Friends and members of the Puglia family sift through the remains of their missing home for valuables on November 6, 2012, after Hurricane Sandy hit Staten Island, New York. View photos of New York preparing for Sandy.
Editor's note: Kate Ascher oversees Happold Consulting's U.S. practice and is the Milstein Professor of Urban Development at Columbia University's Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation. Her firm consults for the New York City Department of Parks & Recreation.
(CNN) -- It should come as no surprise to anyone that New York's infrastructure wasn't up to Hurricane Sandy. What happened in New York was not all that different than what's happened in other places hit by freakish weather events -- the infrastructure wasn't robust enough to withstand nature. It is not the first time it's happened here, and it won't be the last.
The problems in New York stem from many factors. For a start, infrastructure investment here is no more a priority than it is in other places across the country: It's simply not something that voters want badly. When given a choice between investing in schools, health and housing or investing in sewers, tunnels or roads, the latter will always lose out. And that's not just the view of the politicians, but also of the constituents who keep them in office.
Think about what happened after the bridge collapse in Minneapolis in 2007. The press was full of reports about the condition of our nation's bridges, and Washington was abuzz with new ideas for financing roadway infrastructure. More than five years later, our bridges remain in much the same poor condition they were in then, and the voices screaming for an infrastructure bank or other form of dedicated financing to upgrade them have been all but muted.
Of course some of the mess we are witnessing in the metropolitan region is unique to us. For largely historical reasons, New York's power system is run by private utilities answerable to state regulators. Its subway system has also been run by the state -- in the form of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority -- ever since going bankrupt in the 1960s. So any criticism regarding the lack of investment or preparedness for a hurricane event, at least in terms of power or transit, needs to be aimed squarely at Albany, not at City Hall.
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To be fair, the hard-working officials who have spent decades bringing the city subway system back to a state of good repair have done a decent job of it. Compared with the dark days of the 1970s, transit stations are cleaner, subway trains are newer, and reliability and predictability are up. But the funding allocated by the state for investment in the system is nowhere near enough to take a 100-year-old system and make it a resilient one -- resilient enough to withstand the pounding it received this week.
No one should stand behind age as an excuse for vulnerability in infrastructure. Consider the case of London, a city whose infrastructure is -- in almost every respect -- even older than New York's. Yet over the last 25 years, London has grabbed one opportunity after another to bring its core infrastructure -- power, transport and water -- into the 21st century. In almost every aspect, the city's infrastructure is today more resilient than ours.
What has London done in the last several decades to modernize its systems? To protect against flooding, a movable flood barrier was built in the Thames; in more than 100 closures, it has proven effective in protecting the city from major storm surge or tidal events.
Electric power is now produced outside the city, rather than within its boundaries. A major new sewer line is being designed to run along the Thames, part of an ambitious plan to replace the Victorian-era sewers that carry much of the city's wastewater. Transit too has seen its share of investment, with dozens of extended and upgraded rail lines bringing life to formerly downtrodden urban neighborhoods and entirely new high-speed lines knitting together key commercial nodes across the city.
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The difference between the two cities is not money -- it's governance. New York City may control its streets, but it doesn't control its power system or its transit system. Unlike England, where investment decisions are made by the city in conjunction with the national government, when it comes to infrastructure we've got a bundle of intermediary state agencies and regulators deciding what's best for the city and how much investment it deserves -- and a bunch of state politicians circumscribing their ability to do so at every turn.
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Not all New York infrastructure is caught in the same bind. New York's acclaimed water system, devised by city engineers in the 19th century to bring water from the Catskills to the growing urban population, remains a model of how service delivery could be done. Well into its second century, it is controlled by the city in a businesslike fashion, its capital program underpinned by the ability to float bonds to secure needed investment. The result is that projects that contribute to the resilience of the city's water infrastructure, such as the Third Water Tunnel now under construction, get done purposefully and with minimal political interference.
There are other reasons to be optimistic about our infrastructure future. Some 125 years ago, in March of 1888, the worst blizzard on record dumped more than 3 feet of snow on a paralyzed New York City. Telecom and electric wires, newly strung up between all of the quickly industrializing city's buildings, collapsed and were rendered useless -- prompting a mandate to bury all cables from that point forward.
