Conveniently, there is an upcoming opportunity to do something about it. The Department of Transportation recently released its second round of criteria for the Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery (TIGER). This program provides a unique opportunity for Los Angeles to find dollars for biking and walking projects.
For example, in the last round of TIGER grants, the Department of Transportation provided $23 million for the Philadelphia Area Pedestrian and Bike Network. The Department of Transportation provided the following description of the project—
The overall project will repair, reconstruct and improve 16.3 miles of pedestrian and bicycle facilities that will complete a 128-mile regional network in six counties around Philadelphia and Southern New Jersey. TIGER funds will be used to improve the primary commuter routes closest to downtown, in some of the communities hardest hit by the current economic downturn including Southwest Philadelphia and Camden, NJ. Non-motorized commuting options will connect residents in these areas to more prosperous communities that provide employment opportunities, including Philadelphia and Cherry Hill, NJ.
These are the types of projects we should be pushing in Los Angeles if we want to execute the Mayor's vision of more biking and walking. The guidelines for the next round of TIGER grants will use “Innovation” and “Partnership” as criteria. What is more innovative than pushing non-auto travel in the nation’s smoggiest city? Also, what about the City of Los Angeles, the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health and the South Coast Air Quality Management District partnering together on a biking/walking project that promotes non-auto travel, fights obesity, reduces our dependence on foreign oil, and reduces air pollution? I just hope our agencies in Los Angeles aren't afraid of the TIGER this time around.
]]>While this California pollution epidemic poses severe health threats, it provides us an opportunity to rethink how we do things in the Golden State. There have already been significant efforts undertaken by the California Air Resources Board to adopt life-saving measures to reduce diesel pollution from trucks, construction equipment and ships. It is no surprise that all three of these landmark regulations have been attacked by industry lobbyists—to read more about the various obstructionists tactics used to stop these life-saving measures, go to these links: truck obstruction, construction obstruction, and ship obstruction.
Even with these measures, there is more work that needs to be done. For example, we need to continue to push cleaner vehicles and power sources. In Los Angeles, we need our decision-makers to stand up to the oil refineries to make sure they are adopting state of the art pollution controls. We also need to rethink how our transportation system works in our major urban areas. Instead of building road after road that will only exacerbate our chronic air pollution problems, continue our addiction to foreign oil, and drain our funding, we should support more efficient ways of transporting people. Finally, in places in the San Joaquin Valley, we need to make sure agricultural sources of pollution are reducing their fair share.
Beyond the public health and environmental justice concerns with our failure to meet clean air standards, we are facing big economic consequences. Dr. Jane Hall of California State University at Fullerton has determined that residents of the Los Angeles region are paying a hefty price for failing to meet federal clean air standards: $1,250 per person per year, according to a recent study she released. She estimated the cost of air pollution in the San Joaquin Valley is $1,600 per person per year.
So, in the upcoming months as our California political leaders and voters are asked to weaken air pollution regulations, delay action in adopting strong measures to clean the air, or fund bad projects that will exacerbate our air pollution woes, we should stand up and say no. The American Lung Association's report confirms that California needs to continue its leadership with precedent setting efforts to push clean air technologies and strategies. California has achieved great strides in reducing pollution over the decades, but this report confirms that we have a lot more work to do.
]]>The Los Angeles Streetsblog recently posted a quick article that asked whether the Los Angeles Metropolitan Transportation Authority (“METRO” or “MTA”) will try to overload the 30/10 initiative, which should be designed to jump start transit funding with a bunch of highway projects. Today, METRO will decide whether to support 30/10, but there have been significant attempts to add some fine print by the METRO Board. The current language being pursued by METRO goes too far to appease the road building lobby and other business interests.
The Natural Resources Defense Council and the Coalition for Clean Air submitted a letter to METRO yesterday asking that it not advocate to load up the 30/10 initiative with a bunch of highway pork projects aimed at expanding our highway system. Beyond the dramatic air quality issues we face in Los Angeles, we have a climate change dilemma that requires significant action to reduce our dependence on roads. My colleague in D.C., Colin Peppard outlines the climate concern in a recent post on the National Journal Transportation expert blog—
Transportation was responsible for 27% of total US greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in 2008. This makes transportation the nation’s second largest end-use emissions source—larger than any other nation’s economy-wide emissions, with the exception of China. Over the past two decades, transportation has also been the nation’s fastest growing GHG source, responsible for 47% of the net increase in emissions between 1990 and 2007. (Transportation also accounts for close to 70% of US oil consumption, but that’s for an energy security post.)
