Justin Horner's Blog: Curbing Pollution

There's No Such Thing as a Free Lunch (Nor a Free Parking Space)

2010-02-02T17:57:20Z

“Dying is easy; parking is hard.” --Art Buchwald, in his last days.

Last week, the California State Senate passed SB 518, authored by Senator Alan Lowenthal (D-Long Beach) and sponsored by NRDC. SB 518 aims to reduce traffic congestion, greenhouse gas emissions, and public costs by creating incentives for local governments to implement policies that reveal the actual cost of parking and reduce governmental or government-required subsidies for parking.

A long understudied aspect of our transportation system, parking nevertheless has a tremendous impact on our travel choices and, therefore, the environment. It’s estimated that each car in America needs at least four parking spaces (home, work, and at least two for shopping, errands and socializing)—with 4.7 billion cars in the United States, we’re talking about 19 billion parking spaces, an area the size of France! And at costs as high as $40,000 a space, we’re also talking a lot of money.

The Financial Costs of Parking

With local governments and everyday Californians navigating the most treacherous economic waters in decades, everything deserves a second look. The financial costs of parking are hard to ignore. In California, upwards of 90% of parking is “free” to the driver. But is anything really “free?” Private parking lots and public parking spaces need to be purchased, constructed, maintained, lit, insured and protected. If a driver uses the space for free, those costs are picked up by customers (in the form of higher prices) and by taxpayers (in the form of higher taxes). Although parking may seem “free,” the reality is that most of us are paying for other people’s parking nearly every day.

The Environmental Costs of Parking

Now, what does parking have to do with the environment? The answer is “plenty.” SB 518 outlines two primary impacts of free or underpriced parking:

Free parking encourages vehicle trips, thereby increasing traffic congestion, pollution, and greenhouse gas emissions. For example, at employment sites, employer-paid parking increases rates of driving by as much as 22%.
Excessive governmental parking requirements to ensure free parking greatly expand the built environment and increase travel distances, thereby increasing per capita vehicle miles traveled and reducing the viability of other transportation modes, such as walking, bicycling, and transit. Indeed, we’ve all spent at least some time in places like this:

Plus, there are other important impacts. The more we pave over, the poorer our water quality becomes, and paving for vast parking lots also contributes to the Urban Heat Island effect, which increases energy consumption and exacerbates local pollution.

Yet despite all of these serious impacts, little real innovation has entered into parking since the first parking meter was introduced in Oklahoma City in 1935.

SB 518: A Reasonable, Voluntary Approach

There is clearly a lot that needs to be done to reform our current approach to parking. SB 518 is a modest step forward and a beginning of the conversation. Carefully crafted to preserve the authority of local governments to control land use, the bill mandates nothing to local governments, yet offers incentives for those localities interested in taking a new look at parking.

Cities and counties can receive a few extra points on applications they submit to the State for infrastructure funding if they enact a minimum number of reforms from a broad menu of over 20 policies included in the legislation. For example, to qualify for the incentives, localities could choose to:

Reduce minimum parking requirements for residents or businesses, or in areas close to transit, bringing down the cost of development.
Permit shared parking, so that spaces provided for offices during the day can be used by restaurants at night.
“Unbundle” parking from property leases, so that renters and lessees can see the cost of the parking they are paying for.
Permit Parking Cash-Out, so that employees have a choice to pay for their parking.
Create parking benefits districts and residential parking districts so that revenues from parking can go directly towards improvements in areas where the parking is actually located (as opposed to the revenue going into a locality’s general fund). Ventura, California finalized just such a plan last week.
Create a parking program that aims to ensure a 15% vacancy rate (one in seven spaces, give or take) so there’s parking available more often than not.

In other words, SB 518 gives communities the choice of reconsidering their approach to parking while enabling them to better compete for vital State revenues. Localities should not be able to impose these reforms on their residents and businesses without public hearings and action by City Councils and Boards of Supervisors. Indeed, supporters of SB 518 include not only environmentalists like NRDC and the Sierra Club, but also city planners at the American Planning Association, air quality advocates at the American Lung Association, affordable housing groups, and Genentech, the biotech firm that itself is a leader in innovative approaches to parking.

It’s true: free parking isn’t really free. It’s high time we look honestly at how parking impacts our lives and our planet. SB 518 is a fair approach: a purely voluntary encouragement to take a second look at something we always take for granted.

