The Right should not give up on cities
by John Norquist
Why are so many on the Right hostile to rail transit? When I was mayor of Milwaukee from 1988 to 2004, I wanted to restore some of the streetcar system that had been removed back in the fifties. Republicans, fueled by talk-radio personalities, attacked the idea as if I’d proposed Sovietizing the bratwurst industry. This attitude plays out across the United States, in any state that has a city big enough to have or desire a transit system.
Conservatives in Europe, Canada, and Japan aren’t so resistant. In Switzerland, arguably Europe’s most politically conservative nation, streetcars and commuter trains run almost everywhere people live. Is the reaction so different here because American conservatives oppose all government spending? No, the Republican Party, home to most conservatives in Congress, has supported comparatively large increases in spending when it has held power, most recently under George W. Bush. But enthusiasm for spending on the Right seems to focus on war, highways, and prisons. Prisons and war I understand, as the modern Republican Party openly promotes itself as uniquely patriotic and aggressively devoted to law and order. But why support spending lots of tax money on highways?
The reasons are highly situational. Republican support tends to be strongest in middle- and outer-ring suburbs developed in the second half of the 20th century when transportation and zoning standards yielded cul-de-sac subdivisions, malls, and business parks, all requiring cars to navigate. The Republican base spends a lot of time in automobiles, so their representatives feed them more and wider lanes of concrete. There are always other issues on which to take principled anti-spending stands, even as highway expansion projects soar in cost and leave regions just as congested as before.
Highway contractors are also an easy touch for campaign donations. As with military contractors, nearly all of their revenue is derived from government funds. As described by Robert Caro in The Path to Power, Lyndon Johnson learned this early in his political career, raising funds from Texas-based Brown and Root to help elect Democrats. It didn’t take Republicans long to line up at the same counter. For the road-building industry, trading relatively small amounts of campaign cash for billions in government contracts is an easy decision.
But this politically motivated interference has negative side effects. In Canada, where there is no national highway or transit program, cities and provinces fund their own mix of roads and transit. And all Canadian large cities have good transit and street networks. Conversely, in the U.S., declining core cities like Detroit and Buffalo have been covered with federally subsidized highways. Rather than profiting from the investment, Detroit is sinking and the greater region ranks as a leader in traffic congestion along with Atlanta, Houston, Los Angeles, and other areas with massive highway systems. Results like that shouldn’t please a movement that insists on efficient use of government funds.
One oft-repeated critique of conservatives is that they are stuck in the past. When contemplating transportation policy, I wish that were true. After all, it was my fellow Democrats, with some unenthusiastic help from President Dwight Eisenhower, who performed the coup de grace, driving a dagger into the faltering private, but still tax-paying, passenger rail and streetcar transit industries. In 1956, the Interstate Highway Act, sponsored by Sen. Albert Gore Sr., passed through a Democratic Congress. Senate Majority Leader Lyndon Johnson played a key role, pushing escalating subsidies for federal highways from a 40/60 fed/state match when he arrived in Washington to 90/10 in the interstate bill. Federal capital for trains and rail transit was zero. Railroads got the message and dumped passenger service; private transit companies shut down.
Meanwhile, the Right has become dysfunctionally attached to a transportation system that violates its principles. Highways appropriate private property. In greater Milwaukee, systemwide highway widening is on track to cost taxpayers nearly $7 billion, while resulting in the seizing and demolition of nearly $200 million worth of private property. Even where construction doesn’t always require outright confiscation, wider highways drain the value from neighboring private property and have corrosive effects on compact central cities.
Before the recent push by the state to expand highways in Milwaukee, we took the opportunity to remove an aging elevated freeway that was causing blocks and blocks of blight along riverfront land. Occupying property next to the freeway was like living next to the Berlin Wall. Removing the freeway has helped downtown grow as young people and retirees choose the convenience and excitement of urban living. Where before the freeway repelled high-value, jobs-producing uses, a new boulevard is home to a boutique hotel and serves as the gateway to the new headquarters of Fortune 500 Manpower Inc.
Throughout much of the history of human civilization, transportation infrastructure supported a fully functioning civitas—something the Right should care to conserve. Streets served three purposes: movement of goods and people, economic or market functions, and social functions. But for decades, federal policy has mandated that only movement be considered in allocating federal tax dollars. Streets that serve as a setting for people to walk, shop, and engage in civic life are not part of the Department of Transportation playbook. Instead, the federal and state DOTs push big grade-separated roads that focus only on vehicle throughput and not on markets that flourish on streets like Michigan Avenue in Chicago, Broadway in New York City, or Main Street in Hometown, America. The avenues and boulevards of our nation have not been a priority for federal funding even though they host much of America’s social capital and commerce.