The underground network that resulted from that storm is largely responsible for the extraordinarily high levels of reliability Manhattan's electric and telecom customers have enjoyed ever since.
The question now is whether Sandy will stimulate similarly new ways of thinking about our infrastructure. Will she energize what to date have been spotty efforts to prepare the city and its systems for sea level rise and storm surges? Will the money made available by Washington in disaster relief be used to sow the seeds for real change? Will the dislocation experienced by all focus sufficient attention on those state institutions that have been given the power to oversee the city's infrastructure but not the ability to finance it effectively?
Let's hope Sandy brings more than shoreline devastation in her wake. With a little luck, even this terribly large storm cloud could turn out to have a silver lining.
The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Kate Ascher.
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A part of a house that floated off its foundation during the storm now sits in the middle of a coastal estuary in the Oakwood Beach area of Staten Island.
New York City police officers and a resident warm up in front of a fire in a blacked-out area of Oakwood Beach on Staten Island.
A woman looks through a sand covered parking lot used as a donation center on November 5 in the Rockaway neighborhood of the Queens borough of New York City.
Volunteers who call themselves the Broad Channel Police Department help clean a neighbor's damaged house.
People wait in line for food at a distribution center at Coney Island.
A dump truck empties trash collected from homes damaged by Superstorm Sandy on Saturday, November 3, in the Midland Beach neighborhood of Staten Island, New York. New York is trying to clean up and resume normal activities days after the storm hit.
A volunteer places donated clothing in plastic bags to protect it from potential rain at a relief center on Saturday in Midland Beach.
A damaged chair sits on the beach in low-lying Coney Island on Saturday.
A man salvages a set of drums at Rockaway Beach in Queens, New York, on Saturday. Most of the Rockaway Peninsula remains without power.
People gather among debris from Superstorm Sandy and boxes of donated goods on Saturday in Rockaway Beach.
Boats that were swept aground during Sandy sit against homes near a marina on Staten Island on Friday, November 2.
Eddie Liu uses a broom to clean up mud and water from a flooded coin laundry in Coney Island on Friday.
Michelle Dumas hugs her daughter Olivia to warm her up as they wait in an hours-long line for gas at a station Friday on Staten Island.
Men try to clean up the destruction in a flooded deli in Brooklyn, New York, on Friday.
Members of the Traina family on Friday sort through photographs and other personal items from their Staten Island home that was destroyed by Superstorm Sandy.
In the aftermath of Superstorm Sandy, replacement power utility poles are transported along Old Country Road on Friday in Plainview, New York.
Abandoned and flooded cars are piled up on Friday, November 2, in the heavily damaged Rockaway neighborhood, in Queens, where a large section of a landmark boardwalk was washed away.
Food trucks and men selling bread and cheeses line Broadway at Union Square on Friday in New York as the city recovers from the effects of Superstorm Sandy.
Debris piles up near the foundations of the iconic boardwalk, which was washed away in the Rockaway neighborhood in Queens.
A man rides his bike through the heavily damaged Rockaway neighborhood.
Matthew Mark Meyer, left, and Annie Barwick, center, sit in a darkened Randolf Beer Restaurant which is using generator power to reopen on Friday in New York City.
People walk through the heavily damaged Rockaway neighborhood.
Commuters pack into a train on Thursday in New York City. Limited public transit has returned to the city, where 14 of 23 subway lines are running.
Commuters ride the subway. Public transit is operating in New York City, but travel times are long, up to five hours in some cases.
A police officer directs passengers waiting on Thursday to board city buses into Manhattan at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn. About 4,000 buses are replacing the subway lines still closed by Superstorm Sandy damage.
Thousands of people wait to board city buses into Manhattan, and some subway lines remain underwater. Getting water out of the tunnels is "one of the main orders of business right now," Gov. Andrew Cuomo said Thursday.
A police officer directs traffic entering the Brooklyn Queens Expressway into Manhattan.
A police officer checks cars entering the Brooklyn Queens Expressway to confirm that they have three occupants before allowing them to cross into Manhattan on Thursday. Limited public transit has returned to New York, and most major bridges have reopened. However, vehicles must have three occupants to pass.
