"Americans who live outside the Northeast Corridor might enjoy the schadenfreude of knowing that New York Governor Andrew Cuomo has dubbed this the “summer of hell” amid disruptions in public transit.
But hell doesn’t have as many circles of dysfunction, and the root cause is the political misallocation of resources.
Hundreds of trains that run through New York City will be delayed or diverted this summer so Amtrak can make long overdue track repairs at Penn Station, the busiest rail hub in North America. Derailments are now common, and New York’s subways are also breaking down.The mess is a mere portent of the misery that commuters will experience when the 107-year-old tunnel under the Hudson River, which was badly damaged by Hurricane Sandy in 2012, undergoes repairs.
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Liberal politicians extol the virtues of public transit, so why can’t they run a decent public railroad?
The answer is that modern progressives prefer doling out transfer payments to voters and public workers rather than make long-term investments in subway cars, tunnels and bridges.
And even when they do build something, they pile on the costs to pay off their other political constituencies..."
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