A lot of municipalities want custom artwork, lighting, landscaping, etc to accompany their new grade separations.

I chatted with a construction crew working on an underpass project one time. Nearing completion, city hall decided they wanted to modify the lighting because it would be too dark underneath. This change shouldn't have been a big deal because it had no bearing on railroad operations. The railroad was still required to sign off on the change. Only problem was their civil engineer had just left on vacation for the next month.

Work came to a standstill waiting for this guy to return. All of the construction crew were paid to sit at home, and later paid thousands of hours of overtime to meet the construction deadline. Several pieces of expensive equipment on short term leases had to be extended. In the end, the railroad's failure to approve the change in a timely manner increased the cost by $800,000.

Pathetic. I'm sure this is one of many examples of railroads exacerbating the waste. This wouldn't be happening if the railroad was paying the bills.