Parts of lower Manhattan are still without electricity on Thursday. Superstorm Sandy, which made landfall along the New Jersey shore on Monday, October 29, left much of the Eastern Seaboard without power, including much of Manhattan south of 34th Street.
Residents of New York City's East Village enjoy a bonfire on Wednesday, October 31.
East Village residents charge their phones with power from a generator on Wednesday.
Traffic snarls in New York City on Wednesday. Residents and businesses across the Eastern Seaboard are attempting to return to their daily lives in the aftermath of Superstorm Sandy.
A Caring Foundation worker hands out food to residents of the heavily damaged Rockaway section of Queens on Wednesday.
Water floods streets in the Rockaway section of Queens on Wednesday.
Traders stand outside of the New York Stock Exchange in New York on Wednesday. Stocks advanced as U.S. equity markets resumed trading for the first time this week after the storm.
A man surveys damage on Wednesday, October 31, in the Rockaway neighborhood of Queens, New York, where the historic boardwalk was washed away during Superstorm Sandy.
Residents walk with their belongings through the Rockaway section of Queens on Wednesday.
The remains of homes burned down in Rockaway are seen Wednesday, a day after an inferno spread across the flooded neighborhood.
Firefighters continued to survey the damage in Rockaway on Wednesday. At least 80 homes were destroyed.
People wait for buses on Sixth Avenue in New York on Wednesday as New Yorkers cope with the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy.
People attempt to squish into a crowded bus on First Avenue in New York on Wednesday.
Con Edison crew members work on a steam pipe on First Avenue on Wednesday.
The foundations to the historic Rockaway boardwalk in Brooklyn are all that remain after it was washed away Wednesday during Hurricane Sandy.
People walk to work Wednesday on a normally busy street near the New York Stock Exchange.
Traders work on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange on Wednesday after it had been closed for two days.
Commuters arrive in Manhattan by ferry from Jersey City, New Jersey, on its first day back in business after Sandy.
CNN iReporter Jordan Shapiro captured this view of the Williamsburg Bridge in New York at 11 p.m. on Tuesday, October 30. Half of the bridge and Brooklyn is lit, while the Manhattan side and the surrounding part of the island remain shrouded in darkness.
A subway station and escalator sit underwater in New York on Tuesday.
Much of the New York City skyline sits in darkness Tuesday evening after damage from Superstorm Sandy knocked out power. About 6.9 million customers are without power in 15 states and the District of Columbia, according to figures compiled by CNN from power companies.
New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, center, views the damage Tuesday in the Breezy Point neighborhood of Queens, where a fire broke out during Superstorm Sandy and destroyed at least 80 homes.
A resident looks through the debris of his destroyed home in Breezy Point, Queens, on Tuesday.
Burned-out vehicles and destroyed homes line a street in Breezy Point, located on the western end of the Rockaway peninsula in New York.
A fire continues to burn Tuesday in the remains of a structure that was destroyed by the Breezy Point blaze.
A New York City man hands a dog to first responders while being evacuated on Tuesday.
A bartender at the International Bar in the East Village neighborhood of New York City makes drinks in the dark on Tuesday as electricity remains out for many in the city.
Water floods the Plaza Shops in New York, in the wake of Superstorm Sandy, on Tuesday, October 30.
Con Edison employees monitor the drainage of water being pumped out of Seven World Trade Center in the Financial District of New York on Tuesday.
Onlookers watch a construction crane dangling from a $1.5 billion luxury high-rise after collapsing in high winds.
The construction crane dangles from a high-rise in midtown Manhattan.
Ramiro Arcos clears debris from a storm drain in the Financial District of New York after Sandy swept through the city.
A couple walks in the rain Tuesday, with the East River and the Lower Manhattan skyline as a backdrop.
The Manhattan skyline remains dark after much of the city lost electricity in the storm.
Cars float in a flooded below-street-level parking area in the Financial District on Tuesday.
People take a Tuesday morning walk on the Brooklyn Bridge, which remains closed to traffic after the city awakened to the storm damage.
A car sits crushed by a tree in the Financial District on Tuesday. 
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