1/ Utah DOT's #1 priority is expanding US 89 and turning it into a limited-access highway. This project encapsulates some key transpo problems.

- State DOT's don't respond to auto growth; they create it.
- Highways don't pay for themselves.
- The highway justification cycle.

2/ UDOT's justification is regional growth. Corridor is "transitioning from rural residential and agricultural to residential suburbanized and commercial." This land use evolution is treated as natural, but it's the result of UDOT choices. Growth could be directed differently.

3/ There is a vicious highway justification cycle at play.

1. Transit? No! This area is rural. Build highways.
2. Transit? No! This is low density suburban. Expand highways.
3. Transit? No! Ar you kidding? The land use is all wrong. People here only drive. Expand highways.

4/ In truth, UDOT never considered anything other than expanding auto mobility.

5/ UDOT argues (and this one hurts my head) that the corridor lacks: "a Well-Functioning Connection between I-15 and I-84." But...I-15 doesn't need a connection to I-84 BECAUSE IT IS THE CONNECTION TO I-84.

6/ For funding, UDOT is not using any federal money and thus the project is only subject to a state environmental review.

So what is the big "TIF" line item? It stands for "Transportation Investment Fund," which is mostly sales taxes and general funds totaling $3.8 billion.

7/ So what will be the long-term result of the US 89 project? We only have to slide a few miles west to I-15 for the answer. A few decades hence and this pattern will repeat perfectly.

8/ . @jetjocko has a great line in his piece about SF and @jeffreytumlin: "Driving seems like what an economist would call a revealed preference, a thing people obviously love because they do it so much. But it's not. Driving is an enforced preference."