Free Public Transit

Report Finds Americans Are Driving Less, Led by Youth

noreply@blogger.com (fpteditors) — Wed, 15 May 2013 08:13:00 +0000

NYTimes.com: "People tend to drive less during recessions, since fewer people are working (and commuting), and most are looking for ways to save money. But Phineas Baxandall, an author of the report and senior analyst for U.S. Pirg, said the changes preceded the recent recession and appeared to be part of a structural shift that is largely rooted in changing demographics, especially the rise of so-called millennials — today’s teenagers and twentysomethings. “Millennials aren’t driving cars,” he said."

U.S. and Russia struggle to control surrogates in Syria pipeline war

noreply@blogger.com (fpteditors) — Tue, 14 May 2013 17:09:00 +0000

Peak oil, climate change and pipeline geopolitics driving Syria conflict | Nafeez Ahmed | Environment | guardian.co.uk: "But the US, Israel and other external powers are hardly honest brokers. Behind the facade of humanitarian concern, familiar interests are at stake. Three months ago, Iraq gave the greenlight for the signing of a framework agreement for construction of pipelines to transport natural gas from Iran's South Pars field - which it shares with Qatar - across Iraq, to Syria."

We need demand-side environmentalism

noreply@blogger.com (fpteditors) — Tue, 14 May 2013 14:52:00 +0000

A lot of current environmentalism is supply-side. It goes like this:

Demonize fossil-fuel producers
Interfere with fossil-fuel production and transport
Divest from fossil-fuel producers
Create non-fossil-fuel sources of energy

This is akin to trying to stop Niagara Falls with umbrellas. And creating more energy just adds to the volume of water coming over.

Here is a simple plan for demand-side environmentalism:

Stop wasting energy
Expose now-unseen subsidy of autos and sprawl
Change how people live
Lower the birth rate

Making public transit fare-free starts us on that path. The good news is, you don't have to wait for the federal government. You can have free transit in your town or city for about 60 basis points of tax.

Climate change 'will make hundreds of millions homeless'

noreply@blogger.com (fpteditors) — Sun, 12 May 2013 14:00:00 +0000

Climate change is amplifying risks from drought, floods, storm and rising seas. Photograph: Simon Maina/AFP

The Observer: ""When temperatures rise to that level, we will have disrupted weather patterns and spreading deserts," he said. "Hundreds of millions of people will be forced to leave their homelands because their crops and animals will have died. The trouble will come when they try to migrate into new lands, however. That will bring them into armed conflict with people already living there. Nor will it be an occasional occurrence. It could become a permanent feature of life on Earth.""

Fossil fuel policy: Use it faster to get price up, to produce more, to use it faster.

noreply@blogger.com (fpteditors) — Sat, 11 May 2013 10:29:00 +0000

Peak Prosperity: "Imagine if the Americans of 100 years ago had figured out a way to export all of the U.S.'s natural gas bounty, and we were now struggling with the aftermath of those actions. I, for one, would look quite unfavorably on those who so utterly failed to appreciate the limited nature of that abundance that they literally wasted it.

...[future generations] will thank us for giving them efficient buildings and rational transportation systems at a time when energy finally becomes truly scarce – and proportionally expensive.

The time has come to give greater weighting to energy matters than to economic and political desires. To continue to be energetically wasteful at this time in history, when so much data is telling us that the effluent of our activities is measurably altering our support systems, is beyond embarrassing. It's tragic."

Scientists: Climate change causing Arctic Ocean to acidify at alarming rate

noreply@blogger.com (fpteditors) — Mon, 06 May 2013 21:22:00 +0000

The Raw Story: "Scientists with the Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Programme (AMAP) warned Monday morning that the Arctic Ocean is acidifying much more rapidly than previously thought, adding that it will be “tens of thousands of years” before the worst effects of climate change on the Arctic Ocean can be mitigated."

