Photo by padawan.

Dubai: Air quality declines as number of cars rises [Business 24-7]

China: Car owners to be compensated for driving ban during Olympics [Gaurdian]

China: Marathon record holder wont run in China because of pollution [Daily Mail]

United States: Americans learn bikes cut costs and improve fitness [Reuters]

General: Plug-in cars could increase pollution [Detroit Free Press]

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There’s wifi on this bus! Photo by RACINGMIX

Transit with wireless is an incredibly attractive way to travel. And apparently AC Transit, a regional bus agency in the San Francisco Bay Area, agrees, providing wireless internet on all their buses crossing the San Francisco Bay.

Yesterday I had an action packed day of transit; I took BART from North Berkeley to Union City, then hopped on a bus with wireless that crosses the Dumbarton Bridge to Palo Alto, or so I thought. When I realized I was on the wrong bus, and figured out that there were no more buses coming, I had no other option but to take a cab. Read the rest of this entry »

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A McMansion under construction in Texas. Photo by Dean Terry.

In the last few months major magazines and papers have written provocative pieces about the housing bubble in the United States and what it means for the future of the American City. Below, you can find the most interesting pieces:

• The Next Slum? Christopher Leinberger argues that a profound transformation is taking place: dense urban areas are seeing a renaissance while suburbs and exurbs are showing signs of decay. Why? “Sprawling, large-lot suburbs become less attractive as they become more densely built, but urban areas—especially those well served by public transit—become more appealing as they are filled in and built up.”
• There Goes the Neighborhood Matthew Yglesias looks at neighborhoods effected most by the housing bubble and finds that exurbs and fringe cities - where mass transit is non-existent - are taking the biggest hit.
• Slowdown Hits Towns at Outskirts of Texas Boom Reporting for the New York Times, Leslie Eaton talks about how one bedroom community on the fringe of Dallas is struggling to stay afoot as housing values plummet.

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NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg speaking at Regional Planning Association annual meeting. Photo by Ethan Arpi.

In The World In 2008 - a supplement to the Economist - Mayor Bloomberg outlines some of the aims and inspirations for his super-ambitious PLANYC, a city-led initiative to convert New York City into one of the greenest mass human developments on earth. Mayor Bloomberg’s Plan, like New York City itself, is a postmodern mash-up with ideas and inspirations taken from cities around the world. In the Mayor’s own words:

In developing the climate-change strategies that underpin PlanNYC, we drew on the experiences of Berlin for our renewable-energy and green-roof policies; Hong Kong, Shanghai and Delhi for our innovative transit improvements; Copenhagen for our pedestrian and cycling upgrades; Chicagoand Los Angeles for our plan to plant 1m more trees; Amsterdam and Tokyo for our transit-oriented development policies; and Bogotá for our plans for Bus Rapid Transit.

The Mayor also mentions London, Stockholm and Singapore as inspirations for his congestion pricing proposal, one of the more controversial measures of his plan. (See: What Is Congestion Pricing?)

There’s an interesting story behind many of Bloomberg’s proposals; they come from cities in the developing world, places where municipal funds are hard to come by so every project must be constructed carefully for it to succeed. Another interesting point is that city leaders are increasingly communicating with each other, exchanging ideas and success so that they can be replicated throughout the world.

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New York Times Magazine writer Randy Cohen, aka The Ethicist, sits down with Mark Gorton from The Open Planning Project and discusses the ethical implications of driving, congestions pricing, biking and the use of public space by private individuals. Mr. Cohen argues passionately for cities that are clean, livable and pedestrian friendly. Moving to a post-car culture is not about asceticism, he argues, but quite the opposite: “what we’re talking about is how people can be happier…that the automobile undermines…our ordinary daily happiness…”

Special thanks to Rob Katz for finding this outstanding video!

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Photo by mj*laflaca

In 2002 the National Academy of Sciences wrote a report suggesting a modest raise in new car fuel efficiency - from 28 miles per gallon to around 32 - was justified. The Bush Administration ignored this finding. A few years later it thumbed its nose at the environmental community by dissolving the “Partnership for a new Generation of Vehicles,” a joint government-auto industry initiative to put a super fuel-efficient, low-emissions diesel car on the road by the end of this decade. As if that weren’t enough, the Bush Administration has constantly opposed higher fuel taxes, ruling out an important step for reducing what the president calls our ‘addiction’ to oil. I must say that it’s strange that after repeatedly acknowledging the current energy problem he has so passively ignored or actively obstructed almost every effort to find a solution.

So it shouldn’t have come as a surprise yesterday when the EPA announced that it opposes California’s 2002 initiative to regulate CO2, a move that will once again put off the reckoning this country has with oil and carbon. Since this initiative in its original form has been law in California since 2002, it’s goals are no surprise to the Administration or automobile manufacturers. They’ve had roughly five years and little to show; perhaps instead of hiring the engineers to make their cars comply with the law, the auto industry hired the lawyers to take the law down.

Read the rest of this entry »

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Legislation passed by Congress to raise fuel effiency is a welcome first step. Photo by Storm Crypt.

As an engineer working in the field of sustainable transport I am very excited about the latest efforts to improve fuel efficiency, which will certainly help in the fight against climate change, a global phenomenon dating back to the start of the industrial revolution. (As an aside, the New York Times has a really neat graphic on this). One has to praise the US Congress for moving ahead legislation which will boost automobile and SUV fuel efficiency for the first time since 1975.

