Recent Streetsblog USA posts about Boondoggles

Can Seattle Stop Its Highway Tunnel Boondoggle Before It’s Too Late?

By Angie Schmitt | Jan 5, 2015 | 60 Comments

It’s been one year since the world’s largest tunnel boring machine, “Bertha,” got stuck 120 feet beneath Seattle. Before it broke down, the colossal machine had excavated just 1,000 feet of the two-mile tube that’s supposed to house a new, $3.1 billion underground highway to replace an aging elevated road called the Alaskan Way Viaduct. […]

The Great Traffic Projection Swindle

By Angie Schmitt and Payton Chung | Nov 20, 2014 | 22 Comments

This is the final piece in a three-part series about privately-financed roads. In the first two parts of this series, we looked at the Indiana Toll Road as an example of the growth in privately financed highways, and how financial firms can turn these assets into profits, even if the road itself is a big money loser. […]

Study: Corrupt States Spend More on Highways

By Angie Schmitt | Jun 6, 2014 | 14 Comments

A new academic study helps explain the enduring political popularity of expensive transportation boondoggles like Birmingham’s $4.7 billion Northern Beltline and Kentucky’s $2.6 billion Ohio River Bridges. According to research published in the journal Public Administration Review, states with higher levels of public corruption spend more money on highways and construction. The study found highway and construction projects and police programs […]

Washington DOT Chief: Seattle’s Big Highway Tunnel Might Not Get Built

By Angie Schmitt | Apr 30, 2014 | No Comments

Nearly five months after coming to a halt beneath the city of Seattle, Bertha — the largest tunnel boring machine in the world — is still immobilized. It had barely begun to clear space for the underground highway meant to replace the aging Alaskan Way Viaduct when it broke down late last year. Construction crews are […]

Grassroots Efforts “Crushed” by Louisville’s $2.6 Billion Bridge Boondoggle

By Angie Schmitt | Nov 20, 2013 | 34 Comments

At $2.6 billion, the Ohio River Bridges project in Louisville, Kentucky, is the costliest in the state’s history. It includes 18 elevated lanes, two enormously expensive bridges, a mammoth raised interchange, and a $225 million tunnel under an undeveloped suburban property (“Indiana’s Big Dig“). For years, Louisville residents J.C. Stites and Tyler Allen fought for […]

Meet the $4.7 Billion Birmingham Highway Only Cronyism Could Build

By Angie Schmitt | Jan 28, 2013 | 20 Comments

It is really a testament to how dominant the highway industrial complex has become that we even have to talk about Birmingham’s Northern Beltline, a $4.7 billion outerbelt first proposed in the 1960s. But with backing from big companies that would reap windfall real estate profits from the highway — and with a U.S. Senator […]

Show More Stories