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Climate change will increase extreme rainfall; drought, NASA says | GlobalPost

noreply@blogger.com (fpteditors) — Mon, 06 May 2013 15:12:00 +0000

Climate change will increase extreme rainfall; drought, NASA says | GlobalPost: ""In response to carbon dioxide-induced warming, the global water cycle undergoes a gigantic competition for moisture resulting in a global pattern of increased heavy rain, decreased moderate rain, and prolonged droughts in certain regions," said lead author William Lau of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, in a statement."

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First they ignore you, ...

noreply@blogger.com (fpteditors) — Fri, 03 May 2013 15:04:00 +0000

The campaign for free public transit has done nothing but grow. There are active groups or websites in over 20 countries. There have been many breakthroughs: Bangkok, Chengdu, Illinois, Zagreb, Tallinn are just a few of the many locations that have introduced some sort of free transit in the last few years.

Free transit is a solution that addresses energy waste, climate, and energy demand in general. It introduces culture change, taking us on a path compatible with a limited biosphere. As more people ride, it becomes more in demand, more frequent ... starting a virtual cycle.

The only losers with free transit are those who profit from energy waste. Now they are attacking it. This is a sign of our progress, and just encourages us to keep going.

Join us. freepublictransit@facebook.com

Except for U.S. bubble, world oil production flat from 2005

noreply@blogger.com (fpteditors) — Thu, 02 May 2013 22:08:00 +0000

crudeoilpeak.info: "Excluding the US, rest-of-world crude oil production in the 2nd half of 2012 was on the same level as in the 2nd half of 2005, despite 85% higher oil prices. "

Why Motorists Should NOT Pay for Crash Investigations

noreply@blogger.com (fpteditors) — Wed, 01 May 2013 18:30:00 +0000

This Streetsblog article starts out well. Calling out the autosprawl externalities.

Streetsblog New York City: "The same problem applies to private motoring, the costs of which are, in many cases, spread across non-drivers or society at large. The curb lane in front of my home provides free storage for my car-owning neighbors’ vehicles. A portion of my taxes go to maintaining highways I rarely use, caring for uninsured crash victims and asthma patients in city hospitals, bailing out the auto industry because it’s too big to fail, and fighting wars to keep oil cheap."

But then advocates pricing one of those externalities, the costs of collision administration. Adding fees likes this, road-pricing (tolls), and congestion pricing are not good ideas.

We need to take responsibility for our society as a whole, not create more bureaucracy trying, like hypocritical libertarians, to attach fees everywhere in until everything is "fair." Let's face it we have autosprawl. It's horribly expensive and wasteful. We should change it at the root cause, not apply bureaucratic band-aids.

Make public transit fare-free. Carbon dumping, collision costs, and oil wars have been free for autosprawl profiteers for many years. Free transit will shove the rudder in the right direction.

China oil consumption growing faster, and not price-sensitive

noreply@blogger.com (fpteditors) — Tue, 30 Apr 2013 10:56:00 +0000

Early Warning: "If we note that Chinese population is four times larger than the US population, and 2011 US consumption was almost 19mbd, we see that Chinese per-capita consumption is still only something like 1/8 of that of the US. So there's a lot of room to grow still. Also, China is in the middle of building an expressway system that will be substantially larger than the US freeway system."

Keeping up oil production is like walking up the down escalator

noreply@blogger.com (fpteditors) — Mon, 29 Apr 2013 11:55:00 +0000

Resource Insights: "Production from all existing oil fields worldwide is believed to be declining at a rate of about 4 to 5 percent. We are trying to make up that decline from tight oil fields that decline around 10 times faster, and we are only just succeeding for the moment."

APTA: #Publictransit the best way to reduce carbon emissions

noreply@blogger.com (fpteditors) — Mon, 29 Apr 2013 10:22:00 +0000

Commuting by Public Transportation—One of the most Significant Actions to Reduce household
Carbon Emissions

Is your community ready for the net-energy cliff? We are moving faster toward it

noreply@blogger.com (fpteditors) — Sun, 28 Apr 2013 14:49:00 +0000

Peak oil isn’t dead: An interview with Chris Nelder: "And there’s a turning point on this — it’s called the “net energy cliff.” When the ratio of energy output to energy input gets down to about 6, then you fall off this cliff, and it’s just not worth doing. In the early days of oil production, that ratio was about 100 to 1. Globally, right now, it’s approaching 11 to 1. And it’s even lower for some newer sources. The return on investment for heavy oil from the Kern River field in California is about 4 to 1.
The point is that the net energy available to society has been declining radically. Researchers have done a number of papers on this. If you want to run a society, your net energy for oil production has to be at least 5. And if you want to run a modern complex society, with televisions, iPads, highly advanced medicine, etc., then you probably need an EROI closer to 10. So it’s reaching the point where we’re in the danger zone."