No Stomach in Senate Committee for Gas Tax Scheme That Cuts $1.5 Billion From Transit

2010-01-21T23:03:26Z

It’s nice to go to a hearing in Sacramento every once in awhile and find yourself in a cloud of nearly universal agreement. I was able to experience that rare feeling earlier today when the Senate Committee on Budget and Fiscal Review held its hearing on Transportation and Resources Issues.

The first item up was the Administration’s proposal to switch taxes on gasoline to free up money for the general fund. In an earlier post, I explained the scheme and its likely impact on public transit funding in California: a $1.5 billion cut. Indeed, the non-partisan Legislative Analysts Office says the “proposal permanently eliminates state transit funding.” Not good.

Testifying for NRDC this morning, I was pleased to hear the initial comments from many of the Senators. Senator Alan Lowenthal was “appalled” by the proposal’s impact on transit; Senator Mark Leno told of San Francisco’s continued transit funding problems and wondered how this proposal would help things; and Senator Joe Simitian wisely pointed out the likely ridership impacts of further cuts and fare hikes, particularly on those “discretionary” riders who will once again choose their cars, leading to more air pollution and road congestion.

And when it was time for testimony, I was surprised by the breadth of opposition to the proposal. Transit agencies and the California Transit Association were clearly opposed to these cuts, as was the United Transportation Union. Environmentalists like NRDC, EDF and CALPIRG raised obvious objections, as these cuts baldly undermine our commitment to reducing global warming pollution. California’s counties were concerned about the future of their local street and roads money, and CalTrain and Amtrak’s Capitol Corridor raised questions of the future of intercity rail in California. The Sacramento Air Quality Management District and the American Lung Association feared more local air pollution from more driving, and the California Association of General Contractors and the Southern California Contractors Association expressed reservations about a new approach to transportation funding that sacrificed transit and did little to get shovels in the ground.

James Earp, of the California Alliance for Jobs, and Vice Chair of the California Transportation Commission, summed up the general mood when he said the plan was “bad advice” and a “faulty proposal.”

I left a bit early, but didn’t hear a single voice in support all morning.

Clearly, we need solutions, and the hard work of banging one out for transit funding is in the works. But it’s also a rare pleasure to see so many come together to chase a clearly bad idea out of the room. Hopefully, it will stay out.

Another $1.5 Billion Cut?!? Transit Once Again Takes It On the Chin

2010-01-11T19:33:20Z

Governor Schwarzenegger released his 2010-2011 State Budget on Friday, which includes a disastrous $1.5 billion cut to California’s transit agencies.

Everyone knows the story: California’s state government is in the midst of a fiscal nightmare, and Californians themselves are facing high unemployment, housing problems and the whole range of everyday troubles that come with living in a deep, deep recession. Make no mistake: balancing the budget means some serious cuts. The question is whether the cuts are done wisely. We should not be undermining the state’s recovery, frustrating the efforts of Californians to pull themselves out of this mess, or forsaking our environmental goals and responsibilities to the planet.

With these cuts, the proposed Budget manages to do all three. Further cuts to already struggling transit agencies mean 1) more layoffs, as transit agencies can no longer afford drivers and mechanics; 2) less mobility, at a time when access to jobs and social services is crucial; 3) higher transportation costs, as riders pay more for other ways to get around; and 4) more pollution, as transit riders switch to less efficient car and taxi travel, clogging up already congested motorways.

So what’s the Administration’s plan? It's complicated, but most briefly, the Budget proposes to eliminate the sales tax on gasoline and raise the excise tax on gasoline. Since much of the sales tax on gas is set aside for transit, while the excise tax is not, switching and manipulating these two levies allows the Administration to take money set-aside for transit and use it to deal with the General Fund deficit.

Now, if this were the first time transit was kicking in to help with the budget, I’d say we all have to do our share. Unfortunately, despite widespread support for transit among Californians, transit has been hit up early and often, contributing more than $3 billion to budget solutions over the past few years. I think they’ve done their part. The proposal is doubly frustrating because it comes on the heels of a major victory for the California Transit Association earlier this year, when a court ruled that previous efforts to raid transit funds were against state law.

We are moving backwards if we think that making it harder and more expensive to get to work or school, throwing more people onto unemployment, and putting more pollution into the air are the ways to get California on its way to recovery. Public transit is an investment that pays dividends: better jobs, more freedom of movement, and a cleaner, safer transportation system.

