The 50 organizations that make up the Oregon Conservation Network are gathering signatures for a letter to State elected leaders:
Dear Elected Leaders,
One year ago, gas was about $2.80 a gallon. Now, with gas prices hovering around $4 a gallon, many Oregonians are struggling with increased transportation costs. And they’re looking for alternatives to driving everywhere they need to go.
Oregonians are also concerned about the impacts of global warming pollution. Increased greenhouse gas emissions threaten Oregon’s environment, our economy, and our cherished quality of life.
There is a way to help Oregonians grappling with rising transportation costs and – at the same time – tackle global warming.
Common sense transportation investments will give Oregonians better options to get where they need to go. More effective public transportation and safer streets for biking and walking will reduce our dependency on the automobile. These investments will not only ease the pinch on our wallets, they will also reduce the amount of global warming pollution we send into the atmosphere and promote healthier, more active lifestyles.
Alternative modes of transportation have significant benefits to the health of Oregonians. By promoting more active lifestyles with increased walking, biking, and public transportation, we will help to prevent obesity, diabetes, heart disease and other chronic conditions. This will likely save lives and save millions of dollars in health care costs.
As a national leader in environmental protection, Oregon has made a commitment to reduce our contribution to global warming. HB 3543, passed by the 2007 Oregon Legislature, requires Oregon’s greenhouse gas emissions to be reduced to 10% below 1990 levels by 2020 and to 75% below 1990 levels by 2050.
The transportation sector accounts for nearly 40% of Oregon’s greenhouse gas emissions.
Technologies like electric cars and lower-carbon fuels will help reduce our global warming pollution, but to achieve our statewide goals, Oregonians also need more opportunities to reduce the amount we drive.The best way to reduce our need to drive is through a combination of common sense transportation investments and more efficient land use planning. Allowing mixed use neighborhoods where jobs, schools, and shopping opportunities are within an easy walk of our homes helps reduce our reliance on the car.
Governor Kulongoski identified transportation as one of his top priorities in his March 21, 2008 State of the State address, declaring, “Oregon must have the greenest transportation system in the country.”
We agree. Making the appropriate transportation investments and creating more efficient land use planning would be a win-win for Oregon families:
• More money in the pocketbook
• Better options to get around by transit, walking or biking
• Reduced reliance on the automobile
• Reduced global warming pollutionWe urge the 2009 Legislature and Oregon’s Congressional delegation to include the following concepts in any transportation funding or global warming policy package:
1) Funding for all Transportation Options – Any package must ensure adequate funding for greenhouse gas-reducing transit, pedestrian and bicycle facilities. Funding for these investments should be a legislative priority.
2) Establish Statewide Targets for Reducing Oregonians’ Reliance on Driving & Implement Metropolitan Land Use and Transportation Strategies to Reach the Targets – Adopt and apply a greenhouse gas reduction planning tool for transportation and land use decision making to meet the state’s greenhouse gas reduction goals. The technology already exists to estimate likely changes in driving from changes in land use and transportation systems. This technology needs to be deployed in all six of Oregon’s metropolitan areas (Bend, Medford, Eugene, Corvallis, Salem and Portland).
3) Support Community Planning and Design for Reduced Reliance on Driving – Help cities and counties improve their land use and transportation plans to provide Oregonians more choices of where to live and how to get around, including: encouraging mixed-use development; investing in connections like bike paths, sidewalks, and local streets that make biking, walking, and short driving trips more convenient; and making Oregon communities more compact and efficient by limiting outward expansion and sprawl. Link these local plans to the metropolitan strategies for reducing transportation emissions.
4) Support Technologies that Reduce Global Warming Pollution – Improvements in fuel-efficiency, such as plug-in hybrids, and the development of lower-carbon fuels, such as second-generation biofuels, are critical steps towards reducing transportation’s impact on our environment.
