The bloat and urge to spend taxpayer money is sooo obvious. I even showed my kids this one since they love trains:
The next town over has a seldom used railroad spur that is literally the "End of the line". Less than 100 yards away from the end of the railroad spur, there's a dead-end road that turns to dirt if you tried to cross over the train tracks.
Someone decided to improve the safety of this railroad "crossing" even through there's practically NO use EVER ! After a little bit of digging, I found that it cost $600,000 to properly upgrade the "crossing".
Improvements included:
🟢 Asphalt instead of timbers to allow cars to cross.
🟢 Not one, but TWO automatic crossing gates with lights for each side of the "road".
🟢 Electronic Controls and control panel junction boxes to sense when the train is approaching the end of the spur.
🟢 New RR crossing signs (on both sides) and paint for the new asphalt showing cars where to stop and warning them of the dead-end crossing.
I've pointed out this kind of taxpayer funded waste before and too many people have the attitude of "well, _____ is a good project, and it's not that much money" (they think in terms of it being a few dollars from each person living in the area or state, or country) Whether it's a thousand dollars or a billion, it should be both necessary and spent efficiently when it comes to taxpayer funded things!
The bloat and urge to spend taxpayer money is sooo obvious. I even showed my kids this one since they love trains:
The next town over has a seldom used railroad spur that is literally the "End of the line". Less than 100 yards away from the end of the railroad spur, there's a dead-end road that turns to dirt if you tried to cross over the train tracks.
Someone decided to improve the safety of this railroad "crossing" even through there's practically NO use EVER ! After a little bit of digging, I found that it cost $600,000 to properly upgrade the "crossing".
Improvements included:
🟢 Asphalt instead of timbers to allow cars to cross.
🟢 Not one, but TWO automatic crossing gates with lights for each side of the "road".
🟢 Electronic Controls and control panel junction boxes to sense when the train is approaching the end of the spur.
🟢 New RR crossing signs (on both sides) and paint for the new asphalt showing cars where to stop and warning them of the dead-end crossing.
I've pointed out this kind of taxpayer funded waste before and too many people have the attitude of "well, _____ is a good project, and it's not that much money" (they think in terms of it being a few dollars from each person living in the area or state, or country) Whether it's a thousand dollars or a billion, it should be both necessary and spent efficiently when it comes to taxpayer funded things!