There's an article in the New York Times today about the USS Intrepid aircraft carrier needing to be drydocked for repairs. For some reason there seems to be an awful lot of secrecy about what repairs it might need, but if you happen to walk past it on a rainy day you'll get some idea. For instance, you can see water pouring off the upper deck and running down the side leaving a rusted streak. Given the discoloration and extremely visible corrosion it looks like this sort of poor drainage has been left unchecked for quite some time. Which makes me think that these major repairs could have perhaps been avoided had they actually maintained the thing. They certainly should have had the money for it, given the outrageous fees they charge for entrance. It would have been $12 if I'd shown my student ID card; otherwise it would have been $17.
I know this because I went by one of the days I was in New York. I'd never been to the USS Intrepid before and since I had an hour or two to spare so I thought I'd swing by. I took a look but there was no way I was going to spend that kind of money for a museum. Even if I'd had all day to spend there.
I found the whole thing disgusting. Between the prices, the large McDonald's logo adorning the signage(!), the metal detectors one had to pass through to even get to the McDonald's... American history, reduced to crass commercialism and paranoia. And yet while they were apparently so concerned that someone might try to do something dastardly to the ship that they had to set up privacy-violating barriers between Americans and their history, they were still content to let it sit there and rot...