Even though we may disagree from time to time shouldn’t we be civil towards each other? Is it too much to ask that we treat our oppressors, or for that matter, each other with respect so we have the moral high ground??

I don’t want to be a one note singer here, but I think a good deal of this is due to over reliance on government. Why help your neighbor with a barn raising, when there’s Freddie and Fannie — and when you need thousands of dollars in licenses before you can pick up a hammer? Why help poor aunt Matilda with the bills, when there’s welfare, unemployment, and disability? Why work together to build or maintain a road, when the state and federal government do it? Why come together as a community to discuss what your kids will learn at the local school, when the federal government determines curriculum? Why take a homeless person in, or buy them food, when the government provides homeless shelters?

Coming together as a community is inconvenient — it’s easier to simply send cash off to the government, and get decisions handed down, then to actually have to deal with your nasty neighbor across the street when planning a community project.

One by one, we’ve stripped away the reasons we were forced to deal with our neighbors, and to come to an understanding, for the benefit of all — the process that Tocqueville observed. I think this, to a large degree, has destroyed our sense of community.

Someday, I think I’d like to see streets worth of neighbors getting together to work out how they will fund road maintenance, and the snow plow. To try to convince Mrs. Anderson to cut her grass, or not choose puse siding, rather than just calling the cops. It might be inconvenient, but I think it’d do us good.

the original colonial concept of turnpikes was fairly successful,various men with capitol petitioned the governor for a charter for a turnpike

Actually, you mischaracterize the nature of the kinds of people who came together to back these projects — they were much more community oriented, and middle class, than wealthy investors. EH.net (Economic History), for example, says this:

Although the states of Pennsylvania, Virginia and Ohio subsidized privately-operated turnpike companies, most turnpikes were financed solely by private stock subscription and structured to pay dividends. This was a significant achievement, considering the large construction costs (averaging around $1,500 to $2,000 per mile) and the typical length (15 to 40 miles). But the achievement was most striking because, as New England historian Edward Kirkland (1948, 45) put it, “the turnpikes did not make money. As a whole this was true; as a rule it was clear from the beginning.” Organizers and “investors” generally regarded the initial proceeds from sale of stock as a fund from which to build the facility, which would then earn enough in toll receipts to cover operating expenses. One might hope for dividend payments as well, but “it seems to have been generally known long before the rush of construction subsided that turnpike stock was worthless” (Wood 1919, 63).3

Turnpikes promised little in the way of direct dividends and profits, but they offered potentially large indirect benefits. Because turnpikes facilitated movement and trade, nearby merchants, farmers, land owners, and ordinary residents would benefit from a turnpike. Gazetteer Thomas F. Gordon aptly summarized the relationship between these “indirect benefits” and investment in turnpikes: “None have yielded profitable returns to the stockholders, but everyone feels that he has been repaid for his expenditures in the improved value of his lands, and the economy of business” (quoted in Majewski 2000, 49). Gordon’s statement raises an important question. If one could not be excluded from benefiting from a turnpike, and if dividends were not in the offing, what incentive would anyone have to help finance turnpike construction? The turnpike communities faced a serious free-rider problem.

Nevertheless, hundreds of communities overcame the free-rider problem, mostly through a civic-minded culture that encouraged investment for long-term community gain. Alexis de Tocqueville observed that, excepting those of the South, Americans were infused with a spirit of public-mindedness. Their strong sense of community spirit resulted in the funding of schools, libraries, hospitals, churches, canals, dredging companies, wharves, and water companies, as well as turnpikes (Goodrich 1948). Vibrant community and cooperation sprung, according to Tocqueville, from the fertile ground of liberty:

If it is a question of taking a road past his property, [a man] sees at once that this small public matter has a bearing on his greatest private interests, and there is no need to point out to him the close connection between his private profit and the general interest. … Local liberties, then, which induce a great number of citizens to value the affection of their kindred and neighbors, bring men constantly into contact, despite the instincts which separate them, and force them to help one another. … The free institutions of the United States and the political rights enjoyed there provide a thousand continual reminders to every citizen that he lives in society. … Having no particular reason to hate others, since he is neither their slave nor their master, the American’s heart easily inclines toward benevolence. At first it is of necessity that men attend to the public interest, afterward by choice. What had been calculation becomes instinct. By dint of working for the good of his fellow citizens, he in the end acquires a habit and taste for serving them. … I maintain that there is only one effective remedy against the evils which equality may cause, and that is political liberty (Alexis de Tocqueville, 511-13, Lawrence/Mayer edition).