Colin also lays out a good vision for what is needed moving forward--
Practically, what does this mean? It means better road and congestion management and strong consideration of road pricing. It means increasing investment in efficient non-road transportation options, and a real multi-modal freight strategy. It means much better coordination of transportation plans with local land use. And when new road capacity is called for (yes, this environmentalist recognizes that a road is often the best way to get from here to there!), it means being cognizant of the long term energy and climate impacts. And of course, this vision also includes ever-more efficient vehicles running on new low-carbon fuels.
Initiatives like 30/10 help achieve this more sustainable vision. And, supporting a transit-only 30/10 initiative does not mean we will not expand roads. It simply means we will focus the next decade on the transit system, which has been neglected for decades. All in all, I hope Mayor Villaraigosa will stand strong in making sure the 30/10 initiative stays a transit strategy and not just a grab bag to appease the road building lobby and other business interests that want to pave our way out of the Los Angeles transportation crisis. Attempting to expand one road after another has been used in Los Angeles for decades and is fraught with peril. It is time for us to take a fresh approach that will make Los Angeles a more transit-oriented city.
]]>In the hyperpolitical Washington, D.C., there are going to be attacks to any proposed change from the business-as-usual approach. However, at the end of the day, biking and walking is not a conservative, moderate or liberal issue. People just need to get around, and our government needs to provide better options for transportation that can help us kick our addiction to oil. If I want to ride a bike, I should have infrastructure to do so. For example, in Los Angeles, there are some bike lanes that mysteriously end leaving bikers with no designated routes to travel. It's untenable to think projects that fix this problem and allow safer bicycle transport should not be funded. At the end of the day, bicyclers are at a disadvantage because they don’t have thousands of pounds of steel protecting them as they travel.
We should thank Mr. LaHood for continuing to listen to Americans and pushing this issue despite some in the peanut gallery trying to stop this more rational approach to funding transportation projects.
]]>Let’s use Los Angeles as an example because the American Trucking Associations generally has a disregard for the health and welfare of residents in Los Angeles. One project in Los Angeles, the Gerald Desmond Bridge Replacement in the harbor area, will cost taxpayers more than $1 billion dollars. The damage and need to replace this bridge was basically caused by one thing—the constant number of trucks that have rumbled over this bridge and made it deteriorate over the years. You see, the environmental report for the Desmond project notes that trucks cause three times more damage to roads than passenger vehicles, yet it is those passengers that will foot the bill for trucking companies to have nicely paved roads and bridge. Now, I wonder how much more of an impact a truck has on a road compared to a bike.
At a recent meeting in Los Angeles, it came out that it would cost about $280 million to put in place all of the “shovel-ready” bike projects in the Los Angeles region. Currently, transportation planners in the region want to spend more than $1 billion on the Desmond Bridge, $6.3 billion on the I-710 South project, which is designed to allow more and more trucks to go into the harbor in Los Angeles and Long Beach, and many more billions of dollars on infrastructure in the Los Angeles region geared towards subsidizing the trucking industry. Despite the predictions from lobbyists at the National Association of Manufacturers and the American Trucking Associations, I seriously doubt we will see some biking-induced economic apocalypse if our planners spend more dollars fixing and developing the desperately underfunded biking infrastructure in places like Los Angeles.
Bill Graves has no facts to support his hyperbolic position, but instead the Virginia-based trucking lobbyist is simply evoking fear that bicycling may become a more effective means to travel in cities across the country. As a multimodal commuter, I want effective bicycling infrastructure in my community, and trucking companies should want that too. In fact, the Alaska Trucking Association had positive things to say about the Anchorage Bike Plan. Also, we are talking peanuts when compared to the billions of dollars proposed to be spent on earmark projects to fix the problems on our roads caused by trucks. I know it is hard for road builders and truck lobbyists to share the taxpayers’ transportation funds that they have spent so many billions of dollars lobbying for over the years in Washington, D.C. and states throughout the nation. However, the day has come for a more responsible way to fund transportation where Ray LaHood, our Secretary of Transportation, and others will ask that not all the money be blindly spent on roads to fix damage caused by big trucks. Will it help if Mr. LaHood says “please”?
]]>A barrage of studies have highlighted the major impacts on the health and welfare of residents associated with living in close proximity to highways. For example, a recent study from researchers at the University of Southern California (“USC”) found that artery wall thickening among people living within 100 meters of a Los Angeles highway progressed twice as quickly as those who lived farther away. Another Southern California study from the USC research team documented the impairment of normal lung development from long term exposure to highway pollution among children between the ages of 10 and 18.