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Around the world, fuel subsidies are economic ticking time-bomb

noreply@blogger.com (fpteditors) — Thu, 25 Apr 2013 16:30:00 +0000

Indonesia seeks to tackle explosive fuel subsidies | Free Malaysia Today: "JAKARTA: The Indonesian government’s pledge to reduce generous fuel subsidies which will push up prices for motorists has taken it onto politically treacherous ground before elections in 2014."

Due to competition, many countries around the world subsidize transport fuels. This has spurred their local economies, but made them dependent on cheap fuel. Now that peak oil is here, there will be great suffering and upheaval. Nigeria recently narrowly escaped revolution recently and had to roll back subsidy cuts. Look for this process to continue.

Why is urban planning so hopelessly complicated?

noreply@blogger.com (fpteditors) — Mon, 22 Apr 2013 10:39:00 +0000

Municipal governments are besieged by business interests. If they put in light rail here, business X wins, there, Y wins. So sometimes it seems nothing will be done. So they bring in the urban-planning consultants with complex charts. Everyone dozes off, and business X or Y wins.

Urbanization is the future. Degrowth is the future. We have to make cities liveable, walkable, and pleasant. All the scrambling for profit is getting in the way.

Simply make the buses fare-free. Gradually eliminate cars. Then all the charts will have to be re-done.

There is no plan for #peakoil, so, denial is the current strategy

noreply@blogger.com (fpteditors) — Sun, 21 Apr 2013 21:58:00 +0000

Resource Insights by Kurt Cobb: "... most of the world's governments have no plausible plan for addressing the consequences of a persistent decline in world oil production. So, given that, it hardly seems advisable to them to inform the public about a danger for which there is no response.

...As a practical matter, we would have to reduce our energy consumption drastically over time to make it possible for renewable energy to supply the lion's share of our needs. Even a very rapid and large build-out of renewable energy infrastructure would not allow us to consume the colossal amounts of energy that we do today, at least not any time soon."

Scottish Socialist Party makes the case for free public transport #yesscot

noreply@blogger.com (fpteditors) — Sat, 20 Apr 2013 12:45:00 +0000

Scottish Socialist Party

• Free fares would be the biggest single pro-environment policy enacted by any national government anywhere on the planet, dramatically slashing car use and CO2 emissions.• Free fares would be the biggest anti-poverty, pro-social inclusion policy enacted in Scotland, or anywhere else in the UK. It is mainly people on low incomes who rely on public transport

• Free fares would cut the number of road accidents, reducing human suffering and relieving pressure on the NHS and the emergency services. The Scottish Executive estimates that road accidents cost £1.4 billion a year to the Scottish economy. (On an average day in Scotland there is one fatal road accident; another 8-10 involving serious injury; and 250-300 minor accidents. The vast majority involve cars.)

• Free fares would be help to reduce the levels of asthma and other respiratory illnesses, which have risen steeply in line with the expansion of road traffic

• Free fares would potentially increase the spending power of over a million workers by between £40 and £100 a month, boosting the overall economy.

• Free fares would increase business efficiency and productivity: the CBI estimates that traffic congestion costs business across Britain between £15 and £20 billion a year.

• Free fares would be a major tourist attraction, bringing hundreds of millions of pounds into the Scottish economy every year from increased visitor numbers. An increase in tourism of just 20 per cent would bring an extra £1 billion into the Scottish economy.

• Free fares would attract worldwide support, especially from the global environmental movement, and would bring pressure to bear on governments throughout Europe and the wider world to adopt a similar policy.

