or, we should try to figure out why building costs so much money. 90% of the current NYC subway system was complete by 1960. in 2017, just 3km of track took 10 years and costed 5 billion dollars.

    The Central Committee of the CPSU and the Council of Ministers of the USSR resolutely condemn the mistakes made in architecture, design and construction, as contradicting the line of the Party and the Government in this matter, causing significant damage to the national economy and hindering the improvement of the housing and cultural and living conditions of workers.

   When designing and constructing buildings and structures, architects and engineers must pay primary attention to issues of economics, construction, creating the greatest conveniences for the population, landscaping, apartments, schools, hospitals and other buildings and structures, as well as landscaping of residential areas and neighborhoods.

    In order to avoid excesses and amateurishness, our architects and engineers must become conductors of everything new and progressive in design and construction. Construction must be carried out according to the most economical standard projects, developed taking into account the best achievements of domestic and foreign construction, based on industrial production methods.

    Soviet architecture should be characterized by simplicity, strictness of forms and economy of solutions. The attractive appearance of a building and structure should be created not by using far-fetched, expensive decorative ornaments, but by organic connection of architectural forms with the purpose of buildings and structures, their good proportions, as well as the correct use of materials, structures and details and high quality of work.

    The Central Committee of the CPSU and the Council of Ministers of the USSR believe that decisively overcoming shortcomings in design and construction, and the rapid and complete elimination of excesses in architecture will make it possible to save significant funds and direct them to the further expansion of housing, cultural and domestic, industrial and agricultural construction, as well as to the expansion of work on the improvement and landscaping of cities and towns.

Also car centric urban design is IMO inherently ugly (limited options for greenery etc).

I wouldn’t read it as a “beef with beauty”.

But, the south gets the short end of the stick for non-masonry materials and plant growth. Anywhere shaded harbors mold. Wood rots. So the kind of complex trims and accents you see in for example the northeast are fairly absent in the south.

Unless you're trying to keep colored plastic looking bright the desert is easy mode.

Given the number of people using the service, this is incredibly small and I hardly think a sign is going to help the few people at risk!

To me, that seems like a sign where the "let nature sort it out" way of learning is too dangerous to just YOLO it sign-less (despite generally agreeing that we have too many warning signs).

But for me it is in fact a symbolic character of the roughly 20th century that we still suffer from because it sucked all humanity and joy out of everything; including design, art, and beauty itself. That bridge represents the asphalt parking lot of bridges in my mind. Featureless, drab, barren, desolate, soulless, miserable, humanity crushing … the 20th century and its current ripple effects of shell shocked humans lacking any kind of identity, self-respect, or will for survival. It’s the “bare minimum nutrition to prevent by organs from failing” of bridges/design.

At least do the equivalent of showing yourself and brushing your teeth by painting the bridge in some way so you are not constantly reminded that your culture, identity, and self-respect is dead and you have no will for survival.

Coincidentally, the same applies to a painted mural or whatever finish you are pushing for.

There are other types of decorations than colors, and there are other colors than flashy.

The very first example in the OG article isn't colorful, and is rather beautiful. The link to tweet shows a gray beautiful building.

> I don’t want to live in self proclaimed “taste critiques” environment.

If you are surrounded by ugly things, there's very little space where you can learn and develop taste.

Already you can't imagine any other alternatives than "being surrounded by flashy colored buildings all the time"

Edit: you are not alone. I've seen this "counterpoint" in quite a few conversations. Many people cannot imagine anything beyond "buildings in flashy colors" because that's usually the only alternative the modern world provides. Something like this: https://www.dreamstime.com/new-technologies-construction-mul...

People wildly overestimate the costs of making things nice; penny-wise pound-foolish stuff.

In fact (and it annoys me to no end), people tend to think of expensive infrastructure as a positive trait, not a negative one.