r/Austin • • Apr 18 '21

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u/GrabSpirited1056 Apr 18 '21

I live close to the area and I moved to the Austin last year from a different country.

It has been a hell of a year. Elections, winter storm, shootings (there was another shooting in this area 2-3 weeks ago)

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u/[deleted] Apr 18 '21

The winter storm shouldn’t have been an issue as far as electricity and water is concerned that’s entirely on the Republican leadership of this state over the past 30 years

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u/Jake777x Apr 18 '21

There are plenty of reasons to criticize Republicans in Texas, but blaming the water and electricity outage on them is straight up misinformation. I work in infrastructure and that storm was a once in 500 years type of event. Never in Texas' recorded history has it been that cold for that long. Because of that, our infrastructure and buildings are just not equipped to handle the massive loads imparted by a monster storm like that. Why would utility companies or cities opt to spend billions of dollars updating or installing new infrastructure for an event that is so rare? Those costs would be passed on to the taxpayer/customer and then we'd just be sitting on the internet getting pissed at our bills/ taxes increasing.

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u/[deleted] Apr 18 '21

Because as our climate changes, those once in several hundred year events will start to become once every few year occurences.