The space shuttle wasn't as bad as its reputation though. Both accidents had organizational causes and were entirely avoidable. And its huge payload bay and the fact it was a mobile base allowed for the construction of the ISS.
It just failed at reusability, it was more like refurbishability :) But many lessons have been learned from that.
I'm speaking more to the shuttle cost overruns, both in design and mission. I'd argue that the reusability aspect was central to the idea of a "shuttle" and if it failed at that, it missed its mark.
I agree 100% that there are organizational causes to past mishaps. As to whether or not it was avoidable...I tend to think they are rooted very much in human psychology and we think about risk. The same issues occur today within NASA (EVA 23 is a good example [1], despite the 'organizational' fixes put in place after Challenger and Columbia). Humans are really, really good at rationalizing the answer we emotionally want.
It just failed at reusability, it was more like refurbishability :) But many lessons have been learned from that.