overcrowding (in reality there are numerous shortcuts, originally designed for the stations, that they seal off and only their staff use), and that they got paid an $800 million undefined 'ambiance' premium for 'improving' the stations. Oh and white tiles. They like cheap white tiles too.

The upgrade overpricing and delaying is robbing the city of its vitality, business and nightlife, in the name of fat billionaires and greedy shareholders, most of whom wouldn't know how to buy a public transport ticket if their life depended on it (a probable situation if ever they reached that stage). And often the same publicly minded people behind the 1000 roadworks a day hitting the capital and congesting the roads by one third, 80% of which is unnecessary - notably Thames Water, Orange and EDF (the latter two French companies) that once formed majority shareholders of Metronet. This was the original private company that robbed the public purse of $700 million a pop every time it went cap in hand to the govt for extra cash, for its horrifically failed tube upgrade scheme. Instances such as laying the wrong cabling in the Jubilee Line upgrade, then oops having to dig it all out again and restart from scratch, an exercise that took years of pointless disruption but gave them some very tidy profits. Then when they finally were refused their cash they went bust and was paid $2.75 billion from the public purse so the fat cats could keep their cash and carry on patronising lapdance establishments.

The Tube Lines company that took up where they left off was of the same ilk, trying to overcharge an estimated $2.83 billion for the next stage of upgrades. And who continued the 'sock tradition' of sending teams down to work at end of day, putting a covering (eg a smelly old sock) over the CCTV cameras then coming up again in the morning utterly 'exhausted' after a hard nights graft.

3-4 million journeys disrupted a pop. The wonderful differences between planned closures and fully open:

















Finally the mayor, freed from the former govts dreaming-up and thus undying support of this terrible PPP Scheme (Public Private Partnership), a contract with more holes in it than Swiss cheese with acne, got rid of the private sector 'contribution'. For starters, the planned weekend closures for the busiest lines instantly went from 82 weekends down to 5. Yes, *five*. Just a shame it took nine years of no pattern recognition whatsoever, and a failed Olympics deadline to realise this.

What can you say - private companies, standard business practice and the correlations with psychopaths.

Then there's the Public Sector side. Hmmm, the tube staff, with the strongest trade union in the country, and led by red-faced fat and shouty bloke, Rob Crowe. $45,000 starting pay in the ticket hall, $85,000 starter to $110,000 to 'drive' a train (its actually automatic, you just press buttons to open and close doors, and stop at any missed red signals). Then throw in periodic tube strikes over the entire network due to pressing issues such as the colour of the uniform, insufficient changing facilities, not high enough pay, premiums and bonuses (yeah, RIGHT) or whenever they try to sack a single driver for going through multiple red lights. Due to this up to 50 red lights are passed each month, 4x more than during the 1990s. The last gem was when they agreed to hold the city -and country - ransome during the Olympics unless they each got $1,375 or more (they rejected an initial $800 offer at the decision table) to work as normal during the Games. All the pay comes from the public too - and why the ticket prices are the highest in the world despite not making a profit. Now they're striking over why on _earth_ the powers that be want to replace the lot of em with robots.

In short Transport for London (TfL) is an icon for magnificent corruption on a grand scale, the best of both the private and public realms have to offer. They say oh no, corruption is what happens in the Third World and tin-pot dictatorships, the reality is it's exactly the same here, but with expensive lawyers called Jasper to defend it.

It took 7 years during the 1970s to build the entire Victoria Line. It took 9 years during the 1990s to repair one main escalator in Tottenham Court Rd on the Victoria Line, forcing millions to walk up 3 flights of stairs every day, an opportunistic work-out for which they charged by the hour. Says it all.

Don't let private contractors do the work. Don't let public workers dictate the plan.


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## Slartibartfas (Aug 15, 2006)

Public rail infrastructure services really show the limitations of the private business model. It simply does not work and I think the UK for making such a convincing case and by doing so helping other countries at least to prevent making the same mistake. One can debate private run rail services, which I am not convinced to be a completely good thing either but at least its not disastrous, like privatizing rail infrastructure is.

