"Bridges to Nowhere" is a cute, meaningless sound bite

myself | 16 Nov 2005 | redpoll

[GAAC]

Gravina is anything but flat, dude, I know, because I worked on Gravina for 7 years.

[FreedomCalls]

I can imagine someone in Baltimore circa 1790 saying, "Why should I help develop the Midwest?" Or someone back east circa 1840 saying the same thing about California.

They did. That's why the railroads (private companies) were given checkerboarded land grants on either side of the railroads they (privately) built with their own money -- not federal money. The deal was that they would get the land and if development came later because of the railroad infrastructure then both the government land and the ceded railroad land would rise in price and it could be sold off to the benefit of both. The government didn't pay directly to build the railroads through the west -- private capital did.

Example of land grant ownership in a "checkerboard" pattern. This shows a portion of the original Union Pacific land grant, just north of Laramie, Wyoming. It is quite typical of other railroad land grants. The small squares are one-square mile "sections." The rail line appears slightly off-center, because the modern track alignment was improved over the original. From: Railroad Land Grants

[hosepipe]

You are reacting to a comment made by redpoll, I just quoted it..

[RockinRight]

Even a toll road would dramatically improve things. Why not have the State of Alaska foot the bill, not the Feds, then have it be a toll road?

Sounds like a reasonable solution to this Ohioan.

[SunkenCiv]

Note: this topic is from 11/16/2005. Thanks redpoll.

[curth]

If the people want the bridge, see just how badly they want it. Ask the good citizens if they would give up their yearly Permanent Fund checks to pay for it. Last year each person got $1,281.00. Population is 710,231. If my math is correct, that comes out to $909,805,911. Plenty of dough there to build a bridge and it won’t cost the state one additional cent.