We need to be putting more into transit, not cutting through the bone. Fortunately, Assemblymember Michael Eng, Chair of the Assembly’s Transportation Committee, told Streetsblog San Francisco that it was "absolutely incredulous" to cut transit at a time when it's needed "to get working families to their jobs and stimulate the economy."

So, at least someone seems to get it in Sacramento. The Governor needs to seriously reevaluate these cuts.

Public Transit: More Jobs Bang for the Stimulus Buck!

2010-01-05T23:09:33Z

Now, we already know that taking public transit is good for the environment, safer than car travel and even better for your health. But now we know something else: as far as putting people to work, investing in transit easily beats spending more on roads.

To wit: today, our friends at Smart Growth America, USPIRG and the Center for Neighborhood Technology released a new report, What We Learned from the Stimulus. The report looks at job numbers from the House’s Transportation and Infrastructure Committee for the first 10 months after the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) was signed, comparing jobs from transit to those from road building.

The main finding is this: Every billion invested in transit produced 16,419 job-months, while every billion spent on more roads got us just 8,781 job-months. In other words, transit produces nearly twice the jobs per billion spent.

Why is this so? Well, the report lists three primary reasons why transit investment ends up creating jobs so much more efficiently: 1) far less money is spent on the acquisition of land than in road building; 2) transit jobs tend to be more complex, requiring varied expertise; and 3) transit investments goes towards the purchase and maintenance of vehicles. Or, as the report says, “public transportation creates more jobs by spending less on land and more on people.”

For any upcoming jobs bill in DC, this report provides great guidance. Do you want to create more jobs, quickly, while investing in the transportation system we need for the future? If so, the authors say, divide the investment equally between public transportation and road projects. You could see as much as 71,000 more job-months, the equivalent of year-round employment for more than 5,000 people.

And on top of all this, we know that transit investment creates jobs for just those sectors of the workforce that are being hit the hardest by the economy.

That’s right: more jobs for less money; building the transportation system of the future; putting the unemployed back to work. Oh, and we can help the planet, too. Not bad, if you ask me. Hopefully, DC will get the message.

Is Leaving It All Up to Insurance Companies the Best Way Forward on PAYD?

2009-11-06T23:10:27Z

Last month, the California Department of Insurance finalized and released new regulations permitting California insurance companies to offer their customers the option of verifying the miles they drive. This has been called “Pay As You Drive Insurance,” even though there is nothing in the regulations that more directly ties how much you drive to the premiums you pay. We were disappointed. As I’ve written previously, it’s not just verifying your miles that will get you the savings and help the planet. To quote from a recent Op-Ed I co-authored in the San Jose Mercury News:

Verifying your miles is key to any Pay As You Drive program, but it's not enough to make an insurance policy benefit the environment — or your wallet.

On top of verifying how far you drive, your insurer needs to price mileage clearly to give you more power to control your insurance premium. Imagine how you could save if you knew the cost of your insurance by the mile.

We also had concerns about requiring drivers to install devices in their cars to track mileage.

Our biggest criticism, though, was the entirely voluntary nature of the regulations: it is the insurers’ choice alone whether to go this route or not, and we’re not sure that’s the best approach to environmental policy in California. As we told the Department of Insurance, we are unaware of any instance anywhere in the country where merely permitting PAYD has resulted in the significant availability of PAYD policies. Apparently, the Department of Insurance didn't even perform any market analysis to determine the likelihood of companies’ offering these policies. While intending to not force consumers into PAYD, the Department’s regulations do little, if anything, to actually provide consumers the choice of PAYD.

An editorial in yesterday’s San Mateo Times, however, sees it differently. Clearly supportive of PAYD as both an environmental and consumer benefit, the Times supported an entirely voluntary approach, opining “[Insurance Commissioner] Poizner did not mandate any insurance policy terms…he believes that the best way to motivate change is through competition and innovation. We agree”

Now, few disagree that competition can lead to innovation, but even fewer would then conclude that public officials therefore have no role in steering companies in the right direction, as the Times concludes. Examples abound of regulation leading to innovation, particularly here in California. How does the Times think California's per capita energy consumption has basically stayed flat over the past four decades, while the country’s as a whole has soared?

Reasons for Optimism?