In Vienna they modernized half of the U1 line, replacing the tracks and adding some additional switches after 30 years of service. It took 7 weeks in which the line was completely closed down in the southern half. They had 2 temporary tram lines as replacement plus some upgraded bus services during that time. After 7 weeks everything was up and running on new tracks. While it certainly was a pain for the circumstances it was very well handled.

I know London's system is a quite different case because of its age and decade long neglect. But I wonder if more disruptive but more effective renovation works wouldn't be a better strategy at least for part of the work. It should be much cheaper for sure because you really can't work well if you have to prepare and clean up everything weekend wise.

Why isn't the UK nationalizing the Tube again? I mean, it should be crystal clear that a state own company hardly could do worse than the private ones. Is it only ideology that prevents the UK from taking that step?


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## Svartmetall (Aug 5, 2007)

Stockholm very much impressed me when I moved here over a year ago, and continues to do so today. Not once have I ever entertained the notion of getting a car as public transport is generally very efficient and given the size of the city and even the metropolitan area, we have a lot of rail provision (that is growing too). This is not to say there aren't issues, but a number are currently being sorted and in my quite extensive travels I've not come across a city of this size that has the breadth of infrastructure we have here. 

So individual categories:

*Public transportation*: Extensive, well utilised (with around 430+ trips per capita on public transport every year) and generally very reliable. We have (using the German counting method) 7 underground lines in three line groups (quite similar to Munich), a growing ring light rail line that is very well utilised that is currently being expanded to improve cross-city transport and connections between metro lines. A commuter rail system that is having a massive investment to tunnel a new stretch under the city centre to segregate it from long distance travel with new connections to the metro system. A three line smaller commuter system to serve the north-east of Stockholm that is under renovation and expansion. Three suburban light rail lines that serve smaller suburbs such as the island of Lidingö, plus an inner city tram line that is under expansion. This adds up to quite a lot of rail transport. Of course, then you have the gaps filled by buses with strategic "blue buses" to provide high quality trunk routes either in the city centre or between suburbs. There are also system expansions and new rail lines under planning currently. 

*Motorways*: Stockholm has a good system of motorways and has congestion charging for the city centre too. Roads are generally in good shape from what I can see and generally cleared well in harsh weather. Traffic can be intense in sections due to the city's importance to the country and surrounding towns and cities. 

*Housing*: Generally from what I've seen the housing (mostly apartment) stock is of a very high standard - and I've looked around a lot trying to buy. Well insulated, well heated and with reliable services. The only problem is that not enough is being built quickly enough. We have a housing stock shortage.

*Internet*: Sweden as a whole has some of the best internet in the world due to heavy investment (we ranked third behind Japan and South Korea). As such fibre to the apartment is very common and as such it is very reliable and fast.


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## Busiouty (Jan 3, 2013)

Why isn't the UK nationalizing the Tube again? I mean, it should be crystal clear that a state own company hardly could do worse than the private ones. Is it only ideology that prevents the UK from taking that step?


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## Uaarkson (Feb 11, 2009)

Here in Michigan we have some of the worst infrastructure in the nation, which translates to some of the worst in the developed world. Roads, bridges, ramps, all crumbling. Most rural roads are dirt or gravel. Our Internet sucks. The incredible rail systems were decimated in under 50 years (being home to the automotive industry, Michigan was also ground zero for suburban sprawl and de-urbanization, and attempts to build inner city heavy rail/commuter rail was shot down time and time again by this very industry). Infrastructure spending and management is fractured and uneven. Roads can take days to be cleared after heavy snow. I could go on.


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## eddeux (Jun 16, 2010)

Uaarkson said:


> Here in Michigan we have some of the worst infrastructure in the nation, which translates to some of the worst in the developed world. Roads, bridges, ramps, all crumbling. Most rural roads are dirt or gravel. Our Internet sucks. The incredible rail systems were decimated in under 50 years (being home to the automotive industry, Michigan was also ground zero for suburban sprawl and de-urbanization, and attempts to build inner city heavy rail/commuter rail was shot down time and time again by this very industry). Infrastructure spending and management is fractured and uneven. Roads can take days to be cleared after heavy snow. I could go on.


