Comments by "alex smith" (@alexsmith-ob3lu) on "Concrete: A Ticking Time Bomb. Can We Fix It?" video.

In France and Italy, many traditional forms of craftsmanship are still preserved but in America; these types of old crafts have been lost to history.
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The end of WW2 brought about all this “quick and cheap” short sighted ideas of reinforced concrete. So much needed to be rebuilt as fast as possible for little cost, so most countries went the short sighted route that is now having disastrous consequences on us.
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@MadLadsAnonymous You also have to take into account the initial financial costs and long term cost of maintenance. If we (Americans) can't even find the money to properly maintain freeways built in the 1960s; then what makes you think we'll maintain these newer structures with reinforced fiberglass instead of steel rebar?
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@DigitalBenny America has a track record for doing improper maintenance, regardless of what engineering or materials we employ. Just look at our freeway system and you'll understand.
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The more complicated and the more high level engineering involved; the greater the expenses for long term maintenance. If you live in America and you drive a car around; you can easily see the complete lack of endurance these modernist structures have.
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Not surprised by how bad reinforces concrete is from an artistic and technical point of view. Most freeways in the USA were built in the 1950s/60s using reinforced concrete. Many have been torn down and many more are costing billions of dollars in borrowed (not taxpayer!) money just to maintain because of how little endurance these structures have.
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You can thank both political parties for destroying our passenger trains, streetcar networks, and small towns after WW2.
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There are many alternative solutions that exist, but they are not used because of short term monetary/economic pressures or slow policy changes that create such disasterous and ugly buildings.
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@DigitalBenny Last longer? By how much? Another 50 years? People will not maintain or make a building endure if they do not have the LOVE for such a building. Its why you still see centuries old castles still standing, while Soviet style block apartments are being torn down or abandoned.
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@DigitalBenny Yeah, you got nothing to prove your point. You should also take into account the decline of technical-creative skillsets all over America; so you're "miracle material" won't make a difference in the overall problems.
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@steveperreira5850 No kidding, buddy! Everyone laughs at American engineering and admires German engineering. Who invented the combustion engine? Who invented freeways? Germany! The main argument that I was also trying to make above is how every country today has embraced American engineering degrees and American style of doing design work. Not German.
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