No on Phoenix Prop 104: The Promised Benefits Are Almost Certainly Grossly Exaggerated
A reader sent me this: A recent McKinsey study looked at large infrastructure projects (over $1 billion). In the introduction they observe:
Rail projects, for example, go over budget by an average of 44.7 percent, and their demand is overestimated by 51.4 percent.
We actually can combine these two numbers and find that the total cost per user of these systems was over-estimated by 117%, meaning the cost per user was on averagemore than double what was promised when these projects are sold to the taxpayers.
At the end of the day, the first segment of the line cost $75,000 per round trip daily raider. We could have bought every regular rider a prius and a lifetime of gas and still saved money.
