The postwar American development model positions local governments at the bottom of a food chain of governments. In response to cash incentives, cities have allowed themselves to become the de facto implementation branch of state and federal policy. Instead of focusing on the urgent needs of their residents, municipal bureaucracies and local power centers orient around the capital flows that come out of Washington, D.C., Wall Street, and the various state capitals. With transportation funding being the largest, most liquid, and most flexible source of capital, a disproportionate number of
...more
