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Biodiesel Safety
Hmmm… There seems to be a mini-trend going on. On Friday, a biodiesel plant in Idaho exploded, killing one worker. In late June, a fire destroyed a biodiesel site in rural Clackamas County. I can almost hear some intrepid legislator thinking, “boy, we better regulate these things.” The question is, will it be someone who…
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Portland Peak Oil Task Force Appointed
Released by the City on Friday: CITY OF PORTLAND ANNOUNCES PEAK OIL TASK FORCE Eleven citizens to provide recommendations for responding to rising oil prices and diminishing supplies Portland, Ore-Commissioner Dan Saltzman today announced the members of the City of Portland’s Peak Oil Task Force, a citizen advisory group that will provide recommendations to City…
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In Defense of Rail Transit
Rail transit is regularly criticized, including by some commenters on this site, as cost-ineffective with respect to buses or other modes, particularly with respect to reducing congestion.. VTPI has recently produced an overview of the literature on the benefits of trail transit (PDF, 36K).
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Eastside Streetcar Gets a Little More Real
Update: 06 July 2006: The tour continues – yesterday Portland City Council unanimously approved the locally preferred alternative. But apparently the Milwaukie delegation had visited earlier with their “don’t forget us” message. Commissioner Adams pledged to work to make both projects happen. Update: 30 June 2006: The tour of local governments to approve the Eastside…
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Transit Surfer Simplified, More Functional For Cell Phone Users
Over the weekend, we made some significant changes to our Transit Surfer tool. Previously, we had three different interfaces, one for desktop browsers, one for PDAs with HTML browsers, and one for cell phones with WAP/WML browsers. The WAP version has been the weakest, with poor navigation tools. We’ve scrapped that approach and moved to…