[hgomersall]

I'm not sure I agree with your conclusion. In my experience the points you made are used as justification by those responsible for delivering those things as to why they are not doing so. Essentially, house builders want to maximise profit and not build parks. Neo liberals don't want public transport to be subsidised as a public good etc etc.

When we build, to we absolutely must build the right thing because changing it later will be much harder. That does involve lots of hard work persuading people of the benefits.

[offsign_p]

Then I think you misstate my conclusion.

Simply pointing out that NIMBY/no builders aren't the sole or even dominate factor of 'Why America can't build.' Or rather, special interest groups who seek to impose their will on public infrastructure excerpt their own form of Nimbyism -- they block development until it conforms to their interests. One can certainly argue the merits or determents of any of this advocacy, but as you state... it makes the outcome harder to achieve.