We are 2.2 trillion dollars in the hole infrastructure-wise.

[ddeclue]

27% of our bridges are structurally deficient or obsolete.

the average age of American bridges is 43 years old.

the i35 bridge that collapsed in Minneapolis was 42 years old.

we need to spend money on infrastructure not bailing out wall street.

[leftstreet]

1. When do those Shovel Ready Job thingys start?

[MannyGoldstein]

2. Privitization Is The Only Solution

We'll pay Goldman Sachs to take them off our hands.

[Demeter]

3. Is That All?

What about the schools? Surely an equal amount...

[Edweird]

4. As a guy that works in infrastructure, I would LOVE to see some gov projects

come down the pike. But it isn't looking good. There's no money for jobs. Only billions and trillions for the already rich criminal/fuck up class. Something very wrong has happened to our party.

[Quantess]

5. Do you have links for any of these factoids?

I would love to dicuss anything that isn't about Rush Limbaugh's heart attack, but it would be nice to see some sources.

[Major Hogwash]

6. At least. How the hell are people in Minneapolis getting downtown without that bridge?

I used to cross that bridge every day when I went to work back when I lived there 20 years ago.
Without that bridge, I can't see how everyone can get bottlenecked up to get from the south to the north part of town.

[WT Fuheck]

7. Maybe Obama will fight for

300 billion in immediate tax credits, 800 billion in immediate direct gifts to large banks, 100 billion in immediate miscellaneous republican pork barrel projects, a trillion or so immediately to insurance companies, a trillion or so immediately to the "defense" contractors, and a couple hundred billion to infrastructure projects rolled out over the next twenty years.

Fight team, fight! Go-o-o-o-o-o TEAM!

[wuvuj]

8. check here?

http://www.asce.org/reportcard/2005/page.cfm?id=145

27% of America's bridges--more than one in four--are structurally deficient or functionally obsolete.

Since 1998 the number of unsafe dams has risen by more than 33% to 3,500.
There were 29 dam failures in the past two years in the United States.

In 2002, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency estimated that the country must invest $161 billion over the next 20 years to upgrade America's drinking water treatment plants.

The industry needs to invest $10 billion a year over the next five years to ensure the reliability of the national power grid.

As many as 350,000 chemically contaminated waste sites may need to be cleaned up over the next 30 years, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
The national bill for this cleanup could reach $250 billion.

Traffic on the nation's 12,000 miles of inland waterways is increasing, but the facilities are aging. Nearly 50% of the system's 257 locks are more than 60 years old, with some built in the early 19th century.

34% of America's major roads are in poor or mediocre condition.
36% of America's major urban roads are congested.

[Kaleva]

9. gas tax ought to be raised 75 cents a gallon.

[TheKentuckian]

10. That's just our existing falling down raggedy crap

and not accounting for generation behind improvements.

I doubt that figure includes nearly the entire sewer system nationwide. All of that crap is over a hundred and crumbling which risks our insufficient water.

Anybody that claims there isn't anything for virtually everyone to be doing with legitimate and immediately needed purpose is lying and probably an idiot conservative.
We got shit that needs doing enough to provide a decade or two's work at a steady clip for about everyone. Plus, people don't even think about the support, administrative, vendor, and retail jobs that such efforts generate too.

Everything we have is pretty much poorly maintained, obsolete, or in need of update.