Oregonians are trapped between rising gas prices and a future compromised by global warming pollution. Oregon families need more transportation choices. Local governments need the tools to make our communities more efficient.
Please address transportation-induced global warming pollution during the 2009 Oregon Legislative session and the 111th United States Congress.
Sincerely,
Coalition Members
46 responses to “Enviros Stake Out Oregon Transportation Position”
“gas prices hovering around $4 a gallon”
Try $3.25 at Wilsonville Costco and dropping daily.
Please try to keep your panic consistent with the current facts.
Just wait until after the election, we’ll likely be back I’ve $4. That is if we still have currency by then…
That should read “over $4”.
Darn iPhone auto-replace…
After the election???
We are probably going to hit $2.50 before we hit $4.
Haven’t you noticed it is hard to borrow money now?
That makes it hard for commodity speculators to borrow money to hoard oil. Expect prices to drop further as the speculators go bust one by one.
You really need to pay attention to basics, instead of scaremongers.
PS: Doesn’t “peak oil” look a little ragged now!
There are a couple of items that need to be pointed out about this letter.
First, the price of gas is being used only as an excuse. Nowhere in the letter is a proposal being made whereby the users of alternative transportation are willing to accept any financial responsibility for the recommendations by paying for the specialized infrastructure with higher transit fares and a bicycle tax. As usual, the author and advocates want more alternative forms of transport as long as somebody else (taxpayers other than themselves) pay for them. Just like the Federal bailout of the financial institutions due to failed economic lending policies where the legislation was actuality approved and signed into law during the Clinton administration with Biden voting in favor; implementing the recommendations in the letter will raise taxes and increase taxpayer debt, not only for the capitol costs, but also for the ongoing debt to keep the wheels of subsidized transit rolling. This too is a failure of policy. If any of these alternative transport recommendations are implemented, they need to be funded by the users, not the taxpayers.
Second and undoubtedly, many of the signers will be bicyclists and some of the same people that went kicking and screaming claiming their freedom of choice would be violated if a legislator’s proposal to make bicycle helmets mandatory became law. Yet that same freedom of choice for drivers is now is being infringed upon with the proposals that suggest establishing statewide targets for reducing Oregonians’ reliance on driving, and implementing transportation strategies to reach those targets. In other words, bicyclists want to tell other people what to do, but are unwilling to be told what they must do themselves, including stopping at STOP signs and obeying traffic laws. Now that is definitely being a socialistic hypocrite. What is truly needed is less social engineering and a reduction on the reliance of taxpayer funded subsidies to pay for alternative forms of transport thereby requiring these options to be financially self-sustainable.
“Haven’t you noticed it is hard to borrow money now? That makes it hard for commodity speculators to borrow money to hoard oil. Expect prices to drop further as the speculators go bust one by one.”
It also makes it hard to run drilling rigs. I know of one (decent sized) natural gas drilling company that has flat out stopped drilling because they can’t get loans. So as the drilling companies go bust/stop investing in new rigs, expect prices to go higher in the long run.
“PS: Doesn’t “peak oil” look a little ragged now!”
Price volatility goes up as you hit peak. You can see that with several things that have peaked, for instance, Natural gas in North American. Or Black Caviar, Whale oil, or Atlantic Cod, which are renewable resources but harvested at nonrenewable rates…
“I know of one (decent sized) natural gas drilling company that has flat out stopped drilling because they can’t get loans.”
Okay, I looked it up. It is actually the largest natural gas company in North America, (Chesapeake Energy). Their stock price has also collapsed in the last 6 months (down 70%,) and the CEO is selling his stock like crazy. And another decent sized one (XTO Energy) is publicly having similar problems, (and we don’t know how many are having the same problems but have kept it under wraps.) And yes, natural gas and oil are different, but not that different, they use the same rigs to drill for it, and a lot of industries can switch between using one or the other depending on which is cheaper…
“Allowing mixed use neighborhoods where jobs, schools, and shopping opportunities are within an easy walk of our homes helps reduce our reliance on the car.”