Nevertheless, as we have been claiming on this blog, this effort will not be enough! We have to do more. Lee Schipper, a colleague of mine and a fellow contributor to TheCityFix, says it well: “We also need to drive smaller, lighter vehicles. And we need to drive them less.”

The reason why he’s right has to do with an algebraic formula that’s really quite simple:

Using this equation, we can see that by improving fuel efficiency, we’re only effecting one of several variables related to total carbon emissions. But if people continue to buy more polluting cars, regardless of whether they are fuel efficient, and drive them longer distances, any gains in fuel efficiency might not do all that much.

The way the transport sector can fight climate change is by adopting a holistic approach that focuses on all three variables: total car travel, fuel efficiency, and carbon emissions per gallon of fuel. Here’s how we can do it:

• Reducing total car travel by promoting zero-emissions modes like walking and biking. Of course you can’t expect people to walk to work who live 50 miles from their office; after all, in the United States car commuters spend around 100 minutes on average getting to work and back. In many cases this is totally unnecessary because advances in telecommunications make telecommuting easier than ever. What’s more sprawling suburbs and satellite exurbs where walking is impossible are vestiges of the past. The urgency of global warming and energy insecurity demands that cities regulate the way that land is used, making mixed-use, high-density neighborhoods a priority.

• Reducing total car travel by improving public transportation. Currently, only 4.7% of people get to work using public transportation whereas 87.8% of people go by automobile. What this means is that buses, streetcars, and subways must be attractive alternatives to get people out of their cars. So they must come often, cover a large portion of the city, have seamless integration with other transit infrastructure like airports, and be comfortable and cost effective.
• Increasing fuel efficiency through technology improvements mandated by legislation.
• Increasing emissions standards through technology.

Even when considering all the various ways for reducing carbon emissions, raising the fuel efficiency standards, a move that was accepted by the auto industry, should still be considered a good step, especially considering the recent political environment. But with that said, we still need more!

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In all likelihood corn from fields like this one in Iowa will be used to fuel American cars. Photo by Homemade.

In the last few months, high-profile senators like Obama, Clinton, Kerry, McCain, and Lieberman have all introduced important climate legislation, and consequently Congress has found itself center-stage in the struggle to find a solution to global warming. But while Congressional leaders continue to shine in the public spotlight, it’s important not to overlook recent developments in the other two branches of government.

The first happened earlier this year when the United States Supreme Court ruled that, under the Clean Air Act, CO2 and other greenhouse gases could be regulated as pollutants. This was a major setback to the Bush Administration, which had argued before the Court that C02 and the like aren’t pollutants and therefore can’t be regulated. This is particularly important because without the court’s ruling, the executive branch would be just twiddling its thumbs. But after the court’s ruling, President Bush was legally obliged to act. Issuing an executive order, he called on the EPA to work with other relevant agencies to protect the environment with respect to greenhouse gas emissions from motor vehicles, non-road vehicles and non-road engines, in a manner consistent with sound science.

The policy target set by the president’s so-called 20 in 10 plan aims to reduce US gasoline consumption by 20 percent over the next 10 years. How does he plan to do this? By bringing in 35 billion gallons of renewable or alternative fuels by 2017 and improving efficiency of cars and light trucks by up to 4 percent per year.

If you look at the EPA’s public presentations on this, the EPA is taking an integrated systems approach, regulating both vehicles and fuels. Using green house gas performance standards for each, it will then allow for inter-industry trading. The EPA used a similar approach when it set the clean diesel rules, which have yielded among the highest benefit to cost ratios of any rules in US regulatory history. So this shows great promise! Read the rest of this entry »

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Robin Chase at TED 2007. Photo by PMO on flickr.

Robin Chase, founder and former CEO of Zipcar, joins TheCityFix.com as a regular contributor. Robin will be cross posting select items from her personal blog, Network Musings, where she’s been writing on the world of sustainable transportation.

Robin Chase is founder and CEO of GoLoco, an online ridesharing community. GoLoco helps people quickly arrange to share car trips of all lengths between trusted friends, neighbors, and colleagues, and handles online payments from passengers to drivers for their share of the trip costs. GoLoco’s innovative combination of social networks and online payment systems recasts how we think about car travel, making it a time for socializing and with a new emphasis on trip efficiency, in order to reduce per passenger costs.

Robin is also founder and former CEO of Zipcar, the largest carsharing company in the world. Zipcar’s use of the Internet and wireless technology enables rental cars to emulate personal cars. Zipcar’s disruptive technology gives its members on-demand access to cars by-the-hour, revolutionizing people’s relationship to their cars and improving the quality of urban life for all.
Read the rest of this entry »

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Photo by gisleh from Flickr.

On Friday, the US House of Representative voted 235-181 to approve a major energy bill that would substantially raise fuel efficiency standards for the first time since 1975 when the OPEC oil embargoes, triggering oil shortages and long-lines at the pump, drove Congress to increase fuel economy.

Under the new bill, fuel economy for cars and light trucks would rise 40% from its current level of roughly 25 miles per gallon to 35 miles per gallon by the year 2020. While the change would be significant, it’s still a far cry from the much more ambitious aim of European nations to achieve 38 miles per gallon for gasoline-fueled vehicles by 2008. Japan, another country with fuel efficiency standards, is more in line with the Europeans, aiming for 35 miles per gallon by 2010.

In addition to increased fuel efficiency, the bill also mandates the introduction of 36 billion barrels of ethanol into the national fuel mix by 2022. It also includes new energy efficiency standards for buildings, which account for nearly 40% of the nation’s energy use. Read the rest of this entry »

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