{"product":{"product_id":"0521009464","title":"Megaprojects and Risk: An Anatomy of Ambition","price":"36.99","image_url":"https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/51wdzUzNzbL._SL500_.jpg","url":"https://www.amazon.com/dp/0521009464"},"comments":[{"body":"https://www.amazon.com/Megaprojects-Risk-Ambition-Bent-Flyvbjerg/dp/0521009464\r\n\r\nMegaprojects and Risk: An Anatomy of Ambition\r\nby Bent Flyvbjerg \r\n\r\nPromoters of multi-billion dollar land-use development megaprojects systematically misinform parliaments, the public and the media in order to get them approved and built. This book not only explores these issues, but suggests practical solutions drawing on theory and scientific evidence from the several hundred projects in twenty nations and five continents. It is of interest to students, scholars, planners, economists, auditors, politicians and concerned citizens.","subreddit_name":"highspeedrail","author":"DrunkEngr"},{"body":"You should look at Bent Flyvbjerg's work. His main critique is that the methodology used to determine cost-benefits for most \"megaprojects\" is faulty and often wildly optimistic. He had a mildly famous [study on the Olympics.](https://www.researchgate.net/publication/244484259_Olympic_Proportions_Cost_and_Cost_Overrun_at_the_Olympics_1960-2012)\r\n\r\nHe did an interview about his work on megaprojects [here.](http://www.econtalk.org/archives/2015/05/bent_flyvbjerg.html)\r\n\r\nThe page contains a transcript, a link to the audio of the interview and links to his books and published works. The full audio is worth a listen.\r\n\r\n[This article is a lay-person friendly take on his book.](http://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/bertha-seattle-infrastructure-trouble-megaprojects)\r\n\r\nThe amazon page for his book is [here.](https://www.amazon.com/Megaprojects-Risk-Ambition-Bent-Flyvbjerg/dp/0521009464)","subreddit_name":"AskEconomics","author":"Randy_Newman1502"},{"body":"I appreciate that. \r\n\r\nYou might find this guide that I put together for last year's Local-Motive sessions helpful. I was trying to answer the question: is this a good project or not. Obviously, cities need parks and public buildings and lots of things that don't run at a profit on their own, so the questions that comes from that are (1) how do we design these things to maximize the financial benefit and, thus, lower the bar to doing them, and (2) we need to make extra sure that everything else pays for itself because it has to make up for the stuff that doesn't.\r\n\r\nhttps://actionlab.strongtowns.org/hc/en-us/articles/360057656211--Go-or-No-Go-How-to-Analyze-a-New-Project-with-the-Strong-Towns-Approach-Local-Motive-Action-Guide-\r\n\r\nI admittedly am cynical of planners, engineers, and others who propose really large projects, especially when a more incremental proof-of-concept approach is available OR there are other, more urgent things the shiny object is crowding out. I was just discussing with some neighbors tonight how our new local children's museum (our most recent shiny object) is now going to be built in a forest four miles out of town. It's about the building, the shiny object, not the people being served. That is almost an obsessive pet peeve for me and so I tend to be very skeptical of planners when they say, \"I'm all about incremental..... except for this one big project I think we need to do.\"\r\n\r\nI actually can't remember right now what I wrote about TOD, but it tends to go into that latter build-it-and-they-will-come camp. Can it work? Sure, on occasion, but the track record is not great.\r\n\r\nPardon the Amazon link, but there is a great book called Megaprojects and Risk: An anatomy of Ambition by Bent Flyvbjerg that captures the hidden (or conveniently ignored) risk of these projects. And, of course, I'm deeply influenced by the writings of Nassim Taleb, which I recommend to everyone, but especially planners. \r\n\r\nhttps://www.amazon.com/Megaprojects-Risk-Ambition-Bent-Flyvbjerg/dp/0521009464\r\n\r\nWe agree that running government like a business is not the best approach, but -- especially for local governments -- if you don't use business economics and financial measurements to know where you are at, you're doing a huge disservice to the public. The commonly misunderstood reality is that our nonprofit has to run a profit every year or we go away, we just don't distribute that profit to investors and shareholders. So, we kind of run like a business in the sense that our books have to work year after year, but not like a business in that our responsibility is to our mission, not the bottom line. That's how I see local governments working as well. I'm guessing we agree on that.\r\n\r\nI'm happy to have the conversation when I can keep up. This one caught my eye because it was a slightly different critique than normal. Thanks for the conversation.","subreddit_name":"urbanplanning","author":"clmarohn"}]}