Can anyone show that this ACTUALLY reduces driving (except for a tiny minority of people)? I mean how does living close to work help when the kids have soccer, plays, movies various schools, hubby is a semiconductor expert at Intel and wife is a doctor at the regional hospital. (I can see how it would work for singles or childless couples where both work [****] wage jobs at the local min wage mixed use shop.)
(Quality paper only please, no garbage from the building, environmental or transit lobbies.)
Billy
[Moderator: Expletive deleted.]
how does living close to work help when the kids have soccer, plays, movies various schools, hubby is a semiconductor expert at Intel and wife is a doctor at the regional hospital.
Except for your example of split jobs, the rest being close to home of course facilitates walking trips (soccer field close to home, live theaters close to home, schools close to home (as was specifically mentioned by Matthew), etc.)
I’ve had the opportunity to have extended stays in medium-density neighborhoods around the country and the lifestyle is different. If you have a car, you do still drive *some* places, but many common things such as eating out, picking up items at the drug store, picking up fresh produce, are done by walking and it’s not a burden at all.
The interesting thing about your example, above, is that we have now managed to structure a society in which both parents often _must_ work, which can lead to the problem of a split commute and the inability to locate conveniently near schools, shopping, etc.
Indeed, when I visited the Netherlands a few years ago, the split-commute problem was cited as one cause for increasing VMT.
I have lots of empathy for families with kids. I remember schlepping my step-daughter all over Clackamas Country for soccer on Saturdays.
Keep in mind however that while this is significant, it’s only a subset of all households. And even then, some household members have non-auto choices for some trips, and those get easier with good urban design.
(Quality paper only please, no garbage from the building, environmental or transit lobbies.)
This is a thread about environmental groups lobbying, so if you don’t want comments from them, you probably aren’t going to get very useful answers… So why did you ask the question in the first place?
(And, no answers for that one from people named billy.)
“schools close to home (as was specifically mentioned by Matthew)”
I didn’t say anything about that. In fact, over on another blog a few days ago, I was complained about someone that drives their children 1/2 mile to school in my neighborhood, and it is ironic, because when I see them do this, is just after I walked the same 1/2 miles in the opposite direction.
Back when my parents lived in Fresno, (which was back when I was very young,) someone called in to Car Talk from Fresno, to complain about how bad their gas mileage was on their car. And the only thing they ever used the car for, was driving from their house, to the hospital where they worked, which was 1/2 mile… And Click and Clack were telling the person that that was awful for the car, and suggesting that maybe the person should walk or something, and the person said “Walk? But this is America.” Anyways, Click and Clack settled on the answer of, drive the car 2 miles out of your way, and then to the hospital, and the miles per gallon will be higher, although you’ll burn more gas per week. And the person was happy.
My point is, I think urban design is really important, don’t get me wrong, but it isn’t the only piece of the puzzle, you also need people that don’t want to drive everywhere. If you put someone that wants to drive everywhere into a higher density mixed use environment, they’ll still drive a lot. Probably not as much as they used to, (just because things will be closer together,) but still quite a bit. But I think it will be a very long time before we build enough high density mixed use property in our city, for all the people that want it, so for those people that want to drive 1/2 mile to their job, don’t worry, you’ll still live more than 1/2 mile away, and so your gas mileage won’t be too awful.
Sorry, Matthew, I misattributed the schools quote from the original article to you as I was scrolling around too fast.
(I can see how it would work for singles or childless couples where both work [****] wage jobs at the local min wage mixed use shop.)
Yeah, cause mixed-use never implies office space, family owned/operated businesses, medical or educational facilities, law offices, or anything else above minimum wage.