This severe public health issue impacts many throughout the country. The Environmental Protection Agency estimates that 35 million Americans live within 100 meters of major highways. In the Los Angeles region, there are approximately 1.5 million people residing near major roadways. Thus, significant populations are suffering from the lack of action to clean up the air in our highway corridors.
But, we are seeing more and more attention given to this issue, and now it is just a matter of our regulators catching up. A recent article in LA Weekly by Patrick Range McDonald highlighted this issue through the lens of the stylish lofts that are popping up around Los Angeles near our major highways. I suppose the real question these days is how much more information needs to be generated before our agencies take serious action to protect the millions of residents impacted by living close to highways.
Fed up with a lack of action, a coalition of health, environmental, and environmental justice groups asked top environmental officials in California to take this critical public health threat more seriously. The groups asked that our lead air pollution control agencies, including the California Air Resources Board, work together to more fully monitor the levels of pollution near highways. Currently, there has been an unwillingness to even place long-term air pollution monitors near highways in California. Apparently, some fear that we might uncover a public health issue that may be difficult to solve. This approach is akin to going to a doctor and having that doctor not run a test for fear that she may have to prescribe some medicine. We cannot continue to stick our heads in the sand and ignore the harm highway pollution is imposing on those living close to roads. The stakes are just too high.
]]>This partnership between the South Coast Air Quality Management District and the Port of Los Angeles that pushed this truck from concept to reality could not have come at a better time because the harbor continues to have some of the filthiest air in the nation. This move to electric trucks, along with electrified rail and a movement to other more efficient methods to moving freight, is critical to protecting vulnerable populations near our seaports, railyards, and adjacent to our freight corridors. Also, the industries that move our nation's freight need to be put on notice that their constant statements doubting the viability of electric truck technologies need to stop. The technology is here, so let's figure out a way to use it.
This effort also marks a glimpse into the future of how green business can be good business. It is no secret that the City of Los Angeles through the leadership of Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and Janice Hahn see the all-electric truck as a way to clean up the harbor area, but also to boost the local economy by producing this equipment here. Convincing the company to move to Harbor City and negotiating for a $1,000 royalty for each truck sold to parties beyond the Port of Los Angeles is a good move.
All in all, Tuesday, February 24, 2009 will be an important day for clean air in Los Angeles. But let's not rest on our laurels--there are still several issues that need to be addressed such as ensuring these trucks are powered by renewable energy and making the market for these trucks larger. So, I now will raise a higher challenge to the air district and the port. I challenge these agencies to get 2,500 of these trucks on the road by this time next year. From what I know about Mayor Villaraigosa, David Freeman and the South Coast AQMD Board, this is a challenge that they are willing to accept.
]]>The California Air Resources Board ("CARB") recognizes that "air pollution studies indicate that living close to high traffic and the associated emissions may lead to adverse health effects beyond those associated with regional air pollution in urban areas." EPA estimates that in a moderate sized city, particle pollution causes 25 to 50 increased deaths for each 0.5 mg/m3 above the national standard. The studies conducted in the L.A. basin show that concentrations of black carbon (one of the most hazardous components of the fine particles) downwind from highways with heavy truck traffic can be 12-13 mg/m3 times greater than concentrations found in urban air upwind of the highways. Particle concentrations greater than the regional average are measured at least 300 meters from heavily trafficked highways. In the four county Los Angeles air basin, census data show that approximately 1.5 million residents live within 300 meters of major freeways. Using EPA's methodology, for these 1.5 million Angelinos living in this high pollution zone, increased mortality is estimated to range from 300 to 500 deaths per year.
Despite this troubling scientific evidence, the quest for clean air in the basin appears to be a joke for some. In jest during the meeting on Thursday night, several decision-makers on how the I-710 expansion project should proceed mentioned that they wish they had a "clean air fairy" that could come forward and clean up the toxic mess that is air quality near areas where diesel equipment is highly concentrated (e.g. highways, ports, etc). The implication from their tone was that environmental and environmental justice advocates are living in a mythical world in desiring clean, healthy air for all Angelinos. Despite these attempts to diminish the advocates' message, they mentioned that our region is doing the best it can. This led me to question whether that is in fact true. Are we in fact doing the best we can?
Upon thinking about the current direction of the I-710 project is taking and other projects like the SR-47 (another pollution-plagued thoroughfare in LA), it is becoming clearer that we are not doing our best. As debates are brewing in D.C. about adding more and more funds for capital-intensive highway expansion projects, this issue becomes more critical. Our transportation planners continue to desire to add freeway lanes by default throughout communities in the basin, and I am left wondering how we will reduce our severe air pollution problems in the region, battle climate change, and reduce our dependence on foreign oil.