I've never been up to Michigan, but always thought the state was ok besides the Detroit area.


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## Uaarkson (Feb 11, 2009)

The highways are okay for the most part.


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## musiccity (Jan 5, 2011)

Mississippi's infrastructure is horrific, the third world countries I've been to have better roads than MS. We have the highest rates of fatalities on the road in the US, and among the highest in the world due to poor road conditions and lack of lighting. Complete lack of rail, only one rail station in the whole state in the town of Greenwood. Absolutely pitiful.

http://www.foxnews.com/travel/2012/08/22/5-unusually-dangerousand-5-especially-safeplaces-to-drive/

Tennessee on the other hand has superb infrastructure, though there is a lack of public transport.


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## Jonesy55 (Jul 30, 2004)

Slartibartfas said:


> Why isn't the UK nationalizing the Tube again? I mean, it should be crystal clear that a state own company hardly could do worse than the private ones. Is it only ideology that prevents the UK from taking that step?



The London tube is and always had been in public ownership. A 30-year maintenance contract was awarded to private sector consortia a decade ago but that arrangement collapsed (indeed it did prove a costly mistake) and maintenance is now back in the hands of TfL which is a public body.

From the wiki article:



> ransport for London (TfL) replaced LRT in 2000, a development that coincided with the creation of a directly elected Mayor of London and the London Assembly. In January 2003 under new Managing Director Tim O'Toole, the Underground began operating as a Public-Private Partnership (PPP), whereby the infrastructure and rolling stock were maintained by two private companies (Metronet and Tube Lines) under 30-year contracts, while London Underground Limited remained publicly owned and operated by TfL.
> 
> The National Audit Office in a 2004 report on the PPP stated that the Department of Transport, London Regional Transport and London Underground Limited spent £180m in structuring, negotiating and implementing the PPP and also reimbursed £275m of bid costs to the winning bidders.[34]
> 
> ...


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## Jonesy55 (Jul 30, 2004)

As for the national rail network, again the infrastructure privatisation was a short-lived disaster that was brought back into public hands a decade ago. The private train operators I'm not sure, they have brought innovations but some have failed to provide good services . Rolling stock has been greatly improved, as has reliability since the private infrastructure debacle of the late 90s/early 00s was sorted out.

Also passenger numbers carried on the network have rocketed since privatisation after decades of steady decline under the completely nationalised system. It's difficult to pinpoint an exact reason for that but more innovative demand-management pricing and improved rolling stock from private operators for example may be one factor, as may increasing petrol taxes by government.

Passenger journey numbers have recently passed the postwar peak during military demobilisation in 1946 and are now at the highest levels since the early 1930s before mass car ownership.


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## Jonesy55 (Jul 30, 2004)

In terms of my town the infrastructure is generally fine, could be better, could be much worse. We have good rail links with hourly or twice-hourly services heading off in 6 directions to surrounding towns and nearby big cities which includes regional airports, you do however have to change trains to get to London and Liverpool. We may get direct London services again when the West Coast Mainline contract is renewed. 

Local buses are fine, pleasant and generally modern and comfortable and frequent during the day, and they include 'park and ride' systems from 3 locations on the edge of town where people from the surrounding area can leave their vehicles and take public transport to the centre.

But evening and sunday bus services are poor though. However as even the farthest suburbs of the town are only 3-4 kms away from the central areas most places are walkable/cyclable and cycle infrastructure is good compared to most uk towns with plenty of good paths away from motorised traffic. 

The centre of town is very pedestrian friendly though due to geography there is a show-moving stream of circulating cars on a loop of roads in the centre which could be improved.

In terms of longer distance roads, we are well connected to the national motorway network to the east for access to the Midlands and SE of England but it's a mix 1+1 or non-motorway 2+2 roads for heading south, west or north, they can get congested at peak times.

Housing is generally ok, many old homes, probably 25% pre-1919 but most have been upgrade over the years, cost is an issue though as it is all over the country and in many other countries too due to recent property market booms. Most new homes built seem to be either rowhomes or apartments with a few detached properties thrown in if the development is towards the edge of town rather than more central.