There would be more to be optimistic about if we had clear indications from the insurance industry that PAYD is something they’re exploring. Unfortunately, the response seems to be lukewarm. In covering the new regulations, the Insurance Journal itself reported “it is not exactly clear how many companies are going to be interested in offering pay-as-you-drive policies.” When asked, Mercury Insurance, for one, had “no concrete plans to offer a pay-as-you-drive policy at present,” despite the fact that the regulations have been under discussion for nearly two years.

And we also know that many California insurers are already missing existing opportunities to reward customers who drive less with lower premiums. Earlier this year, NRDC joined Consumer Watchdog in releasing a report card grading California’s top 10 insurers on how many opportunities they gave their customers to save. The best grade? C.

This is how well we’re doing leaving it to insurers.

It’s not regulations, per se: it’s bad regulations we should be concerned about. PAYD regulations that would require insurance companies to offer a real, environmentally-friendly product to their customers would preserve consumer choice while meeting our commitment to fighting global warming. That’s why we called for a requirement that California insurers at least offer a PAYD product to their customers. The choice, then, is up to consumers, not insurance companies.

According to a recent report on KTVU in San Francisco, Commissioner Poizner has seen a lot of interest in PAYD among insurance companies and expects them to begin submitting plans to him “by the end of the year.” Like the San Mateo Times, we’ll wait and see how well the insurance companies treat consumers, and the environment.

California Governor Signs New Parking Cash-Out Law!

2009-10-21T20:27:30Z

Last April, I wrote about SB 728, a bill from Long Beach State Senator Alan Lowenthal to expand compliance with California’s Parking Cash-Out program. I’m happy to report that the bill, co-sponsored by NRDC and Environmental Defense Fund, was signed by Governor Schwarzenegger early last week!

Starting on January 1, 2010, cities, counties and air districts will have the option of enforcing Parking Cash-Out. Permitting these entities to enforce the program is just one example of how Sacramento can give localities the tools they need to craft their own approaches to fighting global warming (as well as comply with SB 375).

What’s Parking Cash-Out? It’s simple: an employer who offers free or subsidized parking for employees must also offer a cash allowance equivalent to the subsidy in lieu of the parking space. So, if your free parking space at Justin Horner Pet Supplies & Satellite Repair Company costs me $200 per month, I can offer you either the space or a $200 monthly payment.

Where employers provide it, Parking Cash-Out reduces single-occupancy vehicle trips and increases carpooling and transit use. A survey of eight Southern California businesses using the Program found a 12% decline in annual vehicle miles travelled and global warming pollution per employee per year, and a nearly 10% increase in employees carpooling or using transit. All this, while putting more money in workers’ pockets and saving money for participating employers.

It’s also more fair: if you choose not to take my cash-out offer, you’re effectively paying $200 for your space, which removes the unfair subsidy you would normally get, but that your carpooling, transit-riding, walking and biking co-workers do not.

So-called free parking is never free. There’s the cost to construct it, operate it, maintain it, even light it and secure it. But more than 95% of all parking in California is free for drivers. The costs of this “free” parking are passed through to all of us in higher prices, higher rents, higher taxes and lower wages. Any effort to better match the real cost of parking to the decision to park will be both environmentally beneficial and more fair. SB 728 is just such an effort.

State Transit Cuts: The Aftermath

2009-09-04T19:00:28Z

As Sacramento’s nearly $3.4 billion in cuts to California transit agencies over the past three years begin to take their toll, the California Transit Association has created an interactive “Aftermath” map of what’s happening on the ground. Despite overwhelming support for public transit among Californians, our leaders in Sacramento have taken no noticeable action to address this crisis.

The map outlines how agencies have responded to cuts in the State Transportation Assistance (STA) Program:

Since its creation in the early 1970s, the STA program had been the only ongoing source of state funding dedicated specifically for day-to-day transit operations (although, STA funds were also available for capital expenditures). California is now one of only 13 states that does not provide any state program funding specifically for transit operations.

Over the past three fiscal years, STA cuts alone have totaled $1.97 billion.

View STA Program Aftermath in a larger map

The map lays out in painful detail what readers of this blog already know: fare hikes and service cuts are the order of the day. Zoom in and click on the pins to find out what’s happening in your neck of the woods.

This just in: the Regional Targets Advisory Committee, a body of planners, environmentalists, and other experts convened to recommend the framework for implementing California’s groundbreaking land use and climate bill, SB 375, has also spoken to the importance of transit in a recent report. To wit, they recommend action to

Address the discontinuity between the elimination transit funding in the budget and mandates of SB 375. Public transit is a key tool in reducing greenhouse gas emissions. The state of California has approved mandates to reduce greenhouse gas emissions but has eliminated funding for public transit in the state budget. The state should ensure that its budgets are consistent with its policies on greenhouse gas reductions.

