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Roads
are planned, designed, and built by engineers.
And thank goodness for that.
After hearing all the jokes about how hard it is for
economists to reach a conclusion, can you imagine what a road built
by one of us would look like?
But maybe the idea isn’t so far fetched.
After all, roads consume a tremendous amount of resources,
both in construction and in maintenance.
And they have profound impacts on economic growth.
Too often we make that connection in reverse.
We record traffic counts and conduct engineering needs
assessments to justify road expenditures.
The question, as it is usually posed, is whether or not
spending on a specific road or improvement can be justified in
making our journeys to our jobs shorter and safer.
When and where communities grow, our network of roads can be
expected to grow to accommodate them.
But
for countless parts of the country, including many parts of
Indiana
, the
question increasingly is whether or not there will be any jobs to
drive to. The idea that
the roads we
build might help us create desirable jobs is one that many
Indiana
communities, battered by
the harsh winds of economic
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change,
should be warming up to.
If any state’s experience teaches us that access to transportation is
important, it is
Indiana
. Our
largest and fastest growing city,
Indianapolis
, sits at the
nexus of four major interstate freeways.
And of the four quadrants of the state, the only one not served
by a freeway – the southwest – has the lowest earnings and job
growth. And in each of the
happy situations where significant private investments have been made in
new manufacturing facilities, the sites chosen have had close access to
the major arteries of transportation.
But not all new roads we might contemplate have the same economic impact
for state residents. Roads
that bypass population centers, allowing interstate commerce to whisk
through the state as quickly as possible, are of less benefit to
Hoosiers than roads which connect urban centers.
Better
roads bring better access, which is high octane fuel for any region’s
economy. For consumers, more
access to goods
and services means more variety, lower prices, and more spending power.
For companies, better access to workers
increases the size and variety
of the labor pool,
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whereas
better access to vendors and suppliers of intermediate goods promotes a
better fit between buyers and sellers.
Both these add to productivity and ultimately to the
competitiveness of the economic base.
Imagine for just one moment that the cities of Anderson, Marion, and
Muncie were connected by roads that cut the travel time between any pair
down, say, to 20 minutes. With
access to all three markets, a whole host of specialized resources now
become viable. A regional
airport might be one. Specialized
legal, financial, and technical resources, at least an hour’s drive
away today, could move much closer.
And consumers gain better access to a wider variety of
restaurants, shops and services that ultimately improve their quality of
life.
If you look at commuting patterns between those three cities, such roads
are probably not warranted. But
maybe it’s time we starting thinking outside of the box.
If we only build new roads in areas that are growing, are we not
increasing the handicap for those facing challenges?
At a time when we’re all rethinking economic growth, that
question deserves an answer.
Patrick M. Barkey
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