Sorry to see no mention of High Speed Rail being a focus. Sorry to see no mention of designing our streets and highways to the standard needed (semi’s should only be used in certain corridors to major distribution centers -> then smaller trucks to the stores on the secondary streets > finally the smallest of delivery trucks/bike delivery to the residential areas where homes/smaller stores are located. It is too expensive to support all the roads to the same high standard so that semi-trucks can go on any street they wish too.
Our street standards and our land use planning should be matched up. I don’t see that happening. I still see residential streets being built to non-green level. All roads should be designed to Eco-Road standards.
Our 30 years of Land Use Planning has given us a window to move to the next step. These types of changes will need understanding by all and the reasons understood.
Ray
“Yeah, cause mixed-use never implies office space, family owned/operated businesses, medical or educational facilities, law offices, or anything else above minimum wage.”
Glad to see you’re getting it. Most mixed use is Starbucks class jobs. Along with a few small stores, which due to their small size, have to charge double what a big store charges. A true foundation for financial sustainability and a higher standard of living.
Of course there are spectacular examples like the Round which sports the tallest building in Beaverton – a PARKING STRUCTURE (tied for tallest?)
Who can give us examples of a few mixed use successes in Portland? Please be sure the examples somehow improve the standard of living of the people involved (compared to people living in low density & shopping at Walmart/Target/Home Depot/Costco/Winco.)
Mixed Use Examples
*SE Hawthorne & 33rd (+/- 5-10 blocks)
*SE Belmont & 40th
*SE Clinton & 21st
*SW Capitol Hwy & 37th
*SW Beaverton-Hillsdale Hwy & Sunset Blvd
*NW 23rd & Lovejoy
*NW Thurman & 25th
*N Portland/Rosa Parks & Interstate (interviewed Night Hawk manager for project where he said he was pleasantly surprised with the impact MAX has had on business, did not deny there were hurdles, but overcame and is better for it)
*N Greeley & N Killingsworth
I have lived in, driven, bused, walked, and biked through all stated spaces. I have seen, especially North Portland, them grow, expand (up), and checked against what records are available (2006 census data for N. PDX), and in said areas, all statistically benefit. Additionally, frequent walks and real estate-flyer collection has shown that transit and “close to shops” is nearly 100% listed as a selling point, indicating that “mixed use” is a selling point, which suggests mixed use works and is enjoyed.
M. Lasley,
Hogwash. Your measurements and conclusions for for effectiveness and benefit measure are contrived.
Using a real estate-flyer collection is laughable.
Remonds me of the O story about a realtor pumping up the mixed use, transit bike convenience.
So much so she offered bike tours of listing.
Deep in the typically rose colored story it was stated the realtorhad not made a single sell from her bike/walk/transit campaign yet her and the O were certain it was a valuable and sought after factor.
Selling point?
Ha.
And your list is suspect as well. It seems some of those are nothing but a tax subsidized building with inadequate parking crammed into a less dense existing neighborhood.
Big deal.
All that planning and tax money on a theory that
relies upon perpetual theorizing and hype.
Can anyone show that this ACTUALLY reduces driving? … (Quality paper only please, no garbage from the building, environmental or transit lobbies.)
Here is a paper that came out recently:
http://onlinepubs.trb.org/onlinepubs/tcrp/tcrp_rpt_128.pdf
From that report’s conclusions, page 54: “TOD housing produced considerably less traffic than
is generated by conventional development.”
“Glad to see you’re getting it. Most mixed use is Starbucks class jobs. Along with a few small stores, which due to their small size, have to charge double what a big store charges. A true foundation for financial sustainability and a higher standard of living.”
Are you saying there are no Starbucks in suburban areas, or are you saying that they pay better there? Most of our economy is based off of Starbucks class jobs, (not that that is necessarily a good thing,) but if people don’t have to drive to get their cup of coffee, that does seem like a good thing…
Bob R. Says: From that report’s conclusions, page 54: “TOD housing produced considerably less traffic than is generated by conventional development.”
Now compare this traffic with what it was before the development?
Answer: High density caused more congestion, and TOD only reduced it slightly.