I couldn’t have said it better myself.

Transit in Orange County: Economics 101

2009-08-11T23:43:28Z

An article in Monday’s Orange County Register about the Orange County Transportation Authority (OCTA), Bus Ridership Drops 20% After Fare Increase, Service Cuts, teaches us some basics about market economics: offer people with limited means the chance to pay more for less, and they’ll more often than not pass up the opportunity.

While increasing unemployment could certainly play a role in the decline, it’s the fare increases and service cuts we should be focusing on. As I’ve written earlier, despite rising unemployment and lower gas prices, transit ridership nationally continued to grow over the past year.

Now I suppose one could conclude that the reason OCTA had a million fewer boardings than this time last year was because all these folks found safer, cheaper and more convenient modes of travel. Indeed, when he learned that OCTA lost a fifth of its ridership, one Boardmember asked OCTA staff: “Is there a point where maybe a bus system isn’t even necessary?”

Hmm. Well, I’ll go out on a limb and suggest that increasing the cost of travel and cutting the frequency and range of service does more harm than good.

And we’ve known this for some time. More than ten years ago, a study was done to examine the impacts on riders of service reductions on AC Transit, one of the largest bus agencies in America, located in the San Francisco Bay Area. Like the OCTA case, the service reductions were accompanied by a fare increase. How did these policies impact riders?

43% experienced increased travel costs, an average of $31.35 per week (or a little over $44 these days), 79.9% of which was spent on taxis;
59.9% of these added expenses were for people to get to work. Yes, fare hikes and service cuts also cut wages.
8.7% of the added expenses were for kids to get to school. With unemployment up, school should be easier to attend, not harder.
32% of those surveyed had no other form of transportation.

In the final analysis, the report concluded that the $4.8 million annual savings to AC Transit resulted in $48.1 million in added costs to riders. In addition to the $30 million in estimated added travel costs, that $48.1 million included the value of lost time and lost earnings. As transit riders are of lower income than average, the pain was even more acute. We should mention, too, the impacts on local businesses, as purchasing power dried up.

Now this doesn’t mean that OCTA needs to solve this problem all alone. Far from it. NRDC has called on leaders in Sacramento and Washington to increase their support for transit, particularly on the operations side (which would help keep fares low and routes in service). But we would also certainly press OCTA to stay in the business of providing bus service; thousands of people are depending on you (not to mention the environment!).

Feds Flex Funds for Transit! What’s In It for California?

2009-06-30T01:52:44Z

Last week, President Obama signed the Supplemental Appropriations bill, which, readers of this blog will certainly remember, contains a provision permitting transit agencies to use 10% of their stimulus funding for operations. Up until the President’s signature, stimulus funds were limited to capital investments (like new buses, trains or track). With the nation’s transit systems reeling from declines in revenue and stretching to keep buses and trains running, this flexibility with funding is most welcome.

So, to get down to it: how much can California transit agencies now use for operating expenses?

The Federal Transit Administration has put together a little FAQ page to answer this question. There’s a handy-dandy allocation table, which breaks down the 10% for each urbanized and nonurbanized Metropolitan Statistical Area in the country.

Now, it’s important to remember that we won’t solve all of our problems with this one-time action; but some agencies could definitely get some time to catch their breath. Here are some highlights:

The San Francisco-Oakland MSA can use up to $17.34 million, and San Jose could use $5.5 million. For comparison’s sake, the deficit for BART alone is nearly $23 million.

The Los Angeles-Long Beach-Santa Ana region now has up to $38 million available.

Sacramento could make as much as $3 million available, which could help offset the pain of raising fares twice in a few months.

San Diego has a cool $8 million to use, which could help offset the State’s $14 million cut.

The Federal government’s contribution here should be a bit of a wake-up call to our leaders in Sacramento: after getting out of the transit operating business for more than a decade, Washington is now reconsidering their decision. In light of the upcoming Transportation Reauthorization, this is good news.

Here in California, our leaders in Sacramento still have time to get creative and reverse the long-term impacts of their decision to cut operating funding. In the short term, California’s transit agencies need to take a good look at how they can use these funds to keep buses and trains running and to stop raising fares.

And not a moment too soon: In two days, fares are increasing throughout California.