Broadband access is not world beating but fine for most purposes, 20mbps for £10 per month is typical.


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## Diego N (Apr 1, 2010)

You guys are complaining about simple things :lol:
Just to start I will talk about something essential worldwide. Paved roads and streets.
I wont say Brazil because things would be even worse, so this pictures are from my state, Santa Catarina, one of the most developed places in Brazil, in its southern region. 
The first picture is from an "interstate highway" that connects the city of São Joaquim in Santa Catarina state to São José dos Ausentes in Rio Grande do Sul state.








In the next picture another interstate from Matos Costa in my state to General Carneiro in Paraná state.








This kind of issue can be seen in at least 30% of all roads in my state, and not only in "middle of nothing" areas.
The next picture is from a poorer area of my city. Again one of the most developed in the country. As you might see by yourself at GSV, most of brazilian areas look worse than Africa, what again says that infraestructure is not always followed by HDI or other stuff.









All the images are from Google Street View service.


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## Yuri S Andrade (Sep 29, 2008)

^^
Santa Catarina is indeed the most developed state, with quasi-First World indicators. Its infrastructure, however, is awful. Way worse than other poorer states, so I don't think we should use Santa Catarina as a reference for the entire country (not saying Brazilian infrastuture is good though).

Your city, Blumenau, it's an example of that. Very wealthy, it's already in the "First World", only 4% of households on poverty (in Brazil, as a whole, they're 32%), but the infrastructure is non-existent.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

About the thread, São Paulo state has, by far, the best infrastructure in Latin America. I can summarize it later. 

Londrina has one of the best urban infrastructure in entire country (according to the 2010 Census and its urban survey). Paved roads, proper sidewalks, running water, trees on the streets, sewerage, everything. The infrastructure of Paraná state (where Londrina is located) is way worse than São Paulo's.


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## Registered_User (Apr 15, 2012)

"On the border of breakdown", pretty much sums it all up...

Here are more info:

*Public transport*
There are lots of bus, metro, tram, train and ferry lines, which in the most part run quite regularly. Meaning on the paper it looks quite nice.
In reality it mostly a pain in the ass though. The population has grown 20% the last decade, but the capacity of the lines has not grown to keep up with it. You pretty need to fight for a space on board one of the buses or trams, and if you're lucky to get on board you will in probably 8 out of 10 times come several minutes late to your destination compared to the time table. This is probably mostly due to the overcrowding, which lead to long stops, but also due to heavy traffic (that I will cover next).

Especially the trams have been neglected for decades. Most of the trams 8the wagons themselves) are 30 years old, and a lot of the infrastructure are 60-70 years old. The last couple of years there has been quite a bit of focus on work on catching up on maintenance, but it will take many years. Especially since they must keep the lines open during roadworks.

The metro has new wagons, which is great. But the network is in serious need a new tunnel east-west through the city center. The current tunnel passed its capacity some 10 years ago, and the frequency out into the suburbs can't be increased due to capacity problems where all lines meet up in the city center. A new tunnel is at least 15 years into the future, maybe more.

*Roads and traffic*
All, and then I mean all, roads are paved - which is nice. But same as with the public transport the roads have not been upgraded to handle the growing population. Since the public transport struggle with capacity and delays a lot of people have to choose cars to get where they need in time - leading to ever more congestion, delays and frustration.

*Water supply*
The water out of the tap is clean, fresh and great. But now I hear stories that the cities water supply is closing in on the limit as well. There is a rather large lake which make up the supply, and from what I have heard we consume its total volume of water 3 times a year. So something obviously need to be done to increase the capacity here as well.

*Housing*
There is a major shortage of housing, and in return we get an average 8-9 % annual price increase. The city is growing at a rate of ~17.000 people a year (~2 %), and when knowing that more than 50 % of the households in the entire city have just 1 person there seems to be a need for at least 8.000, maybe 10.000 new apartments a year. Still they only manage to finish about 3-4.000 a year.