Admit it: High density causes traffic congestion, pollution and costs more than low density.
The only advantage of high density is that it generates lots of government money for developers and light rail.
Oh, my, look what I found in the report:
• A primary reason for higher TOD transit use is self selection. Current transit users and those predisposed to use transit seek out TOD.
• When work location is unchanged, often a significant percent (e.g., 50%) were transit users before moving to the TOD.
Looks like the expensive, government subsided TODs, merely concentrate pre-existing transit users in one taxpayer subsidized ghetto.
Have a nice Day
Matthew Says:
…if people don’t have to drive to get their cup of coffee, that does seem like a good thing..
An even better thing is to drive a few miles (or tens of miles) to a superstore to cut you food bills in half.
That is one way that the automobile has reduced our cost of living and therefore increased our standard of living. Spend $5 on gas to drive 20 miles to a nearby superstore to save $50. Try that on transit – you couldn’t get on the train with a weeks/months worth of groceries. Let alone the new TV or microwave (which will be made in China wherever you buy it.)
Why is it a good thing to reduce driving?
What are the trade offs? What is the price of reduced driving?
Why is transit better? Is it cheaper (no)? Is it faster (no)? Is it more convenient than a car just outside your front door (no)? Does it require less public subsidy (no)? Does it save energy (no)? Does it reduce pollution (no)? Does it serve the poor better or cheaper than helping them get a car (no)? Does it serve the low income people unable to drive better than giving taxi vouchers (no)?
So what is the point of transit anyway?
billy Says:
Why is it a good thing to reduce driving?
If you’re going to answer your own questions, why bother to ask, especially when the answers fly in the face of reality?
“especially when the answers fly in the face of reality?”
Sorry, you are the wrong one. Prove your case with real data from credible sources like Trimet and the Federal agencies. Otherwise you are just repeating false information to justify wasting millions of dollars.
Transit is a public service billy, it’s a public service that provides transportation to those who cannot be served otherwise or who can’t pay for their own cars.
I wouldn’t say that cars reduce our cost of living, they merely increase it. Just add it all up…gas, insurance, maintenance, depreciation, and not to mention the negative externalities of air, water and ground pollution to public health and the environment.
All in all, public transit saves me money and is convenient for me because I’m a student and a worker. I own a car, and I use it for some things, but most of the time you can find me on the bus or MAX. I’m sorry if you don’t understand that.
Prove your case with real data from credible sources like Trimet and the Federal agencies.
billy, the TRB report already referenced in this thread (which you claim to have read at least portions of), is a federally-sponsored report.
billy: Why is transit better? Is it cheaper (no)? Is it faster (no)? Is it more convenient than a car just outside your front door (no)? Does it require less public subsidy (no)? Does it save energy (no)? Does it reduce pollution (no)? Does it serve the poor better or cheaper than helping them get a car (no)? Does it serve the low income people unable to drive better than giving taxi vouchers (no)?
Is it cheaper? Yes, quite often it’s dramatically less expensive to use public transportation rather than own a car. No gas, no parking, no car payments, no insurance, no maintenance. Using a car sharing service like FlexCar is a great option for emergencies or trips like shopping, etc.
Is it faster? Not usually, but a lot of commutes are almost as fast by transit, and you get to read on the bus — and don’t have to park the car.
Is it more convenient? Not more convenient, no. But with a little foresight and planning, it can be extremely convenient.
Does it require less public subsidy? No. There is a good argument to be made that it’s worth the subsidy.
Does it save energy? Absolutely.
Does it reduce pollution? Absolutely. No question about it.
Does it serve the poor better than helping them buy a car? Other than a public subsidy, how would you accomplish that? And why is it better for them to have a car and all the extra expenses (like insurance) that go along with it?
And yes, it’s a lot cheaper than taxi vouchers. Taxis are expensive in Portland. Why is that a better public subsidy than public transit?
