However, the political system was just as corrupt a half century ago as now. Lyndon Johnson, Richard Daley, Wilbur Mills, etc., were just as corrupt as the current batch in power, if not as leftist. Yet the Interstate system was built in spite of the normal graft.
The irony is that solving transportation problems is actually easy. I do it for a living, and I always tell people that I could have done 90% of my job as a professional with a 10th-grade education.
The biggest challenge isn't solving the problem: its paying for the solution and dealing with political opposition -- much of it completely understandable because the solution is at odds with everything people want in a free society.
I'll fix any transportation problem you're dealing with right now. The only conditions are:
1. You have to give me the authority to tell you where you can live.
2. You have to give me the authority to tell you where you can work.
3. You have to give me the authority to tell you when you travel to and from work.
4. You have to give me the authority to tell you how to travel to and from work.
5. You have to give me the same authority over all of your travel -- including school, vacation, errands, etc.
Anyone who would accept such things belongs in a prison camp.
Eisenhower, after all, had many years earlier been on a months-long military convoy from Washington to San Francisco that made a lasting impression with him of the nation's nearly-impassible roadways. In typical cold-war fashion, he pushed for a network of all-weather highways connecting major military installations in case of a conflict with the Soviets. (And this purpose, of course, could be justified as a constitutional use of federal funds, unlikely to be challenged.)
The hang-up was Ike's intention to bypass the big cities to expedite movement of troops and materiel. Politics reared its ugly head and some routes were changed to mollify mayors and governors. In other cases--I-70 through Utah for example--military needs overrode objections by state politicians and the highway took twists and turns that looked on the map like the road to nowhere.
Times have changed. Enviros now are in control in many states, unfortunately. The Sierra Club, Fiends of the Earth and EDF have used their clout and delayed highways to the point that they don't get built, or get torn up as happened in San Francisco after the Loma Prieta earthquake.in '89.
I can recall when California's then-governor, Gray Davis, opened the last segment of the Foothill Freeway and declared it would be the last freeway built in California. He could be right.
It's time to start over, and do it right. Poole's arguments are valid, especially with respect to the obsolete fuel tax.
The only weak point I can see is treating highways as "public utilities." Good grief! Don't we have enough consumer abuse from politically-appointed public utilities commissions with regard to "tiered" electric and gas rates, "green" meters, incentives to replace our water-wasting top-loading washing machines with clothes-ruining front-loading machines? Does this idiocy have to extend to methods of setting highway tolls, perhaps as a function of family income? Or the number of children you have? Or your vehicle's average MPG?
Why not allow the market to function for a change? Or is that too difficult to understand?