>>1594409Take it out of politicians and their hungry need for prestige, to cash in on voters. This is what dominates the decisions, here, the US, anywhere really.
Set up an institute of infrastructure that manages almost all of the budget. My language has a word for a "technocratic, publicly founded, institution" basicly, a institute of educated people of the industry, or otherwise suitable to govern it, and let them prioritize all founding. Make it so there's a panel for projects, where 1/3 of the chairs is from politicians, thus never giving them full power of it. But give them Veto over the panel. Why this bureaucratic panel? It shouldn't be bureaucratic, it should be a quick and formal way of clearing a project, and if the governments politicians want anything done they either have to gain the support of the experts, by adjusting the project (i.e. building a tramway at the same time, rail line on the bridge, etc.) or the media would be aware, that the politicians vetoed a project, and brute forced tax payers money on something experts strongly recommended against.
This would obviously not work in any society prone to corruption, and my definition of corruption is the US and worse. The US seems to have state and local level politicians, that would if not take money, at least "favours for other favours". But i would probably work in my culture, even thou a lot of politicians would argue against this system, as they would loose the power, and have to answer to the media when infrastructure is falling behind maintenance, or new projects that has been projected and calculated to be beneficial gets delayed, due to budget cuts.