Roads and Transit

A common political occurrence today is the combination of road and mass transit packages into a single bill.  Erica Barnett writes about Seattle's situation, and I'm familiar with the same situation in Chicago/Illinois.

At first it sounds like a good compromise, but it's not.  Sure, one concern of transit supporters is that they use it every day and more money should give better service.  Thinking along this line, it then makes sense that you improve the roads to benefit the people who use them every day, right?

I'm all for compromise and fairness, but the question of roads and transit is not just about service.  More roads insure more pollution, and undermine a major part of the purpose of better transit service; the encouragement of higher ridership, and lower pollution.  In this concern, transit supporters lose through such a "compromise".  Why?  If no new roads were built, and no new funding went to transit, ridership would still increase, which would itself provide additional funding.  Service quality would suffer, but one of two objectives would still be achieved.

In the compromise, the roadies get everything they want, and transit trades one objective for another, with no overall net progress.  That's not fair as I see it.  Some compromise is necessary, that's understandable, but roads and transit is not the right compromise.  What if instead of more roads, we did something for roadies that would benefit them, but also not counter to transit objectives?

Here's one idea.  What about additional funding for more efficient cars and trucks?  Lowering the price of efficient vehicles will lower the amount of gas used, but also lower the amount of dollars roadies spend on their vehicles and gas.  Everyone gets something out of that proposal.

Here's another that's already on the table, though mostly ignored.  In Illinois the suburban population wants more money for schools as part of the compromise.  No problem.  I'd give five times as much money to compromise on schools rather than roads.

Worst idea.. ever

USA today reports on a program to charge drivers per mile rather than per gallon.  The idea is to spend a ton of money to make sure SUV drivers aren't "unfairly" paying for roads for hybrid and electric vehicle drivers.  This concept of fairness neglects several major factors. One is fairness over the impact that SUV has upon the environment.  Another is neglecting the simple conclusion that since an SUV is heavier, it must cause more road wear per mile driven too, right?  And how about the higher fatality and damage rates from heavy vehicles colliding with smaller vehicles?

Iowa, Oregon, Minnesota and Colorado are all investigating this idea.  I'd strongly suggest if you live in one of those states you find out what representatives are behind this idea and make them stop.

More on legal vs. voluntary

Forget the light bulbs- Part II, by Mike Tidwell, is well stated, and somewhat ironic for me.  The gist is very much the same as Individual vs. national sacrifice, and Me vs. Us.  What's ironic is of course the title.  My first foray into some real action was encouraging the use of, and spreading information about CFL's.  It helps remind me that one of the most important factors of individual action is that it gives individuals the chance to become involved without feeling overwhelmed all at once.

The risk is that we won't move beyond that initial phase to tackle the real issues, or worse we'll start to think they aren't necessary.  In effect, light bulbs are about momentum, and are not much different from rallies, advertising or blogs.  It's all part of the process, where the end goal is widespread support for the truly necessary solutions.  The primary overarching need is charge for carbon emissions, either through taxes or auctions.  We need in effect, to put a price upon our planet. 

That sounds horrible, but since money is merely a far distanced abstraction of value, its more wrong to consider the planet free than valuable.  What is free is abused freely.  As said by Martin Luther King, Jr., "Freedom is not free".  Knowledge and acceptance of this will keep freedom alive, by acknowledging its cost in addition to value.  We must do the same for our planet, because that is what will keep it, and us, alive.

Forward the Cause

Over the last year, I have been looking for ways to move the environmental cause forward, as it needs to be.  I've tried a few things with this blog; writing on a number of topics, commenting at others blogs, starting the light bulb labeling petition.  I've also written letters to senators and representatives.  Recently, I've become involved with a few local groups.  One seems very promising.  Nevertheless, what leaves me a bit empty about it all is I feel like I'm communicating with the wrong audience.

It's encouraging to get to know others with common goals, even fun, but the real obstacle to progress doesn't seem to be something you can solve from within that group.  The biggest obstacles lie outside the environmental community.  What is really necessary is growing the environmental community, influencing non-environmental politicians and corporations.  The question then is, how?  It seems to me there are two parts, offense and defense. 

For offense, speak about the need for environmental reform, and not just to those who agree.  Damn the hate thrown back.  Do not get mad, and do not expect to convince everyone, or even most of the people you talk to, but if you could convince just a few people to do something like vote for the more environmental candidate in a political race, when they would have done the opposite, that is a significant win. 

If you live in a district with non-environmental elected officials, use it as an opportunity.  My district's representative’s vote yes on almost all of the environmental legislation, so writing them seems more for appearances than real effect. I can’t ask them to vote twice. But if you’re representative’s are voting no, you have the opportunity for progress. Depending on how close you are to voting for them, consider two options. If you’d actually consider them if they changed their environmental stance, let them know this. You have more power now than at any other point.

If your representative is someone you’d never vote for, you could lie, and still play option one, or you could try hardball. Hardball seems more fun, but it’s much harder because there is so much mudslinging nothing new seems to stick. If you do it though, you’ll be more effective if you can rile people up as much as possible, while still convincing your representative that change will satisfy you, or at least shift your focus.

For defense, we need environmental collaboration which is less self-destructive. I read recently at GristMill about a PETA campaign targeted at meat eating environmentalists. As Alex Roth points out, the approach is counterproductive. I agree with what PETA is trying to do, but I’m also a carnivore. Does this make me a hypocrite? Not really. I applaud anyone who makes the choice, or simply has the preference toward no meat. Meat, however, is one of the last things I personally would sacrifice. Despite this desire, I wouldn’t oppose legislation which had the effect of making meat more expensive. Fair is fair. If I make that choice I should be willing to sacrifice something else instead. PETA can disagree with that, but I think they would do more good by building the environmental community rather than attacking it.

Defense is more than just having an outward focus; it also means supporting common goals. If there’s one thing everyone in the environmental community should be able to agree upon it is CO2 is bad. The corollary of this is that an all encompassing attack on carbon is appropriate. There is some disagreement of whether this means a carbon tax, or a cap and trade system. I have my opinion of which is best, but I will support either. Get one in place and then debate the replacement. And yes, there will need to be a replacement because the first one passed will set targets too low. The important thing is getting something in place. It’s easier to raise a tax than create a new tax.

The more I think about it, defense is complicated because even those few simple statements above are sure to have some controversial content.

(P.S. I already ate mostly chicken, not beef, but will do so even more after reading Livestock’s Long Shadow. Poultry is concluded to be the least damaging of meats, based upon energy use, nitrogen efficiency and CO2 production. I’ve also recently switched to soy milk.)

Chicagoland Transit

One would think with rising gas prices and awareness of the dual needs of CO2 emission reductions and a lessening of dependence on oil that public transportation would be becoming more important to the State of Illinois.  But apparently that is wrong as the Illinois State Legislature has instead cut funding for CTA, Metra and Pace.

What's more, the same event is happening in California.  This is ridiculous.  The budget cuts at CTA may completely eliminate my morning/evening route, which is generally full near capacity.

I could say a lot of things here.  I could show the economics of how little it costs per mile to use public transportation, how much less gasoline it consumes, but instead I'll just go with indignation today. 

It's ridiculous and I'm pissed.