Spend $5 on gas to drive 20 miles
The problem is that it doesn’t cost $5 to go 20 miles. While you may be able to get gas for that, it doesn’t include the costs of things like air pollution, water pollution, oil defense, parking and the longer infrastructure needed to allow room for cheap parking.
you couldn’t get on the train with a weeks/months worth of groceries
With a big backpack and being willing to carry 1-2 bags a hand, I am able to do that. Yes being single is a part of that, but no one is saying that you have to use transit for every trip.
Instead of social engineering targets proposed by enviro socialists in progressive white hats and clothing, any targets established need to address transport tax equity whereby the users of alternative forms of transport are provided a path to transport independence without the reliance on taxpayer funded subsidies. Such targets must include: 1) A scheduled strategy whereby within two years a direct bicycle tax paid by bicyclists only is established to fund all specialized bicycle infrastructure; and 2) an objective that aspires to make transit financially self-sustainable starting by increasing the ridership paid share of operational costs beyond the current 21 percent with the goal of moving all the way to the 100 percentile of costs, then reducing the taxpayer subsidies that fund the capitol costs with the dollars replaced by a surcharge on transit fares. Such taxpayer funded subsidies are no different than, and similar to, the tax breaks given to big oil that reduce the price of motor fuels for motorists that enviro socialists want to take away.
Is it cheaper? Yes, quite often it’s dramatically less expensive to use public transportation rather than own a car.
ONLY because other people are paying 80% of your real cost.
Is it faster? Not usually
THANK YOU
Is it more convenient? Not more convenient, no.
THANK YOU
Does it require less public subsidy? No.
WRONG it gets 80% subsidy in Portland.
Does it save energy? Absolutely.]
PROVE IT WITH REAL DATA. Trimet buses use more energy per passenger mile than a small car. And a small car is much bigger than your part of a bus – 4 seats in the car, one in the bus.
Does it reduce pollution? Absolutely. No question about it.
WRONG AGAIN. On two counts. 1. Bus uses more energy thus pollutes more. 2) gasolene gas cars do not put out the crap that trimet’s diesel buses do.
Other than a public subsidy, how would you accomplish that?
ONE TIME SUBSIDY to buy a car vs. a lifetime of subsidy on transit.
And why is it better for them to have a car and all the extra expenses (like insurance) that go along with it?
BECAUSE they get better jobs and end up with more money even after car expenses. Remember a car only costs around $0.25 per mile TOTAL COST. (Not the $0.50 that the AAA&IRS use.) Many times it is actually cheaper to drive than to pay even the low subsidized transit fare. A $2.00 trimet ticket will operate your car for 8 miles. That will get you from downtown to Beaverton, Vancouver or Lake Oswego. Faster, more comfortable, door to door and no drug deals. Driving equal to the real cost of that $2.00 Trimet ticket ($10.00) will get you from downtown to Salem or the Mt. Hood wilderness.
Taxis are expensive in Portland. Why is that a better public subsidy than public transit?
BECAUSE YOU ONLY HAVE TO subsidize low income people that are unable to drive, instead of all the over paid government employees that take MAX downtown.
Jason McHuff Says: it doesn’t include the costs of things like air pollution, water pollution, oil defense,
BUSES REQUIRE all of those things too. And in about the same amounts.
Bob R. Says: the TRB report already referenced in this thread (which you claim to have read at least portions of), is a federally-sponsored report.
YES, BUT it doesn’t prove your point. See above quote ; TOD dwellers are self selected and most were already transit users. The report just shows that most TODs merely concentrate pre-existing transit users.
Big waste of money!
billy
PROVE IT WITH REAL DATA. Trimet buses use more energy per passenger mile than a small car. And a small car is much bigger than your part of a bus – 4 seats in the car, one in the bus.
Whenever I ride the bus, there seem to be a lot of people besides myself, and a great many autos have only one person, not four. Your comparison makes no sense.