The letter sent today lays out several alternatives that could be used to dramatically reduce pollution, including electrified trucks, electrified rail, and implementation of an advanced container transport system. These are the technologies that our leaders need to be implementing and laying the groundwork for now instead of continuing the stale tactic of continuously adding highway lanes.
I recall the day in my childhood when someone alleged that the Tooth Fairy did not exist. I denied these assertions and still believed in this mythical being because I did not want to lose out on cash under my pillow. Like my childhood self, our region is in denial that its actions are not exacerbating LA's notorious air pollution problems. The impacts of this denial are far greater than losing a couple of bucks under a pillow. We are left with premature death, asthma attacks, children missing school days, and many other chronic problems. That is a lot to lay our head on at night. So, I encourage our planners and air quality agencies to work with NRDC and other groups to realize that we do not live in a fairy tale land where someone can wave a wand and our pollution disappears. Our air pollution woes are real and deserve real attention and solutions.
]]>We are at a crossroads in terms of the American transportation system. Our leaders are faced with some choices as they contemplate how to spend hundreds of billions of dollars of taxpayer's money. We can create a transportation system that meets the needs of all residents, which means reducing greenhouse gas pollution, fostering our energy security, reducing traditional air pollutants, and providing a safe, reliable means to get from point A to B. Or, we can fund a bunch of boondoggles that will not result in a more efficient transportation system. (By the way, one of the meeting participants taught me the origin of how the term boondoggle came to be known as a project that wastes time and money-see 1935 New York Times article). I hope our leaders will choose the former.
I also want to quickly hit on an issue that is often overlooked in the national transportation debate, the movement of freight. It is easy to forget about the system that moves freight to our store shelves. There is a dark side to this segment of the transportation system because communities throughout the nation are suffering the impacts from the immense amount of diesel pollution caused by freight movement (see e.g. the example of communities hammered by pollution in Southern California). We need to make sure that the national freight system works to minimize the impacts from moving TVs, toys, key chains, and other products on communities near freight centers (e.g. railyards, distribution centers, and ports).
In the end, there needs to be accountability for all projects. Good projects that achieve the objectives mentioned above need to be funded. And Congress should create a boondoggle resting place to toss to the side those projects that do not achieve our objectives.
]]>In a strange portion of the website, it talks about what people can do to take action. The section recommends that people monitor various websites (it does not provide a link to these websites-by the way, here is SCAQMD's Air Monitoring Website) to see if particulate matter levels are high. If there are high levels of pollution, which happens frequently in the harbor area, it then lists a whole host of things people should do (e.g. keep windows closed, exercise indoors at a shopping mall or gym, vacuum with HEPA filters). The interesting thing about the website is that it does not encourage people to take action by telling the ports and their polluting tenants what actions the polluters should be taking. For example, maybe when people want to go for walks and play outdoors, they could recommend that shipping companies take their ships and unload them indoor at malls or at a gymnasium. Well, enough of the sarcasm-I am going to take the liberty of taking action in a different way than the ways suggested by the polluting tenants at the ports.
Now, here is a list of action items for these polluting port actors.
These are just a few suggestions, and my colleagues and I have many more. But for now, we're going to continue to push the ports and their polluting tenants until they have no need for a Proposition 65 warning.
]]>In reading this article, it highlights something that needs to change in the shipping industry-essentially shippers need to have that "can do" attitude that my second grade teacher always talked about when my classmates and I whined about class work being too hard. To be fair, certain companies have shown immense leadership in this arena-for example, Maersk, one of the world's largest shipping companies, decided to use significantly cleaner fuels off the coast of California, which has immense benefits to residents in Southern California and Northern California breathing the fouled air partly the result of ship pollution. As another example, Foss Maritime has been one of the leaders in pushing hybrid tug technology. However, there has been plenty of foot dragging.
There are many other initiatives out there by companies, but if we are going to solve the problems articulated in Wade Graham's beautifully written article about this industry and its impacts on residents in Southern California, advanced technologies need to be embraced. As people are suffering immense health impacts from shipping and the consequences of global warming loom large, the time for action is now.
Finally, the shipping industry has been under-regulated in the air pollution arena, and that is one of the reasons why we are in the situation where areas around ports are amongst the most polluted places in California. Well crafted regulation will provide immense benefits to health and could result in significant reductions of greenhouse gas emission. If our regulatory agencies, the ports, and the shipping industry step up to the plate, we can take a whack at solving the substantial problem of rampant pollution from shipping.
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