California Transit Not Alone: 80% of Systems Short of Funds

2009-06-15T22:40:24Z

In a pair of revealing reports, the American Public Transportation Association (APTA) tells us that:

a) Despite lower gas prices, rising unemployment, the economic “situation,” and declining revenues, public transportation ridership is basically the same as it was last year (ridership decreased 1.2%, a negligible amount, but still less than the decline in the miles Americans drove (1.7%)); while at the same time

b) according to a new survey, more than 80% of the transit agencies APTA asked nationwide reported flat or decreasing local, regional and state funding. Of these systems, nearly 60% reported higher ridership over the past year

I’m no economist, but I know that when you have to offer the same level of service with less money, something has to give. To wit:

89% of the systems surveyed had to raise fares or cut service (with nearly half doing both!)
65% of the systems reduced or eliminated off-peak service, while 48% have reduced their system’s geographic coverage
50% of the systems were forced to eliminate staff positions (with several systems cutting more than 400 employees!)

And that’s not all! Without coming relief from the state or the Federal government…

2/3 of the agencies are considering further service cuts; and
1/2 considering fare increases (with some, like Sacramento Regional Transit, for a second time)

Let’s keep our fingers crossed for the Supplemental Appropriations bill up for a vote this week in DC. The provision permitting 10% of a transit district’s stimulus funds to be used for operations is still included.

Fourteen States Say: “OK, let’s have a look at Pay As You Drive Insurance”

2009-06-04T22:13:16Z

(Thanks to Allen Greenberg at the US Department of Transportation for this lead)

(Updated as of October 9, 2009)

In a previous post, I described Pay as You Drive Insurance (PAYD), its environmental benefits, and some of the progress made here in California in getting it implemented and getting policies in the glove compartments of California drivers. To wit:

Now, as we know, Californians are driving less, yet many of us are still paying the same for auto insurance. Shouldn’t we pay less if we’re driving less? Clearly the answer is yes: low mile drivers subsidize high mileage drivers; poor drivers (who tend to drive less) subsidize rich drivers (who drive more); and without matching the cost of insurance to how much we use (imagine if everyone paid the same flat fee each year for gasoline!) we’re encouraging driving and all its associated environmental problems.

Despite the idea of PAYD being around for decades, it has not taken root to any significant extent anywhere in the country. But things may be changing…

According to a review of state Climate Action Plans by the New America Foundation, and a recent announcement by the State of Pennsylvania, no fewer than 13 14* states are relying on PAYD as a strategy to combat global warming pollution. When you add up the annual vehicle miles travelled (VMT) from these 13 14 states alone, you’re looking at nearly 25% of all the miles driven in the United States.

For these 13 14 states, the Brookings Institution has estimated an average per state VMT reduction of 7% if all their auto insurance policies are PAYD, and a nearly equivalent reduction in global warming pollution. And there may be even more reason to hope.

If you take these 13 14 states, add eight states that already have a type of PAYD product (TX, OR, NJ, MI, MO, AL, LA, and KT), and one state considering legislation on PAYD (WA), you could cover nearly half of all the miles driven in the United States.

Using Brookings’ estimates again, you’d get a national VMT reduction of 4%, and nearly $3.5 billion in individual accident cost savings(!).

Now there’s a long, regulatory row to hoe, and many big states are not even captured here (hello, New York and Florida ~~and Pennsylvania~~). Plus, of course, not everyone is going to take out a PAYD policy, even if it’s available. Nevertheless, there may be a light at the end of the tunnel of our outdated auto insurance system.

And as the National Association of Insurance Commissioners will likely hold a Climate Change and Global Warming Summit this year, PAYD would have to be part of the discussion.

* The 14 states are: Arizona, California, Colorado, Maryland, Maine, Minnesota, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Virginia and Vermont

Signs of Sanity on Transit Funding from the US Senate

2009-05-29T23:23:02Z

In a previous post, I emphasized the need to provide operating funds for transit, not just capital funds. There’s no sense buying more buses when you’re laying off the people who drive them and repair them. But both the Federal government and the California state government have taken themselves out of the business of actually helping to run the transit systems they’re buying equipment for. Go figure.

Well, it appears someone has been either a) reading this blog or b) listening to any of the thousands of others who have been saying the same thing, because good news just came across my desk.