WRONG AGAIN. On two counts. 1. Bus uses more energy thus pollutes more. 2) gasolene gas cars do not put out the crap that trimet’s diesel buses do.
Buses use pollute less per person because they don’t ride around with one passenger. Again, it’s a silly comparison. And, again, a lot more cars than buses, regardless of the “crap.” Cars certainly contribute their own share of “crap.”
BECAUSE they get better jobs and end up with more money even after car expenses. Remember a car only costs around $0.25 per mile TOTAL COST. (Not the $0.50 that the AAA&IRS use.) Many times it is actually cheaper to drive than to pay even the low subsidized transit fare. A $2.00 trimet ticket will operate your car for 8 miles. That will get you from downtown to Beaverton, Vancouver or Lake Oswego. Faster, more comfortable, door to door and no drug deals. Driving equal to the real cost of that $2.00 Trimet ticket ($10.00) will get you from downtown to Salem or the Mt. Hood wilderness.
In your calculations you completely ignore all the other costs of an automobile, as though the only expense is fuel. If you claim that the “real” cost is half what AAA calculates, you’re the one who needs to “prove it with real data.”
Provide something more credible than http://tinyurl.com/3wwdw5
Jeff F Says: Whenever I ride the bus, there seem to be a lot of people besides myself, and a great many autos have only one person, not four.
WHERE IS YOUR REAL DATA?
Jeff F Says: Your comparison makes no sense.
THAT IS BECAUSE YOU CAN’T READ. The number of seats did not imply the number of passengers, only that the little car is still bigger than a single seat on a bus, therefore the comparison of bus to little car still is overly generous to the bus. If you actually were capable of looking at real numbers, you would find that buses use more energy than a small car per passenger moved per mile. Actually they use just a bit more energy than the average American car.
Jeff F Says: Buses use pollute less per person because they don’t ride around with one passenger.
NO THEY RIDE around with an average of 9 passengers and they use more than 9 times the fuel of a small car. Please look at the facts before repeating transit industry hacks’ lies.
Jeff F Says: In your calculations you completely ignore all the other costs of an automobile, as though the only expense is fuel.
NO THEY DON’T – PLEASE LEARN HOW TO READ: I said: “ $0.25 per mile TOTAL COST. ” Do you understand the term TOTAL COST? It is all inclusive. If you want to conjure up some exteralitries to apply to cars, you need to also apply them to transit which also burns fuel and emits exhaust.
For instance Mark Delucchi in ACCESS NUMBER 16 • SPRING 2000, page 12 found that buses have 2-6 times the external cost of cars. Note that this is a well respected journal published by a State University.
Jeff F Says: If you claim that the “real” cost is half what AAA calculates, you’re the one who needs to “prove it with real data.” Provide something more credible than http://tinyurl.com/3wwdw5
TRY READING AND UNDERSTANDING AAA’s “Your Driving Costs” (Is that credible enough for you?) (aaaexchange.com/Assets/Files/20073261133460.YourDrivingCosts2007.pdf)
In it you will find that about ½ of the cost in due to AAA assuming your car is 2 ½ years old, while the national average is 9 years. They list ownership cost as $6000/year in that 48 cents per mile. How many people pay $6000 EVERY YEAR for their car insurance, license, registration&taxes, finance charges and depreciation ($3400)? Cut that $6000 to reflect the average car and adjust other costs accordingly and you get about ½ the cost of the official AAA number. Do the math!
billy: try reading and understanding Rules 1, 2 and 4. Just a suggestion.
THAT IS BECAUSE YOU CAN’T READ .. PLEASE LEARN HOW TO READ
Billy, please stop shouting and please refrain from personal attacks.
I remember when Jim Karlock used to hang around here and post very similar numbers and arguments. Jim Karlock used to openly state his distrust of people who hid behind pseudonyms. I sure wish Jim Karlock was around here, Billy, to tell you the problems associated with posting from a pseudonym. (In addition to Rules 1, 2, and 4, there’s also Rule #3.)
