AMERICA IS AT A CROSSROADS WITH ITS INFRASTRUCTURE FUTURE OPENING LINES Source: americancityandcounty.com, Maria Lehman, First Published August 23, 2024 The first step to solving a problem is admitting there is a problem in the first place. Much of America’s infrastructure was built 50 to 100 years ago and has not been replaced or modernized to meet current needs and doesn’t address the needs of the future. Since 1998, the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) has released the Report Card for America’s Infrastructure, which, every four years, does a deep dive into the state of various infrastructure categories. It provides both a letter grade and a narrative to explain how we need to work for future infrastructure needs. Simply put, for the past three decades, the grades have not been the kind you want to bring home to your parents. You cannot build a modern economy on top of crumbling infrastructure. Across the country, we are experiencing disastrous consequences in terms of human health and safety as well as economic impacts in insuring assets, along with the cost of rebuilding in the wake of a disaster. It does not matter if it is climate change-related or manmade. In response to these consequences, the ASCE released the Sustainable Infrastructure Standard, ASCE 73-23, a tool that provides guidance for infrastructure owners to develop and implement sustainable solutions throughout a project’s entire life cycle. It’s designed for a range of civil projects from energy to water to transportation systems and acts as a guide for engineers to develop and implement practices that promote sustainability and long-term reliability of infrastructure projects. It was introduced in October 2023, and we are starting to see the benefits of its implementation in projects across the country. Nonetheless, America’s communities are at a crossroads. A new survey and report released in July by GHD, a global engineering firm, reveals a mix of optimism and pessimism about the future needs of America’s infrastructure.Thirteen thousand people worldwide were surveyed, including 4,000 in the U.S., with a focus on responses from California, Florida, New York and Texas. It presents a comprehensive and nuanced understanding of intergenerational equity, which is focused on creating fair and just spaces that prioritize all generations, both now and in the future—all through an infrastructure lens.The survey results and report highlight the need for public infrastructure owners and consultants to listen carefully to their stakeholders to make better infrastructure development decisions. Resilience and adaptability of infrastructure are vital in mitigating the impacts of climate change, population growth and redistribution and economic fluctuations. In the past few years, there have been several bills, such as the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law (BIL), the CHIPS and Science Act, the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), and the Water Resources Development Act (WRDA), that have significantly increased the federal share of infrastructure funding for the first time in decades. It is a recognition that the state of our current infrastructure needs to improve. Roads, bridges, water lines and other public infrastructure are a fundamental right, not a privilege, in a modern society. It should be noted that there has been support on both sides of the political spectrum for these bills. Not only were the votes bipartisan, but even those who may not have been supportive in the past are now seeing the positive 11 CIVIL AND MUNICIPAL VOLUME 05, ISSUE 10
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