Like urban boulevards, transit systems tend to fit comfortably in urbanized metropolitan areas. Thriving in tight spaces, transit systems involve far less seizing of property, and they attract development, boosting the value of neighboring property. Unlike highways, they generally function better as they attract more users. It’s no surprise that cities with good transit have high concentrations of jobs and real estate value while places dominated by highways and without transit have faltered economically. Forcing road expansion on cities that don’t want it while blocking investment in value-adding transit improvements seems imprudent and even punitive.
Throughout history, cities—created by market forces and the complex interactions of the people drawn to them—have been a setting for the growth of individual liberties, property rights chief among them. The city-states of Renaissance Italy and the North European Hanseatic League flourished as trade and private ownership expanded and declined only when large nation-states taxed them to wage wars. Today, conservatives still claim to value personal freedom and cherish markets, but they are alienated from the cities that nourish both. Instead, they are committed to a central state more interested in crusading abroad than building community at home.
The billions we devote to war would be better spent renewing America’s own cities. Not blindly paving to satisfy federal mandates but prudently planning and efficiently constructing infrastructure to serve local needs. What could be more conservative than that?
John Norquist, who served as Democratic mayor of Milwaukee from 1988 to 2004, is president of the Congress for the New Urbanism.
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Why is John Norquist….. a far left former mayor of Milwaukee writing articles for the American Conservative? What’s next, Mayor Phil Gordon writing an editorial on why we should support open borders? If I lived in a tiny country like Switzerland and got to ride around with Swiss people on a train that would be just fine. But as someone who has ridden the bus in Los Angeles, Phoenix, Milwaukee and other cities…I can say that it absolutely sucks. The worst part is that you have to ride along with complete scumbags and some of the dumbest, most obnoxious human beings on the planet. The light rail in Phoenix takes ages to get across town….and then you have to get off and transfer onto a bus. Who wants to sit and wait for a rail system or walk 15 blocks to the bus stop when it’s hot as hell outside(or cold as balls if you’re talking about Milwaukee.)
Having a car is about personality and freedom to drive around where you want, when you want, in your own space. There are better and more serious ways of ridding ourselves of dependence on foreign oil than herding people into cattle cars. We could simply make vehicles that don’t run on gasoline. Any solution aimed at energy reduction would require that we impose population control measures like immigration restrictions and maybe even reproductive restrictions….since any savings by reducing fuel consumption would be negated by rising populations of these areas.
What happens when the workers on these trains decide to strike because they are not happy with their government wages or some technicality in their benefits package?
I’m open to the idea of light rail systems if they are well thought out. Preferably I’d like to see cities become financially solvent before embarking on huge construction projects which will require further subsidizing since they don’t pay for themselves and more often lose money.
P.S. Since when does John Norquist care about property rights? Milwaukee has one of the highest property tax rates…and is one of the least business friendly cities in the country…. which is why companies are leaving in droves to places like Florida and Texas.
Also when I was a kid the city fined us and we to go to hearings just because we took down a rusty old chain link fence in our backyard…all because they claimed it was “historical.”
Brandon has clearly never experienced a good transit system, which provides for far more “freedom” than cars.
I used to live in Japan, and the transit system always got me where I needed to go in a time that was comparbile to what I could do with a car. It was far, far cheaper as well….I spent about $150 a month on transit, which is a third of what it takes to own and operate a car. Since conservatives equate money with freedom, I was certainly $300/month more “free” in Japan. It bought a lot of good beer, trust me. I was also “free” to to have to go to the gym every day, because I had a half hour of exercise built into my daily routine. I was also free to go out and have a few drinks, and not worry about how to get home. Likewise, I was free not to worry about other potential drunk drivers, as they were all on the trains too! And let’s not even get started on the 25% or so of people who cannot drive here in the US. How much “freedom” do they have when it comes to transit, being forced to beg rides from friends and family.
I am sorry, but a good transit system provides MORE freedom, not less, than our “stuck behind some jerk, waiting for the stoplight outside the strip mall” wonderland we have created here in the US.
I am a longtime transit rider and have made many a trip on the Chicago elevated and the CTA’s buses, as well as the transit systems in L.A., San Francisco, New York, Boston, New Orleans, Toronto, Baltimore, Montreal, St. Louis and Dallas and I have sat next to some of the people Brandon Adamson describes in his splenetic and spittle-flecked little tantrum. Some of those experiences were a little challenging, but nothing as challenging as if I’d had to sit next to Brendan Adamson. He and our lavishly subsidized highway system are welcome to each other.In fact, I’m beginning to think our huge highway subsidies may be worth it if they keep Brandon Adamson off my bus.
Chad,
I have no doubt that Japan provides an excellent transit system and is in fact a superior country in most regards. For one thing, they do what’s in their national interests, which is more than what can be said of the peculiar policies of the US. And yes, if we had an immigration policy like Japan, I’m sure we would be a more civilized and advanced society as well. However, there is one major difference with Japan’s transit system, and that is that you get to ride it with Japanese people…who are polite and don’t talk on their cellphones. They don’t “hoot and holler” or try to strike up annoying, unsolicited conversations with you. And the drunks on the trains are worse then the ones on the road…because they start fights and are generally super obnoxious. At least while driving you can easily avoid them if you drive defensively.
