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And fire departments lobbying against said things because they say it slows their response times when their giant trucks are what slow them down and most refuse to look at smaller trucks like used in Europe and Asia

I hear it over and over: “We can’t slow down car traffic (on this dangerous roadway and save lives) because doing that would slow down car traffic.” Up there with this: “We could never make American cities less sprawled out because they are too sprawled out.” Make it make sense.

we can't change things because they already are the way they are

To be clear, I did read this. They do have the money because the construction and maintenance of a six-lane stroad is expensive. They mean they do not have a cheap way to maintain the current “level of service” and make it safe for people outside a car.

A nit: this is partly "urban planning" (as the article says), but predominantly "transportation planning." What's the difference? -different gov't entities (municipal land use authority vs. state transportation agency) -different professionals w/ different cultures (planners vs. traffic engineers)