• Free fares would reduce Scotland’s reliance on depleting oil reserves; 67 per cent of all oil produced globally is used for transport.

Oil industry gambling $6 Trillion, including your pension, that nothing will be done for #climate

noreply@blogger.com (fpteditors) — Fri, 19 Apr 2013 15:11:00 +0000

Bill McKibben and Jeremy Leggett | Environment | guardian.co.uk: "Six trillion dollars is what oil, gas, and coal companies will invest over the next ten years on turning fossil fuel deposits into reserves, assuming last year’s level of investment stays the same. Reserves are by definition bodies of oil, gas or coal that can be drilled or mined economically. Regulators allow companies, currently, to book them as assets, and on the assumption that they are at zero risk of being stranded - left below ground, "value"unrealized - over the full life of their exploitation. Yet a report published today shows they are at very real risk of being stranded, and in large quantity. "

Whidbey Island for 20 years #freetransit on 0.6% tax

noreply@blogger.com (fpteditors) — Fri, 19 Apr 2013 14:31:00 +0000

From The Tyee 2007 by Dave Olsen: "Have you ever imagined a world where riders of public transit pay no fares, the atmosphere on board every bus is calm and friendly, and all buses not only have bike racks and are wheelchair accessible, but are completely free of advertisements?

Do you want to experience the real thing? Then come along on my visit to Whidbey Island in Northwest Washington State."

	Island Transit (includes vanpool)	BC Transit in Nanaimo
Service Population	79,252	92,300
Ridership	1,101,711 (902,793 for buses; 198,918 for vanpools)	2,317,763
Service Kilometres	4,548,706 (2,804,721 for buses; 1,743,984 for vanpools)	2,263,992
Service Hours	71,031 (all buses)	94,333
Vehicles in Service	56 buses; 101 vans	31 buses
Operating Budget	$8,392,677 ($0 from fares; all from a 0.6% sales tax collected in Island County)	$6,906,910 ($3,065,488 from fares)

People of Bahrain show amazing courage against US-KSA oil power

noreply@blogger.com (fpteditors) — Thu, 18 Apr 2013 15:57:00 +0000

Alternative energies only encourage more growth, which means more fossil fuel demand.

noreply@blogger.com (fpteditors) — Tue, 16 Apr 2013 03:23:00 +0000

Power Shift Away From Green Illusions: "The high cost of wind and solar technologies brings to light the fossil fuels behind the curtain. If we want to address climate change and the many other consequences of energy production, there's no evidence that lower energy costs and growth are a step in the right direction. The answer is straightforward, really. We'll need to greatly reduce both consumption and the number of people consuming over time."

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Here are the details on why U.S. public transportation is so pathetic

noreply@blogger.com (fpteditors) — Mon, 15 Apr 2013 08:40:00 +0000

Chris Hedges - Truthdig: "WASHINGTON, D.C.—The deterioration of the nation’s public transportation, like the deterioration of health care, education, social services, public utilities, bridges and roads, is part of the relentless seizing and harvesting of public resources and programs by corporations."

Split widens in 1% as Washington Post publishes Chris Nelder

noreply@blogger.com (fpteditors) — Sat, 13 Apr 2013 23:48:00 +0000

Peak oil isn’t dead: An interview with Chris Nelder: "Chris Nelder: There has always been a lot of confusion about this point. Peak oil was never about “running out of oil.” The only people who characterized it that way either didn’t know what they were talking about or were trying to confuse the issue. Peak oil has always referred to the production rate of oil — it’s about finding the point where that production rate peaks."

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Forty years of MPG improvements have not lowered per capita gasoline use

noreply@blogger.com (fpteditors) — Fri, 12 Apr 2013 02:03:00 +0000

Figure 8. US per capita consumption of oil products, split between gasoline and other.

Total consumption from BP’s 2012 Statistical Review of World Energy.

Gasoline consumptionfrom EIA. (Amounts include biofuels.) Difference by subtraction.

Our Finite World: "The amount of fuel used for gasoline has stayed in the 10 to 12 barrels a year per capita band, since 1970, in spite of huge improvements in vehicle efficiency."