[dougmwne]

That’s probably a reductive take. This bill is massive, over 2000 pages. It has funding for all kinds of transportation, green, energy and digital infrastructure. Roads are a part of that because once they are built, they need to be maintained or else people will die. There are several examples of bridges and overpasses collapsing and leading to deaths and badly maintained road surface leads to fatal accidents as well. Also, talking about this bill in terms of what it does for roads and bridges is going to be the best way to talk to the public as that is the thing they experience every day. Talking about the esoterics of the energy grid isn’t going to land for most people.

[bluejekyll]

An area that I didn’t see talk about was investment in pedestrian and bicycle safety infrastructure. That’s generally a much smaller investment with significant gains in reducing car travel, to the GP’s point.

I would have liked to see spending on bike and pedestrian safety projects as a percentage of any money spend on car infrastructure.

[DaftDank]

I live in a fairly rural, but affluent, part of Michigan now, and at one of the township board meetings, they were discussing a proposed bike lane. The reason they didn't want it? Only one person (on the board) really said anything at all, and his reasoning was that he imagined a scenario in which there would be some sort of biking event where lots of people would be biking the trail, and his driveway could somehow end up getting blocked. Keep in mind, this is a rural area where most properties sit on 5-10+ acres at least, and the driveways are very far apart generally.

It didn't make a whole lot of sense to me, but I just got the impression that for whatever reason, they were deeply opposed to the idea of people being able to safely bike down country roads. After living in San Francisco and Indianapolis in the years before, it was definitely weird seeing people being opposed to bike paths, especially when it would not interfere with their country life almost at all. Maybe they thought it would start them down a path of changing their way of life? I don't know.

[SauciestGNU]

I think another part is that cycling is a culture war signifier, because it's associated with environmentalism and urbanism.

[CalRobert]

"they need to be maintained or else people will die. "

Maintained or decomissioned.