Why Can't Blue States Build Nice Things?

[Tiny]

There was another thought provoking segment on Fareed Zakaria's show today. In a few days the transcript will appear here,

https://transcripts.cnn.com/show/fzgps

He interviewed an architect who worked on the renovation of the Penn Station Amtrak/Subway station in NYC and an expert on affordable housing in New York.

The part about Penn Station was interesting. The Trump administration took control of renovation from the state government, which was blowing up the budget and failing to get anything done, ostensibly to save money for the federal government. Will the federal government do a better job than the state and city would have? Hell if I know. But infrastructure costs in blue states are on average much higher than red states and Europe.

The part about affordable housing was more interesting. The expert had located sites close to the subway and other mass transit in NYC with room to house 1.3 million people. However, it's impossible for mid sized developers to construct housing at the locations because the red tape and "not in my background" mentality prevents it. He or Zakaria contrasted the situation to the greater Houston area, where the absence of zoning helps make housing much more affordable.

Any thoughts from esteemed board members?

[Yssup Rider]

Blue states????

Stretching pretty hard there Tiny.

[txdot-guy]

Here’s a link to the video if anyone wants to watch it.

https://www.cnn.com/2025/07/06/polit...re-development

As far as blue vs red states goes I would point you to the Bullet Train they have had trouble building in Texas. They have been talking about some version of that project since the eighties. Apparently Southwest Airlines helped kill the project back in the nineties.

https://klaq.com/southwest-airlines-...-bullet-train/

They started work on it again back in 2009 and it took until 2022 and the Texas Supreme Court to clear up the eminent domain issues.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_Central_Railway

My point is that Red States have their own issues with eminent domain and not in my backyard as much as any other and it can take a combination of the right people and the right time for things to progress.

The conservative attitude of “I own it and I’ll do whatever I want with it” does lead to laws that allow easy property development. Like in Houston. But the opposite is also true. The conservative bent towards private ownership can derail a good idea in its tracks. Some times you need the power of the state to bankroll large municipal projects. Those projects are very difficult to get off the ground without some form of private / public partnership that appeases the conservative government and the willingness for the state to claim its eminent domain sovereignty.