The last few months, I've started to really notice how shit the quality of most buildings and infrastructure is in the US. I know a lot of people in the construction industry and grew up in it, and it's really just amazing how everything is built to maximize short term appearance and minimize cost. EVERYTHING, even ostensibly "luxury" housing, is built this way. I used to live an apartment building that was only a few years old but when you looked at the details you could already see the thing was falling apart. I've seen roads get resurfaced only to see a bunch of cracks and pot holes show up the next winter.
So as America enters terminal decline, I fully expect the buildings and infrastructure around us is just gonna fall apart and look hideous. Especially the suburbs. I feel like most suburbs are held together with paper mache and veneer. And of course Americans will deny it's happening and pretend it's totally fine.
I visited Chicago for a couple days and I could not believe how absolutely dilapidated everything was. Just rotten wood, rusted metal, holes in drywall, broken shit everywhere, super fucking dirty.
Hotel was retrofitted from the 40's, with 90's bathrooms and 2000's carpet but everything else was 40's. Exposed pipes all over the place, and haphazardly closed off vent ducts from an old unused heating system. Air conditioner was puttied into the window hastily many years ago.
You'd go into a corner store or restaurant and they'd have like, a hole in the floor taped off, or missing ceiling tiles, almost every time.
Like seriously, I live near a substantially smaller city and they take care of shit there. You wouldn't eat off the benches or anything, but they do a reasonable job. Chicago is falling apart.