From Boston to Tokyo, from Rio to Madrid, people have found a common cause: They're tired of marquee mega-projects.
That's a good thing — mostly. Even as we've got to do lots more small things, we should save our big-project energy for stuff that matters. Mayor de Blasio should think about how to seize upon this trend.
The latest backlash against big is in Boston. Last week, the US Olympic Committee decided to fire Beantown from competing for the 2024 Summer Olympics. Boston “lost” proudly, and for two solid reasons.
First, people just weren't that into it. Half the public was opposed.
Second, the city's mayor and governor — a Democrat and a Republican, respectively — said that they wouldn't risk taxpayer money on potentially unlimited cost overruns.
With subways that are falling apart at a faster rate than ours are, Boston would've shown contempt for Beantowners in going with Games instead of trains.
Boston wasn't alone. A few days earlier, Japan said it was dumping the $2 billion starchitect designing its Olympic stadium for 2020. Japan will build cheaper and simpler.
And in Europe, Madrid's leftist mayor, Manuela Carmena, won office this year running on what she calls “the politics of the small.” She told the Financial Times, “I don't want to have anything to do with grand ideas and grand dimensions.”
In Brazil, where Rio beat Madrid for the 2016 Summer Games, people are protesting everything from higher costs to corruption to evictions.
Beijing won the 2022 Winter Olympics last week just seven years after hosting the Summer Olympics — because almost nobody else wanted it, and because China has no idea how to power its economy besides massive public-works projects.
And the anti-Games agitators are right. No modern Olympics has ever been a boon to its host city. Stadiums in Beijing and Athens are rotting.
The London Olympics in 2012 were a blast for tourists, but the Games didn't do much for London's economy, which was doing great anyway. Yes, the Olympics spurred London to build trains and new housing — but it could have done those things anyway.
And it's probably a good thing New York lost those 2012 Games, despite then-Mayor Michael Bloomberg's desire for them. The last thing Manhattan's West Side needs is a football stadium.
We do need the No. 7 train extension that was part of the Olympic bid, plus more housing in Queens — but we're getting those things anyway. And it's too bad that, well more than a decade ago, we didn't do what Japan was brave enough to do, and pull the plug on a “money is no object” architect.
Maybe then we wouldn't be stuck paying for a $4 billion PATH station downtown. We could use that money to build a new tunnel under the Hudson River before the fish take over the old one.
Fitting right in, Mayor de Blasio didn't run for office on grand plans. He started with a pretty modest idea that did improve people's lives: pre-K. He should keep it up.
One idea would be to improve the quality of life for New Yorkers living amongst constant private-sector construction. Since a developer, SL Green, emptied out a whole block of restaurants and shops to build a new tower by Grand Central, vagrants have taken over the vacant space to sleep.
The mayor should make sure that property owners work with the police to protect their empty space. He should also crack down on citywide construction noise after hours and on weekends.
But de Blasio shouldn't forget: We do need big things, just the right things. The state-run MTA is out of cash for transit projects, and the governor is right to say that the city, with a record number of jobs and flush with taxpayer cash, should put a few billion in.
And the mayor should find the money for his own transit ideas, including a subway plan for Utica Avenue that he mentioned a few months ago and then promptly forgot. If it's cheaper to do rail above ground instead of underground, that's fine, too.
We still need to think big sometimes — but we need to think right first. As the world's mega-project protests prove, people these days aren't so easily impressed.
This piece originally appeared in New York Post