Tocqueville’s testimonial is broad and general, but its accuracy is seen in the archival records and local histories of the turnpike communities. Stockholder’s lists reveal a web of neighbors, kin, and locally prominent figures voluntarily contributing to what they saw as an important community improvement. Appeals made in newspapers, local speeches, town meetings, door-to-door solicitations, correspondence, and negotiations in assembling the route stressed the importance of community improvement rather than dividends.4 Furthermore, many toll road projects involved the effort to build a monument and symbol of the community. Participating in a company by donating cash or giving moral support was a relatively rewarding way of establishing public services; it was pursued at least in part for the sake of community romance and adventure as ends in themselves (Brown 1973, 68). It should be noted that turnpikes were not entirely exceptional enterprises in the early nineteenth century. In many fields, the corporate form had a public-service ethos, aimed not primarily at paying dividends, but at serving the community (Handlin and Handlin 1945, 22, Goodrich 1948, 306, Hurst 1970, 15).

Given the importance of community activism and long-term gains, most “investors” tended to be not outside speculators, but locals positioned to enjoy the turnpikes’ indirect benefits. “But with a few exceptions, the vast majority of the stockholders in turnpike were farmers, land speculators, merchants or individuals and firms interested in commerce” (Durrenberger 1931, 104). A large number of ordinary households held turnpike stock. Pennsylvania compiled the most complete set of investment records, which show that more than 24,000 individuals purchased turnpike or toll bridge stock between 1800 and 1821. The average holding was $250 worth of stock, and the median was less than $150 (Majewski 2001). Such sums indicate that most turnpike investors were wealthier than the average citizen, but hardly part of the urban elite that dominated larger corporations such as the Bank of the United States. County-level studies indicate that most turnpike investment came from farmers and artisans, as opposed to the merchants and professionals more usually associated with early corporations (Majewski 2000, 49-53).

I also recommend the rest of this article, which may be found here: http://eh.net/encyclopedia/article/klein.majewski.turnpikes

the land for which belonged to someone else.

Some of these projects did use eminent domain, but there are also many examples of major projects requiring large plots of land which have been completed successfully without using eminent domain.

The turnpike was built as a money-raising business

Wrong, as noted above.

,and if you couldn’t pay,no turnpike for you.

Of course. How else do you suggest these kinds of projects be paid for, Bil? By theft? If you want roads that will be free to users, I suggest you donate your money and organize others to do the same. I’d support it, especially if it were a road I would use, or if it would be particularly helpful to people in difficult circumstances. Or, you could finance it with advertisements. Or, you could take subscriptions or tolls, but specify that those showing they have incomes under a certain amount get the fees waived.

Theft is not an appropriate way to fund magnanimity.

There were gatehouses every so often,and you paid according to how far and with what you traveled.There also existed ’shunpikes’which were illicit shortcuts around the tollhouses,showing that even then there were people willing to use someone elses efforts without paying.

Sure, cheaters will always exist. People shoplift too, does that mean we need government running K-mart? And modern technology — such as electronic tolls, can further mitigate these problems.

Now for modern times,it was only a few years ago that the bridge between Vt and NH was still charging a toll.We have to pay tolls to drive on such as the Mass. Pike.Someone had to give up their land for these semi-public roads,I am sure not voluntarily.

Yes, it’s unfortunate.

There are many private roads in smaller housing developements,with the roads held in common,and covenants in place to provide funding from all therein.I know of several near me,none of them work as conceived.There is always someone that refuses to pay for repair and plowing,misuse the road ,and to hell with any that complain.

If he/she continues to use the property of others without their permission, she should be taken to court, and restitution obtained.

It is a certain portion of the human race,and will not change.Do you think that on any given stretch of road these isn’t at least one that won’t pay,one that won’t want you crossing their property,one that will want to profit excessively?

If that one person won’t let others cross his/her property, his/her neighbors won’t let him/her cross their property either. The damage to the difficult person will be much greater — the neighbors can use another route, or even construct a sort of “shunpike” of their own, finding a way around the property. The difficult individual may have no way to access their property by car.