To wit, the U.S. Senate Appropriations Committee is considering a bill that would, in part, allow transit agencies to use up to 10 percent of the funds received from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (the "stimulus" funds) to cover operating costs. And they even got the talking points right:

SEC. 1202. This section provides additional flexibility to transit agencies in how they may use up to 10 percent of the formula grants provided in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. The act provided $6,900,000,000 to transit agencies for capital investments. However, the economic downturn is bringing severe distress to many of these agencies, and they now face lay-offs, furloughs and significant cuts to their transit service. These cutbacks would occur at a time when demand for such service is rising, and they work against the very purpose of the Recovery Act investments. [emphasis added]

If I were you, I’d let your Senators know you think this is a sensible idea (FYI, California’s own Dianne Feinstein sits on the Committee).

Who's Driving Up CO2? Check the Maps!

2009-05-29T01:23:29Z

NRDC’s Smart Growth Director, Kaid Benfield, first drew my attention to these fascinating new maps from Chicago’s Center for Neighborhood Technology. For dozens of American metropolitan areas, they’ve compiled census-block-by-census-block data on where CO2 emissions from driving are the highest.

Here, I’m teasing out the California regions CNT covered. From yellow, to orange, to red, the darker the area, the higher the per household emissions from driving. Any surprises?

The San Francisco Bay Area and San Diego

Sacramento and Stockton :

I’d go to the site for the LA map; it warrants some zooming.

In all cases we’re seeing what we would expect: lower per household driving when you get closer to the regional center and when you live in a denser area. Regional centers tend to be those places with adequate transit service, a mix of uses and walkable streets and sidewalks. Although suburban and exurban areas may have the superficial appearance of vast, green, eco-living, these maps tell the real story.

And some good news: during the first quarter of this year, bike sales topped car sales!!

We're Driving Less, But Why? Ask Esquire!

2009-05-11T22:39:50Z

As I’ve posted repeatedly, for almost a year-and-a-half, Americans generally, and Californians in particular, have been driving less. This is a really big deal: there have been times where the rate of growth has been faster or slower, but there have really been only three or four instances since World War II where miles driven has actually dropped; and in those cases, not for as long as this recent decline. Here’s the visual, from the Federal Highway Administration:

Now any reader of a blog on the NRDC website is going to be smart enough to posit the two most obvious theories for this decline: high gas prices and the, um, slowing economy.

Gas prices certainly impact the amount we drive, but not to the extent that would account for a decline like this. Most people have little choice as to where and how far they drive, so gas prices are what economists call inelastic, which means that demand is pretty constant despite small price changes. Of course, the price of anything has an impact on who’s going to buy it, but for something like gas, the long-term impacts are much more significant. To really deal with persistently high gas prices, someone has to, say, pack up and move somewhere that doesn't require as much driving. In the short term, people usually take the hit and make slight adjustments on relatively optional travel.

In any case, gas prices have come down (and risen) again, yet the consistent downward VMT trend continues.

The overall state of the economy, and its impact on driving, are not as well-understood as the impact of gas prices. Nevertheless, when more than 10% of the workforce is not driving to work, you’re going to see a decline in total mileage. In fact, a report from Inrix found that 99 out of the most congested 100 metro areas reduced congestion in 2008. The causes: “turbulent fuel prices and a struggling economy.”

Now, clearly, I have a vested interest in discovering that actually, in fact, the reason people are driving less is because they’ve decided to take the bus, ride their bikes, hop on a train or walk to the store. This would point to a broader cultural shift in the way we travel as opposed to just a little depression-style bump in the road on our way to more and more driving (and more and more pollution).

Which brings me to the meat of the post. As will often happen, I found a forwarded email in my inbox directing me to an article on Vehicle Miles Travelled (VMT) trends, by Nate Silver. It’s always fun when your nerdy subject shows up in Esquire (!), and it’s also cool when the author is the guy behind FiveThirtyEight.com, the polling site everyone who talks about polling sites talks about as being uncannily accurate and thorough.

Nate was struggling with this question, too. How much of the VMT drop is gas prices, how much is economy and how much could be something else? So…“To sort this out, I built a regression model that accounts for both gas prices and the unemployment rate in a given month and attempts to predict from this data how much the typical American will drive.”

While his model predicted that Americans should have driven more in January 2009, Americans actually drove 8% less.

We don’t know why, precisely, but there does seem to be more to this decline in driving than just gas prices and an economic slowdown. And that could indicate broader social and cultural trends towards less driving, which is great for our health and good for the planet.