I’m not too bothered by the long construction times myself. And they were adding new content indeed - something that would definitely have priority in my eyes.
I still think the same though, would prefer new content / other features to have more priority over this one 
And considering a lot of time has passed, I’d say this issue has now become less pressing for a lot of people. You can call it selfish, I’m alright if it is actually, but I’d rather have them working on things that improve the game for everyone rather than only for newer players.
If you see how much effort a lot of the veteran players already put into making the game easier/better for newer players I wouldn’t call it selfish - they clearly want to improve the game for new people and help them out to get them through the game without making the same mistakes. Don’t think it is too much to ask for new improvements to not just be geared towards those as well then.