infrastructure

Who's Really to Blame for America's Lousy Transit Systems?

Historian Nicholas Dagen Bloom says that American politicians, especially at the municipal level, made a series of choices that diverted resources from mass transit to auto transportation. Neither racism nor the market nor secret conspiracies by industry made these choices inevitable.

Julie Livingston and Andrew Ross See the Car as a Machine for Unfreedom

The automobile is an object made to symbolize freedom that actually physically embodies a host of coercive relationships to work, debt, surveillance and policing, and the basic right of free movement, according to the authors of a new study. 

Will Baltimore's Black Communities Ever See Justice for the "Highway to Nowhere"?

The Robert Moses-designed expressway displaced Black families and neighborhoods for a stub of a freeway that ultimately stretched for less than two miles and does not connect to the rest of the interstate system. 

What Airports Can Tell Us About Histories of Regional Development

by Eric Porter

From the perspective of travelers, airports appear as generic "non-places." But for people who aren't just passing through—entrepreneurs, activists, and especially workers—their particularity makes them sites of struggle that shape the life of a region. Historians have much to learn from them, too. 

The Lost Art of Maintenance

The struggles of the New York transit system to preserve the useful life of its train cars, and to prevent problems before they occur, reflects deep and troubling changes in society's relationship to infrastructure and labor power. 

Mr. Biden, Tear Down this Highway

It's time to stop expanding the urban highways that divide communities, perpetuate racial segregation and harm health, and to consider removing them entirely, argues one architectural designer. 

Robert Moses is Dead. Making Him a Bogeyman Keeps Planners from Understanding Racism

By condemning the big projects Moses favored, planners excuse their own involvement in perpetuating the idea that some neighborhoods and some residents are more valuable than others. 

Biden's Push for Infrastructure Can't Leave Black Communities Behind

by N.D.B. Connolly

When infrastructure programs drive growth politics, entrenched interests in banking, real estate and planning can profit from preserving and expanding racial inequality. 

The Daily Show on Racism in Highway Building

Kevin Kruse contributes to the Daily Show's satirical take on the racist history of urban highway construction. 

The Industrial Infrastructure Catastrophe Hanging Over the Gulf Coast

The flooding and destruction of the refineries and storage facilities along 52 miles of the Houston Ship Channel is a matter of if, not when, says environmental lawywer Jim Blackburn. 

For 2022, the Democrats Don't Have an Alternative to Embracing Left Populist Energy

by Wallace Hettle

The political field is tilted against the Democrats for the midterms and 2024; will the party embrace the energy of progressives and mobilize its voters the way that conservatives are successfully doing on the other side? 

What's in the Infrastructure Plan for Animals?

Collisions between wildlife and vehicles are bad for animals and dangerous and costly to people and governments, too. The United States may take steps to catch up with technology to mitigate them. 

First, the Canals: John C. Calhoun, Slavery and Infrastructure

by Ariel Ron

The career of John C. Calhoun sheds light on conservative opposition to infrastructure spending today; his opposition to the improvements of the day was rooted in his commitment to a politics of hierarchy. 

A Conflict Among the Founders Still Shapes the Infrastructure Debate

by Susan Nagel

"The lack of a clearly defined constitutional role for the federal government in funding infrastructure improvements left it to the men who had been competing to enrich themselves to figure out what role the national government ought to play."

How the Meaning of Infrastructure Has Changed Over Time

by Peter A. Shulman

Economists who have criticized the broad working definition of "infrastructure" in the Biden bill need to consider the history of the term, as "the means to build something greater." 

The Hidden Stakes of the Infrastructure Wars

by David Alff

Debates over what counts as infrastructure are nothing new and reflect a history of conflict over who should benefit from public works and competing ideas of the scope of government.

Infrastructure Spending Has Always Involved Social Engineering

by Erika M. Bsumek and James Sidbury

Infrastructure projects have always created winners and losers. Historically, communities of color in America have been more likely to suffer harm from them. It's therefore entirely appropriate to make justice concerns a part of a proposed infrastructure bill. 

Powerline Politics in the 1970s and Today

by Tyler Priest

Environmental activists have forged anti-pipeline alliances with rural landowners using the issue of eminent domain. History shows that this might boomerang if farmers oppose the new electric transmission lines that will be needed to implement green electrification. 

Infrastructure Isn’t Really About Roads. It’s About the Society We Want.

by Erik Klinenberg

The word "infrastructure" has always been sufficiently capacious to include all kinds of systems necessary for the operation of society. If anything, Biden's plan needs to be bigger, and incorporate the civic infrastructure of elections and public knowledge and the social infrastructure of schools, parks and libraries. 

What 19th-Century Domestic Manuals Say about Housing as Infrastructure

by Leah Marie Becker

"We are only as safe as the person breathing the most polluted air or with the least access to stable housing."