Atlanta city infrastructure best in country?
June 15, 2009 at 9:56 am by Andisheh Nouraee in News
GEORGIA DEPARTMENT OF NATURAL RESOURCES MEETING: Blessed are the new-fangled showerheads. For they restricteth thy flow. (Credit: Sonny Perdue)
This is weird.
The list-generating business consultants at Mercer say Atlanta has the best city infrastructure the United States.
Mercer says the ranking is based on “electricity supply, water availability, telephone and mail services, public transport provision, traffic congestion and the range of international flights from local airports.”
Um, Mercer, what the f@$k is wrong with you?
Atlanta’s long-terms water use planner is Jesus.
Atlanta’s mass transit funding is controlled by Satan.
Metro commuters endure the worst traffic in the nation and the city’s biggest transportation project of the past decade consists of forcing Ryan Gravel to pose for photos by a disused rail line every six months.
I suspect the massive number of flights in-and-out of Hartsfield-Jackson is throwing off Mercer’s magic formula. If that’s the case, the formula needs tweaking.
Mercer, people pay you a lot of money to know stuff. Earn your money. Know stuff. Read a newspaper. Visit some local blogs, such as this one. AtlantaWaterShortage.com is pretty good, too.
June 15th, 2009 at 10:08 am
must be our excellent telephone and mail services!
June 15th, 2009 at 10:11 am
WTF!?!
That must be why my water bill is so ACCURATE!!!
June 15th, 2009 at 10:54 am
They need to get out more there at Mercer. Breath some fresh air. Twitter in the nude. Whatever it takes.
June 15th, 2009 at 11:34 am
At minimum I have to think Boston would beat out Atlanta in any reliable measure of city infrastructure. Sure, you’re taxed through the nose up there, but they have great mass transit, reliable utilities (more reliable than Atlanta’s in my experience), tons of flights in & out of Logan airport, and their traffic congestion isn’t any WORSE than Atlanta’s…
I wonder if the presence of UPS HQ isn’t also skewing the numbers in Atlanta’s favor, since “mail services” is one of the factors.
June 15th, 2009 at 11:56 am
I think all they would need to do is add Federal and State backing to their formula and it would tell a better story.
I think the City’s ability to pay for it’s infrastructure would be a big factor.
June 15th, 2009 at 11:56 am
This is what happens when you live in Macon.
June 15th, 2009 at 12:42 pm
While our traffic is bad, is it really the worst in the nation? For me, at least, it is fairly avoidable. I can’t ever think of a time getting stuck in an hour long traffic jam, and I assume that happens a lot more in bigger cities.
That’s just an assumption though
June 15th, 2009 at 1:28 pm
Ryan – L.A. is usually at the top of traffic congestion lists and we usually hang around third or fourth with Houston. Washington DC and San Fran/Oakland are up there, as well.
I have seen us as high as second.
We are not number one, but close.
June 15th, 2009 at 1:41 pm
Maybe their definition of Atlanta is the 285 loop.
June 15th, 2009 at 1:50 pm
Maybe things are not as bad as some people think.
However, it’s hard to believe giving our transportation and water issues.
June 15th, 2009 at 2:43 pm
Chicago’s air access to the world is comparable to Atlanta’s. It’s public transit is vastly superior and it sits on the shore of the largest collection of fresh water on Earth.
Unless someone shut off Chicago’s electricity recently, I’m not sure how Atlanta “beats” it on a city infrastructure list.
June 15th, 2009 at 2:45 pm
Other Cities at least make some money off the traffic to regulate the demand. I don’t see having a cheap system as a plus as a resident.
If anything we have too much traffic that does not contribute to the infrastructure (in the sense that the cost to service them is more) The traffic is also choking out the real commerce that we need which is tourism to attract residents.
June 15th, 2009 at 4:35 pm
People complain about how Atlanta has the worst traffic of anywhere. Yeah, our traffic is bad…but in 17 years of living here, I have never, ever had to sit in traffic on freeways here on the weekend for NO reason like I have had to do in…Los Angeles, San Francisco, Chicago, New York and Washington. In all of those places, I have sat in miles and miles of backed-up freeway traffic on the weekends for no apparent reason (event, accident, etc…)
June 15th, 2009 at 4:50 pm
Keith – can you pick some lottery numbers for me because you are the luckiest dude I know.
June 15th, 2009 at 5:09 pm
As I continued to read the story, I kept thinking to myself that the words, “April Fools,” would appear at the bottom of the story. The same goes for Keith’s comment ;)
June 15th, 2009 at 8:19 pm
I’m not sure I would call what we have in the city as roads either.
More like a collection of the most violent holes in the earth of perfect rim destroying size. Or the ‘fixed’ version of the hole that is a giant steel automobile launch pad with giant hooks.
I go through about 4 tires every 2 years.
June 15th, 2009 at 8:47 pm
Seriously, how many of you have spent significant time in other cities? I grew up in New York. It was common practice to crawl on the LIE between Manhattan and Nassau County on any given Sunday afternoon. I spent a summer in Chicago on business often going between the far SW suburbs (Joliet) and Downtown – I-55 was a mess for no apparent reason. When I was in LA 2 yrs ago, I-5 was backed up from Santa Ana to Downtown, again…no construction, no accidents, no events.
I really wonder how many people who constantly complain about things here have spent time in other cities for some perspective.
June 15th, 2009 at 8:50 pm
I should clarify my comment above in that I am talking about weekend traffic – something Atlanta just does not have. Weekday traffic, we are all bad.
June 15th, 2009 at 9:03 pm
4 months in Houston
6 months in Raleigh Durham
Numerous multi-day trips to Chicago, Dallas, LA, Miami, Tampa, D.C., Orlando, Philadelphia. I would spend the two days before or after the weekend on business and the weekend for fun.
I guess all those traffic experts don’t know what they are talking about either, huh?
June 15th, 2009 at 9:09 pm
The Weekend traffic we have now is probably where our weekday traffic should be.
All other cities mentioned have mass transit systems that at least attempt to alleviate traffic.
Tolls and all that other stuff as mentioned before. ie: at least the cities are getting compensated for it.
June 16th, 2009 at 11:27 am
keith, i want to live in your world.