The $1.2 Trillion Plan to Rebuild America

[Music] infrastructure it might be the one thing americans can actually agree on right across the country roads bridges trains water supplies and energy grids are all failing and it's something us presidents have vowed to fix for decades the bridges and highways we fail to repair today will have to be rebuilt tomorrow at many times the cost our roads our bridges our schools it is also time to rebuild our crumbling infrastructure america this is how we truly build back better now some of those promises might finally be delivered on with the passage of this massive 700 page 1.2 trillion dollar infrastructure bill america on main street and at the dinner table is talking about infrastructure when 20 years ago they didn't even know what that meant on this vote so how do we get here what makes this moment truly different the a's are 69. and will this plan really be enough the nays are 30 to save america's crumbling infrastructure the bill as amended is passed [Music] in 2021 the us got a c minus on the american society of civil engineers infrastructure report card for those of you less familiar with the american grading system that's not great when you're talking about a network that underpins the daily lives of hundreds of millions of people specifically civil engineers what we do is largely unnoticed until something goes really wrong so you know we've kind of been banging the drum and banging the drum but people are like oh i have clean water and my sewers work and yeah i hit a pothole once in a while but that's because the weather changes and so there's been a lot of excuses because things systemically haven't been failing they're now getting to the point where the infrastructure you know i laugh it's not a midlife crisis it's an old age crisis it's impacting everyday americans every day to understand how we got here you need to know how infrastructure gets paid for in the us it varies by projects but typically some money comes from the federal budget which is controlled by congress in washington dc and the rest is covered by state and local governments or private companies that's pretty different from european countries who mainly fund their infrastructure through national governments according to a brookings analysis federal infrastructure spending in the u.s peaked in 1933 as fdr invested in the new deal after the great depression president roosevelt headed for the capital by special train to begin planning a billion and a half dollar relief program that gave rise to programs like the public works administration and projects like the hoover dam laguardia airport and the lincoln tunnel it also tackled some less iconic but crucial upgrades like rural electrification and municipal water systems economists say that investment in infrastructure is what helped lead the country toward economic success in the years that followed you cannot build a modern economy and a crumbling infrastructure there was another spike in federal funding in the late 1950s during the interstate highway era for the progress that will keep this and all other american cities alive and then again in the 1970s when more comprehensive environmental and community development efforts were introduced but since the 1980s infrastructure has made up less and less of u.s federal funding today only a quarter of public infrastructure money comes from the federal government leaving already struggling state and local governments to cover more of the costs and the maintenance globally the us has fallen behind other countries take a look at this chart showing g20 countries projected infrastructure spending by 2040. china is leading the pack with just over five percent of its gdp going towards infrastructure the us is all the way down here at just 1.5 percent this new 1 trillion package would be the largest investment in decades but not quite as big as the spending under the new deal now that we've put this incredibly thrilling and easily digestible bill into context let's get into what's actually inside of it remember it's 2 700 pages long so we can't cover it all but let's start with the basics utilities every two minutes a water main breaks in the us and roughly six billion gallons of treated water is lost every day that's enough to fill over nine thousand pools meanwhile safe drinking water isn't a guarantee water quality in the u.s varies from state to state county to county and can even depend on which street you live on since 2014 flint michigan has been synonymous with tainted water a group of largely unregulated toxic chemicals widely used for years is now a growing threat to water safety in thousands of american communities the new bill would put 55 billion dollars towards water and wastewater infrastructure that includes 15 billion dollars to replace lead pipes and 10 billion to address contamination from a chemical compound called pfas which is still technically legal to have in drinking water in recent years widespread power outages have become more common blackouts are estimated to cost the us economy billions of dollars every year to address this the bill puts forward 65 billion dollars to improve the nation's power grid and invest in things like carbon capture and clean hydrogen next up we have transportation only five percent of u.s commuters use public transit to get to work the vast majority of people drive cars and depending where you live that could mean dodging potholes sitting in traffic jams or navigating buckling pavement according to the white house 173 000 miles of america's highway and major roads and 45 000 bridges are in poor condition i mean you're you're one bad day away from a collapse where a lot of people die the bill provides 110 billion dollars for roads and bridges with an extra 7.5 billion set aside to build electric vehicle charging stations meanwhile public transit systems could get 39 billion dollars and amtrak would get 66 billion to improve its 50 year old rail service don't forget the president is a big fan of trains poor infrastructure costs the average person 3 300 a year and that might mean well your power went out and you lost a refrigerator in a freezer full of food and you've got to replace it you know you have a water line break somewhere you're either buying bottled water or you have boil water alerts there's even provisions for the further development and deployment of hyperloop while many of these priorities like roads bridges and water supplies may seem familiar this bill represents the first time that both political parties have really acknowledged that climate change is taking a toll on the nation's infrastructure tens of billions of dollars have been set aside to address floods wildfires and drinking water shortages but as we know a lot can go wrong when it comes to infrastructure the vision on paper isn't always what happens in reality and these things take time but the urgency to get things done this time around does feel different so i think in a matter of a couple of years there's going to be a lot of orange cones out there people are going to see construction in a lot of different areas and will see that their money is going to something in their neighborhood america's 1.2 trillion plan won't be enough to solve everything there's still a gap of nearly 2.6 trillion to catch up with similar countries but the bill is an historic investment in u.s infrastructure and an opportunity for the construction industry to leave its mark on a country for generations to come if you enjoyed this video and you want to get more from the definitive video channel for construction make sure you subscribe to the b1m [Music] you

Channel: The B1M

Views: 1,601,660

Keywords: B1M, TheB1M, Construction, architecture, engineering, The B1M, Fred Mills, building, usa, us, america, infrastructure, infrastructure bill, congress, roads, bridges, build back better, biden, trains, green energy, clean energy, hydrogen, carbon, ev, electric vehicles, clean water, pfas, lead, flint michigan, us infrastructure, asce, us infrastructure bill

Id: uyQjnW5ZQp8

Length: 8min 32sec (512 seconds)

Published: Wed Nov 10 2021

Reddit Comments

[u/ajstewart03]

I bet it won’t go anywhere

[u/0x706c617921]

Yawn

[u/Denslayer]

Too much small government that holds up everything