There are many ways for those constructing roads to avoid the problem of the holdout – as Walter Block points out in an essay on the topic,

“But the private road developer is not without defenses, all of which will tend to lower the price he must pay. First, there is no necessity for an absolutely straight road, nor even for one that follows the natural contours of the land. Although one may prefer, on technical grounds, path A, it is usually possible to utilize paths B to Z, all at variously higher costs. If so, then the cheapest of these alternatives provides an upper limit to what the owners along path A may charge for their properties. For example, it maybe cheaper to blast through an uninhabited mountain rather than pay the exorbitant price of the farmer in the valley; this fact tends to put a limit upon the asking price of the valley farmer.Second, the road developer, knowing that he will be satisfied with any of five trajectories, can purchase options to buy the land along each site. If a recalcitrant holdout materializes on any one route, he can shift to his second, third, fourth or fifth choice. The competition between owners along each of these passageways will tend to keep the price down. Third, in the rare case of a holdout who possesses an absolutely essential plot, it is always possible to build a bridge over this land or to tunnel underneath. Ownership of land does not consist of property rights up to the sky or down to the core of the earth; the owner cannot forbid planes from passing overhead,nor can he prohibit a bridge over his land, as long as it does not interfere with the use of his land. Although vastly more expensive than a surface road, these options again put an upper bound on the price the holdout can insist upon.”

Block later completed a book on the topic, which can be found here: http://books.google.com/books?id=jmLzWJ3qRNEC&pg=PT7&dq=privatizing+roads&lr=&cd=2#v=onepage&q=privatizing%20roads&f=false

Don Boudreaux noted in the WSJ, in a discussion on the Kelo decision,

“It’s true that privately built housing communities depend upon road and sewer systems, which typically are built by government. But this observation doesn’t address my argument that eminent domain is unnecessary. The fact that housing developers routinely acquire large contiguous plots of land without eminent domain — that is, by buying individual plots from private owners — suggests that government doesn’t need eminent domain to build roads and to do whatever else it does.

Unlike David, I trust democratic mechanisms much less than I trust the rules of private property. If the city of New London, for example, can confiscate private property without the owners’ consent, government officials have too little incentive to bargain in good faith with property owners to find out if mutually advantageous deals are possible. Government will confiscate property rather than pay market prices for it. And politicians will pander to special-interest groups eager to gain at the public expense.

The fact that government is democratically elected might put some restraint on use of this power — or it might not. If a majority of voters in New London perceive that they can gain by directing the city fathers to confiscate private property owned by voters in the minority, why should we trust that the city will seize private property only if doing so yields significant benefits to the public at large?

By obliging all persons — including government officials — to pay voluntarily agreed upon prices for any properties acquired, we best ensure that worthwhile transfers of property rights occur and that transfers that aren’t worthwhile are avoided.”

And later,

“You raise an interesting point — usually called the “hold-up problem” — in which a single property owner can hold a project hostage and extract maximum gain. But in reality, because there is almost always more than one way to build a road or to site a large development, there usually isn’t any one property owner who can hold the project hostage. This is one reason why private developers commonly succeed in assembling large parcels without using eminent domain.

Moreover, ingenious strategies exist to avoid the hold-up problem. For example, a buyer can negotiate sales contracts contingent upon the buyer acquiring all necessary parcels of land. With such contracts, no one landowner is ever in a position to hold-out strategically for the full value of the project.”

In a dream world,certainly not this one.You give too much credit to your fellow man. —bil

Large projects succeed all the time, requiring the willing participation of many individuals and organizations. Do you really suppose that transportation can only be provided by stealing people’s property?

Here’s another book I recommend checking out, called “Street Smart”: http://books.google.com/books?id=sYAxKrpSjOsC&printsec=frontcover&dq=street+smart&cd=1#v=onepage&q=&f=false

And here’s an interesting essay by the mayor of Annaheim, entitled “Development Without Eminent Domain”. The methods are clearly not all entirely voluntary, but it is interesting to note some alternatives, in situations where eminent domain is often used: http://www.anaheim.net/administration/PIO/Perspectives-Pringlev4sm.pdf