The prices have reached a limit where those with a regular will not be able to enter the housing market without help from parents or other relatives.
A 50 sqm apartment today cost minimum €350.000.

*Airport*
Oslo Airport is located 45 km north of the city, and can be easily reached by express train in 20 minutes. The airport opened in 1998.
The airport has a capacity of 23 millioner annual travelers, while it in 2011 had 21,1 million travelers. So it's closing in on the limit, which has forced the airport authorities into extend the terminal building. There is also talk about a third runway.

*Power supply*
Luckily no issues here. It always works, and I can't remember having a fall out - at least not the last 4-5 years.

I love Oslo in many ways, but it sure is experiencing a lot of "growth pain" these days.
The city had 500.000 inhabitants in the year of 2000, and now it has more than 620.000 and growing rapidly. Some major steps need to be done!


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## poshbakerloo (Jan 16, 2007)

*Manchester, UK*

In general very good.

It has the constantly expanding Metrolink network (tram) which is getting bigger and bigger all the time.

There is a decent bus network, although in general I hate buses to try to avoid them.

Roads, for an English city they are pretty good. There is a functioning Inner Ring Road, and a decent orbital motorway. The roads in the centre are pretty cut off but that is to keep the cars out on purpose, outside the centre they are fine for driving.

Airport, the best outside London. You can get to a lot of places from it.

Rail is very good in the south, not so good in the north where its mainly diesel and rather slow and dated. The south uses the WCML for commuter services so are pretty fast even for local trains which go 90mph in places.


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## alexandru.mircea (May 18, 2011)

*Paris* - I've not been here for long so my impressions are incomplete and possibly superficial.

*Public transport*.
_Metro_ - wonderfully practical. Hard to find a place in Paris where you're not in 5 to 10 minutes walk from a metro station. Still able to handle the large crowds (though complementary lines are required, for the future). Only minus: many stations in decay, and many RER trains in decay. They always have a two-three metro stations under renovation but when they finish all 300 of them 2-3 decades will have passed and new renovations will be needed, and so on... Also the central underground station Chatelet is in dire need of renovation, but as the largest underground transport station in the world it's more or less impossible to close it down, so I don't know how they'll do it. The very important RER B line (serves the CdG airport and Stade de France) is under full renovation (planned to end in 2016 I think), which is great and hopefully all the RER lines eventually receive the same treatement. 
_Bus_ - impractical, too full and too slow, too little of use. Night buses are great, though. Suburban lines much more important and of much better use.
_Train_ - the wealth of options to travel from Paris by train to anywhere in France and neighbouring countries is outstanding.
_Airports_ - very good, only complain is the low cost airport is too far. 

*Traffic infrastructure*: could do with the roads a bit less crowded, maybe some taxation like in London? The highways are severely insufficient nowadays, at rush hour. 
Surface (both road and boardwalk): brilliant, best I've seen in Western Europe so far. 
Street furniture: great. More intensive cleaning would be good, though.

*Housing*: dunno much on this one. Hard to build anything in Paris, as we all know. Private residences look good or very good more often than not, but public residences are quite poor looking. I would definitely not buy a home in an area with many public housing residences. There are some neighbourhoods which look like the suburbs, only the people are of a higher standard.


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## Latin l0cO (Nov 8, 2004)

Yuri S Andrade said:


> About the thread, São Paulo state has, by far, the best infrastructure in Latin America. I can summarize it later.


Thats a very bold statement. How did you come to this conclusion?


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## mintgum84 (Aug 18, 2011)

On all counts, truly amongst the worlds best.


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## Yuri S Andrade (Sep 29, 2008)

Latin l0cO said:


> Thats a very bold statement. How did you come to this conclusion?


Bold statement? How come? São Paulo's GDP, for instance, it's almost as twice as large as the Argentinian, so it's quite natural the state to have a proeminence in this area.

Getting into specifics: airports handling almost 60 million passengers a year, the busiest port in Latin America, 5,000 km of expressays (4 lanes or more), the subway/train systems in the capital's metropolitan area are 314 km long and handle 7 million passengers/day. 

Is there anything remotely comparable elsewhere in Latin America? I guess not.


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