Zack KanterVerified account

Your general point is true. But the "Hyperloop" to O'Hare isn't expensive infrastructure -- it doesn't exist beyond the pipe dream in Elon Musk's head.

In that case, who cares? If it isn’t going to be built, there’s very little impact.

Because public infrastructure needs to have public accountability. If we cut down on buses because "hey take a scooter" it's gonna suck if you can't ride a scooter or don't have a bank account/smartphone/credit card and relied on buses.

If all the rich people take the hyperloop to ohare, that means less revenue for the cta, which goes to the entire city, not just the expensive downtown highrise district. Most of the 41000 people that work at Ohare take the cta and it's gonna suck for them the most.

I agree that the author is a bit heavy handed in his word choice, but the one thing that does strike me as at least a *little* worrisome is losing sight of the notion that infrastructure is something that everyone in a community shares.

The decisions around how those resources are used and paid for are, at least in theory, up to voters who put elected officials in office. With private industry, citizens lose that local control.

This annoys me so much. Reveals that for these people, public works inefficiency is not merely a necessary evil we need in order to build roads; is is *the entire point,* and the building of those roads more of a secondary consideration

Same happened in France; with this incompetent, corrupt and inefficient public agency that's basically an expensive job board, to "fight unemployment." When "some other solutions" (ahem) came up creating jobs, people were pissed because they were "doing the government's job!"