If you had read my post you would see that I’m not opposed to light rail. I disagree that a transit system provides more freedom than a car. Most people would prefer to drive a car…which is why generally even the people who are fervent supporters of light rail only ride it when their car breaks down.
Brandon,
You are a misleading douche bag who most definately has not been to Japan. Before commenting on something you know nothing about please stop, and think to yourself “what would George W do in this scenario”.
Regards,
Marc
Comment of the year by FK Pious! In addition to his other issues, Brandon Adamson is a highly unreliable source of information on John Norquist. As Mayor, Norquist almost always kept his budget increases under the rate of inflation and trimmed city government employment ranks by more than 1000 positions over his four terms. On property rights, he’s argued for limited use of eminent domain powers and wrote an amicus brief on behalf of the plaintiffs in the Kelo Case. http://www.ij.org/about/1403
Marc,
Why don’t you learn how to spell words like “definitely” before making childish comments in a reasoned debate. I’m not a supporter of George W, but you spell like Dan Quayle. Anyway we’re trying to have a discussion here, and there is no reason to personalize it.
F.K.,
If you sat next to me on the bus, it would not bother you because I am polite and keep to myself. Perhaps you are right about mass transit. Who knows? I haven’t enjoyed my experiences on buses/rail but am certainly open public transportation and other forms of urban renewal.
Steve,
I used to live Milwaukee, so I’m only speaking as to my experience of growing up there. Most of my family moved away due to the astronomical property taxes, poor economic prospects, horrible public schools and cold weather. Maybe Norquist did some good things. If so, kudos to him. Conservatism in Milwaukee as I remember it, is mostly neocon…and I can definitely picture local hosts like Mark Belling ranting and raving about Norquist’s transit proposals. The city doesn’t appear to have good republican alternatives to anything.
I do know that Phoenix light rail loses a ton of money, about 20 million per year….and that it is hot as hell outside while you are waiting for one of those trains.
Brandon — Saying Phoenix light rail “loses” money is a nonstarter. How much money do freeways make? I can assure you they lose far more money while at the same time offering far less bang for the buck in economic development.
True conservatives would believe in providing transportation choices — not having the government dictate how to get around for us. True conservatives would also have road users pay a user fee — similar to transit fares and toll roads. By providing only one choice in most communities, the government currently dictates everyone has to drive. Massive subsidies are poured into highways, which are shoved down our throats. In many communities, it’s often even impossible to exercise our most fundamentally human form of transport — walking — because many of our public spaces are completed allocated to cars with no room left over for people. Real freedom is having transportation options and not being a slave to your car.
Does the conservative case against public transit really depend on the notion that Americans are a uniquely intolerable group of people? Or is it that Americans are a uniquely misanthropic group of people?
I at least have some sympathy for arguments in favor of the flexibility of cars. Indeed, I think they are a great and improvable technology that will undoubtedly continue to play a very prominent role in transportation for the conceivable future, even in a more balanced, multi-modal world.
But the obvious problem is that being in favor of cars doesn’t mean you have to be in favor of ONLY cars, since all the notable transportation technologies have different advantages and disadvantages that make it quite likely a multi-modal model is going to end up optimal. So I guess that is where the notion that Americans just can’t stand being around each other becomes necessary.
Mr. Norquist, the reason that “conservatives” are opposed to rapid transit is that they are no longer conservatives. Conservatism has come to mean “individualism,” which is of course the opposite of real conservatism. Conservatives were convinced that individualism was the opposite of collectivism. It isn’t; community is. Collectivism depends on stripping the human person of all this natural connections–family, neighborhood, civic, religious, etc.–which leaves him naked before the state.
Getting on a rail car is viewed as forced collectivization, while getting stuck in a traffic jam in your own private car is viewed as “individualism.” The rail is “government” but somehow the road escapes this description.
John,
Thank you for a thoughtful and thought-provoking article. Your insights are on target, as always.
To those inclined to dismiss Mr. Norquist as a “lefty,” here’s a conservative Republican who says I’d vote for a thoughtful, responsible leader like Norquist any day of the week. We need leaders who think more than we need labels.
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I am a longtime transit rider and have made many a trip on the Chicago elevated and the CTA’s buses, as well as the transit systems in L.A., San Francisco, New York, Boston, New Orleans, Toronto, Baltimore, Montreal, St. Louis and Dallas and I have sat next to some of the people Brandon Adamson describes in his splenetic and spittle-flecked little tantrum. Some of those experiences were a little challenging, but nothing as challenging as if I’d had to sit next to Brendan Adamson. He and our lavishly subsidized highway system are welcome to each other.In fact, I’m beginning to think our huge highway subsidies may be worth it if they keep Brandon Adamson off my bus.