[BariumBlue]

To add to what the central city budget problem is - each new piece of street and road in LA has, on average, not paid for itself in terms of increased revenue from taxes or otherwise.

So for each new street widening, new road, and piece of highway capacity, LA was increasing it's financial liability to revenue ratio.

Add over decades all of the street and road construction that LA has done, and it now has a unsustainable amount of road maintenance it's responsible for compared to the amount of revenue it pulls in. I'm having a hard time finding numbers though so please correct me or add numbers if you can find them.

[scoofy]

Strong Towns has already done the financial analysis for Los Angeles. It's not looking very good: https://www.strongtowns.org/journal/2025-10-27-ground-zero-l...

[strictnein]

Unless things are really different in California from where I'm at, I find it unlikely that the city is responsible for maintaining state and federal highways.

[amanaplanacanal]

At least in my state, state and federal highways are all the responsibility of the state DOT, which is massively subsidized out of general fund tax dollars and federal grants. There have been recent attempts to increase fuel taxes, but they get regularly shut down by the electorate. It's not looking good for highway maintenance, either.