re: How does road construction take so long

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I know its a scam because I see videos of the dutch/germans building shite in a weekend that takes a year here.

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Decades ago when they were planning on rebuilding part of the inner loop in Brussels that involved excavating for tunnels and lowering the roadway completely the authorities there came up with what to my mind is still one of the most brilliant solutions ever to lessen impact on traffic: they brought in their army engineer division and in one night had them erect their mobile bridges to build a temporary viaduct system for several miles so traffic could continue uninterrupted above the work area. Each time they needed to move a little further along they brought them in again and added to the viaduct span.

Skyscrapers are not built faster.

The Empire State Building was built in 11 months with no fatalities. Steel was from Bethlehem Steel.

Was in Vancouver, Canada a week ago. Road crews went out in the city. Three people. All had shovels. All fillers in holes. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing.

They actually filled holes in less than an hour and moved on.

Why can’t we?

Because we’re Americans. You know. The best and the brightest.

/s

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Liquidated damages is a pretty good incentive

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LD’s are great on paper, but have to actually be enforced. If they aren’t enforced, they can be problematic:

- State issues an RFP for a project. RFP has significant language around liquidated damages.
- Company A (shitty local contractor with connections) submits a low-ball bid.
- Company B (more reputable, larger contractor) submits a compete bid that accounts for all provisions in the RFP.
- State goes with the low bid because they’re the government and they have to.
- Company A fricks the job up, has quality issues, and blows the schedule.

Here’s what should happen:
- State documents all quality issues and schedule overages.
- State fully enforces all liquidated damages, bends Company A over, and refuses to pay extra for anything that was clear in the RFP.
- Company A takes a huge loss on the project and either folds or has to bid the next one correctly.
- Next time there’s an RFP, bids should be better because there are consequences.

Here’s what actually happens:
- Quality issues and schedule overages get swept under the rug because Company A has connections.
- LD’s don’t get enforced because they aren’t documented correctly and/or the state doesn’t want to put Company A out of business (again, connections).
- Company A gets change orders for all kinds of shite that should have been in their bid, and they make money on the project.
- Next time there’s an RFP, Company A wins again.
- Company B says “frick this” and doesn’t bother bidding anymore.

At least in Louisiana, this happens far too often. You get shitty contractors winning jobs because they’re willing to take more risk knowing their buddies will bail them out if it goes south. The bid process itself is highly scrutinized, but there’s a ton of room for maneuvering once a project has been awarded and there are less eyes on it.

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Public sector. They have no incentive to move quickly.

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Very little of the paving done in this country is done by public employees. The vast majority is done by private paving companies.

By the way, if you want to become a millionaire rather quickly, starting a paving company is one of the fastest ways to do it.

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They’ve been “working” on I-65 in Kentucky and Southern Indiana for years. It was supposed to be completed in 2020. They’re still working on it.

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Now they have covid as an excuse.

Here's a hint: Does most of the work take place around election time?

Government inspectors make it take so long.