Of course, we do allow pseudonymous posting here, Billy, it’s just that we prefer that once a person has an identity on this web site, they stick with it, to avoid “sock-puppetry”. Others have been called out for this before, so I’m not singling you out. I’m reasonably confident that Jim Karlock would feel the same way, if he were here with us now.
I just want to note that while buses do pollute, they generally run and emit the pollution whether a person rides it or not. However, a private vehicle only pollutes when someone decides to use it.
To add some data to the discussion, according to TriMet data, in FY2008 TriMet buses drove 26,227,524 vehicle-miles, including about 3.7 million non-revenue miles, meaning the buses were being moved around “out of service” for various reasons such as start/end-of-day, maintenance, etc.
Those same buses delivered 225,211,008 passenger-miles of service.
So while it is true that buses sometimes run empty, on average, taking into account all the travel made by bus vehicles, there are 8.6 passengers on board each bus at any given time.
What we need to see is a figure for total Diesel fuel consumed by TriMet in FY2008 for fixed-route buses (excluding LIFT buses which aren’t in the above totals) to determine fuel economy. Past estimates have put this at around 35 bus passenger-miles per gallon of Diesel.
At the present time, transit buses are not subject emissions regulations as strict as private autos, so once we have determined fuel economy, it is possible that cars could still beat buses on emissions, but one must be careful to conduct an apples-to-apples comparison of short mostly-urban trips, and not include rural miles which are not characteristically shared with transit.
Billy, you didn’t mention the fact that TriMet’s two axle busses do the heaviest damage to Portland streets and roads (source Sam Adams’ office) while passengers contribute nothing through the farebox to repair them. Fixing the roads is yet another motorist paid subsidy to transit.
Terry Parker Says:
Billy, you didn’t mention the fact that TriMet’s two axle busses do the heaviest damage to Portland streets and roads (source Sam Adams’ office) while passengers contribute nothing through the farebox to repair them. Fixing the roads is yet another motorist paid subsidy to transit.
I need to dig around and see if I can find the ODOT study I was sent a few years ago in which it was determined that the most destructive contributor to roads were those studded tires Oregonians insist on driving all winter long, just in case it snows for one day.
Jason, dont waste your time digging for information…
[Moderator: Personally-directed remarks regarding billy and JK removed.]
“Why is it a good thing to reduce driving? What are the trade offs? What is the price of reduced driving? Why is transit better?”
I didn’t actually say that people will get on the transit to go to the coffee shop, in fact, if they live in a mixed use building, chance are far higher that they’d walk… Maybe they could drive, I don’t know, go over to the parking lot, get in their car, drive from one parking space to another one in the same lot, and then get back out and walk into the coffee shop, but really, I was thinking walking all 200 feet of the way there would be cheaper/faster/more convenient/require less subsidies/save energy/reduce pollution/be much faster&easier than applying for government benefits and/or waiting for a taxi…
Fun fact for the day: The most common destination for taxi trips in Coos Bay is the liquor store. So if we subsidized taxis, would that be considered an “ethanol subsidy?”
Hey, Bob!
What is this hangup you have with Jarlock?
BTW, isn’t he the one that runs that highly informative and accurate website, PortlandFacts.com that I used for the information that I posted?
Isn’t he running for State Rep. in your district against some Democrat that wants to increase your taxes?
Oh, and my apologies for any rule violations.
[personally directed content removed]
The new hybrid buses in Clark County emit less diesel pollution, but they only have 35 seats. Can’t someone design a fuel-efficient bus that will carry a reasonable number of people? It IS going to happen in cars. Why not mass transit? And a lighter vehicle would do less damge to the highways. The two major safety considerations—-rolling over and getting crushed by a heavier vehicle— could be largely solved by a sturdy crush proof floor incorporating a low center of gravity.