The Empire State Building was, for its time, monumental. The New York landmark may not be such a big deal these days, but its construction history in often invoked as a sign that we’ve lost the capacity to do big stuff.
After all, the iconic skyscraper’s builders brought the project to completion $19 million under budget, 12 days ahead of schedule, and in just over a year.
At the height of the depression.
By contrast, California's High-Speed Rail project - designed to ultimately link San Diego with Sacramento - was authorized in 2008. Construction on Phase 1 didn't being until 2015. As of now, $11.2 billion has been spent without a single train having left a single station. The total budget was originally in the $33-40 billion range, although it’s now anticipated to run past $128 billion. And no one’s expecting project completion any time in the next decade.
Closer to home, we can compare the original 7.4 kilometer Yonge Line of Toronto’s subway system (fully-functional by 1954 after just five years’ work) with its grandson, the Eglinton Crosstown LRT. The Eglinton line was announced in 2007, work began in 2011 and, 13 years later, completion is still nowhere in sight. Since I live just a few blocks from what might one day become an LRT station, I’ll be sure to let you know if anything changes.
In the grand scheme of things, North America might not even have it so bad. Lately, everyone (and by “everyone” I mean everyone besides my wife, children, or even a single person I have ever met) has been buzzing about a 17,000-word article called “Foundations: Why Britain Has Stagnated”. I strongly encourage you to read the whole thing have ChatGPT summarize it for you.
The main takeaway from Foundations is that the UK’s excessive regulations, high energy and labour costs, bureaucratic delays, and outdated tax incentives led to an application process requiring 360,000 pages and nearly £300 million for the Lower Thames Crossing project before any work was even approved!
The rot that lies behind Britain’s paralysis has been building since the 1990’s, through both Conservative and Labour governments.
But things might not be so bad here at home.
For one thing, we probably don’t have a regulatory bureaucracy that’s quite so extreme as Britain’s. I’m aware of nothing in Canada that’s analogous to the UK’s "nutrient neutrality” requirements.
And while our energy costs are certainly not cheap, they’re a whole lot better here than in the UK. Commercial electricity, for instance, costs an average of USD 0.117 per kWh in Canada, far below the USD 0.485 per kWh they’re paying in the UK. And the cost of natural gas for home heating in Canada (USD 0.038 per kWh) isn’t even close to what they shell out across the pond (USD 0.092 per kWh).
Which might at least partially explain why, despite all the delays, cost overruns, and unexpected service failures involved, some major infrastructure projects have reached a (broadly) happy conclusion.
For every expensive failure (like the Eglinton Crosstown LRT or the Ottawa Confederation Line), there have also been successes (like Confederation Bridge and Vancouver’s Canada Line). Things are far from perfect, but it’s not all doom and gloom either.
The Foundations article ends on a positive note:
We believe that Britain can enjoy such a renewal once more. To do so, it need simply remove the barriers that stop the private sector from doing what it already wants to do: build homes, bridges, tunnels, roads, trams, railways, nuclear power plants, grid connections, prisons, aqueducts, reservoirs, and more.
Removing barriers. Or even better, resisting the erection of new barriers before they’re in place. We can always hope.
Trans Mountain pipeline is a good example of why infrastructure is, if even possible anymore, so much more costly, at least in Canada. The approval process alone essentially killed off the project but had to be rescued to save political face and was necessarily nationalized. The expectations of risk-free, impact free construction enshrined in regulation is a major component. Environmental monitors likely outnumbered equipment operators and in addition to delaying activities tying up machinery and personnel, they engaged in such activities as transplanting frogs and moss. Another uniquely Canadian feature is the holding hostage of all resource development to the (SCOC enabled) never-ending grievance industry and resulting shakedowns. As someone who has been involved at multiple levels of construction projects, my one word culprit would have to be 'Leviathan'.
You offer two examples where we have "not" lost the ability to complete: the Confederation Bridge and the Canada Line.
Mr. Wikipedia tells me that the Confederation bridge was constructed between 1993 and 1997. Of course, the initial thoughts about such a bridge go back to the 1870s - a looooonnnnggg time - but Mr. Wikipedia (again!) tells me that the current iteration became a reasonably firm proposal in the 1980s, so, perhaps 10 - 15 years soup to nuts (i.e. start to finish for those of you without culinary inclinations).
That fine fellow Mr. Wikipedia (yet again!!) tells me that the Canada Line came under consideration starting in 1990 and was considered and considered until 2000, with construction starting in 2002 and completion in 2009.
To summarize, these "successes" themselves had a history of paralysis by analysis and, in any event, the projects came under consideration over forty years ago (the Bridge) and thirty years ago (the Line). Can one reasonably consider (ooooppps: that word!) them to be "current" successes or "historical" successes and if the latter, does that perhaps negate your thesis?
Just wondering.
The truth is, I am, by turns, cynical and pessimistic and not anywhere near optimistic about Canada's ability to do just about anything other than waste money and dither. On those latter two (lack of) "qualities" I am quite confident in claiming supremacy but not in pretty much anything else.