ruminations about architecture and design

Wednesday, July 12, 2017

looking out the back door


Railroads travel through the places that people prefer not to think about very much. Because of this, it is possible to get a good sense of how things work--or don't work. Towers of ilium offers the following observations:
-Improvements to infrastructure are nearly always layered on top of, or woven within, existing systems. The results tend not to be visually attractive, but things keep on working.
-Private property that borders on rail routes probably has more volatility in terms of cash value. If there isn't a station close by, it suffers more.
-Room for expansion is desperately limited. Decisions made hundreds of years ago have defined right-of-ways within narrow parameters. The private property adjacent to these routes may have low valuation, but it imposes considerable costs on the entire urban network.

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