How to Bring Parking Charges to Offices

Paid parking at offices reduces commute trips by 23%, producing very large traffic and CO2 reduction. This is a very effective policy that is not popular. Are there "clever policy tricks" to bring this about? Can we help cities "jump in together" with small steps, making this policy more palatable? Could cities synchronize their actions to reduce risk? Here is a web page with details of such a proposal: http://www.cities21.org/paidParking.htm

An example of cities "jumping in together" is provided: "Interesting example in the Twin Cities. This was always said about changing bars and restaurants to non-smoking. Every time any city council member proposed it, they were shouted down by people who said, "But people will go somewhere else and all our businesses will lose out." Then one December day the city of Bloomington (largest suburb) passed a smoking ban. The following month St. Paul did the same, then Minneapolis right after. It turns out they had been in agreement all along about who would go first and who would follow next."

What do you think?

True Cost of Driving

In light of today's (Sept. 26, 2006) post on the true cost of driving, consider this editorial. In my opinion, the true cost of driving cannot be calculated without taking into account the need to secure access to oil. US domestic oil discovery peaked in 1930. US domestic oil production peaked in 1970. In 1994, the US began importing more oil than we could produce. Each year since 1994, the US has had to import more oil and spend more money to secure the supply of oil. Andy Singer, a great editorial cartoonist, just came out with a new one depicting how transportation policy begets energy policy begets foreign policy.

What is your take on things?

Explain Relationship of Increasing Efficiency and Keeping Traffic Moving and Win $1,000

Every one knows what traffic congestion is. Transportation engineers know that efficiency improvements can make a big difference in traffic flow. They simply have a problem communicating this concept to the public (and politicians).

Well, one State Dept of Transportation official has challenged the transportation profession - or anyone else - to solve this communication problem.

Washington State Department of Transportation Secretary Doug MacDonald has challenged transportation professionals to think of a better way to communicate to the general public the relationship between maximizing the use of existing system capacity, increasing efficiency, and keeping highway traffic moving.

As a follow-up to his challenge, Secretary MacDonald has made a personal donation of $1,000 to be awarded to the person or group that submits the best idea. Entries are due by October 6, 2006 and should be submitted to Washington DOT's special e-mail address: Dougmacdonaldchallenge@wsdot.wa.gov

Please e-mail any questions concerning the contest to that e-mail address.

The contest winner and honorable mentions will be showcased in a Transportation Research Board poster session to be scheduled during the 2007 TRB Annual Meeting in Washington, D.C.

The contest winner will be awarded the $1,000 check to start off the new year with considerable flair.

To download the contest flyer and for further information, please consult the TRB Congestion Pricing Committee's website at:
http://www.trb-pricing.org/modules.php?name=Content&pa=showpage&pid=7&page=1

Portland Prepares Peak Oil Briefing Book

In May 2006, Portland City Council created a Peak Oil Task Force to develop recommendations on appropriate responses to uncertainties in the supply and affordability of oil. The Task Force is intended to identify key short-term and long-term vulnerabilities and develop recommendations for addressing these. Twelve citizens were appointed to the Task Force in June, and the Task Force is expected to provide recommendations to City Council in early 2007.

Changes in the availability of affordable petroleum products may have significant impacts on transportation, housing, food, and other life-essential products and services. Click here for a set of background materials [94 page PDF] intended to provide an overview of the peak oil issue, excerpts of relevant Portland policy and planning documents, and a number of related resources.

For more information: Click here

Simmons: "We are past energy peak"

TDM Talk

On June 20, 2006, Matthew Simmons of Simmons and Company International gave a presentation to the Department of Defense entitled, "The Energy Crisis Has Arrived." In this presentation, Simmons declared that world energy production has peaked and stated that he believes Middle East oil production will decline by 50 percent in the next 12 years.

Click here for powerpoint slides from presentation

By the Numbers: Gas Prices and Cutting America's Oil Addiction

Below are some interesting figures gathered by the Sierra Club that I thought that the TDM Community might find useful.

WASHINGTON - May 3 -

GAS PRICES

$2.92… Average retail price for regular gasoline, up 69 cents from a year ago. [1]

$2,873…Amount average family of four spent on gasoline in 2005[2]

$73.75…Price per barrel of crude oil on the New York Mercantile Exchange[3]


RECORD PROFITS

$8.4 billion…ExxonMobil’s first-quarter profits in 2006

$4 billion…ChevronTexaco’s first-quarter profits in 2006, up 49% from 2005

$3.29 billion…ConocoPhillip’s first-quarter profits in 2006

$15.7 billion…Combined first-quarter profits of ExxonMobil, ChevroTexaco and ConocoPhillips

$63.8 billion…combined 2005 profits of ExxonMobil ($36.1 billion), Chevron ($14.1 billion)and ConnocoPhillips ($13.5 billion). [4]


HANDOUTS TO AMERICANS VERSUS BIG OIL

$30 million…Amount the top 10 oil companies spent on lobbying in 2005[5]

$80 billion…in subsidies and tax loopholes to the oil and gas and other polluting energy industries in the energy law signed in 2005. [6]


OIL DEPENDENCE

25% …Percentage of world oil production consumed by the United States.

3% …Percentage of world’s oil reserves located in the United States. [7]


ARCTIC REFUGE AND AMERICA’S COASTS

1 cent…Amount of savings for consumers at the pump if we drill for oil in the Arctic Refuge.[8]

20 years…When consumers would see the penny savings.[9]

47 days…Amount of oil from opening up parts of Lease Sale 181 in the Gulf of Mexico to drilling


REAL SOLUTIONS

4 million…The number of barrels of oil per day that the United States would save if fuel economy standards were raised to 40 miles per gallon within 20 years. [10]

$2,200…Amount that the average driver would save at the gas pump over the lifetime of a vehicle if fuel economy standards were raised to 40 miles per gallon over the next 10 years, a conservative estimate based on lower gas prices. [11]


POLL NUMBERS

71…Percentage of Americans who disapprove of the way President Bush is handling energy policy[12]


82%…Percentage of Americans who don’t think President Bush has a clear plan for keeping gas prices down [13]



[1] Dept. of Energy's Weekly U.S. Retail Gasoline Prices
[2] Consumer Expenditure Survey from Bureau of Labor Statistics and the Energy Information Administration

[3] http://www.bloomberg.com/energy/
[4] U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission data

[5] http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/03/business/media/03oil.html

[6] Taxpayers for Common Sense – www.taxpayer.net

[7] Energy Information Administration (EIA) – www.eia.doe.gov
[8] http://www.tws.org/Library/Documents/upload/PennyaGallon20yrs1.pdf
[9] ibid

[10] Friedman et al. "Drilling In Detroit: Tapping Automaker Ingenuity to Build Safe and Efficient

Automobiles." Union of Concerned Scientists & Center for Auto Safety. June 2001.

[11] ibid

[12] http://www.usatoday.com/news/polls/tables/live/2006-05-01-poll.htm
[13] http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/05/01/opinion/polls/main1567675.shtml

Carpool Incentives - What works? What is appropriate?

Marge Gasnick, with the Mid-America Regional Council (MPO in Kansas City),
posted a request to the TRANSP-TDM listserv today. She was seeking feedback on providing incentives and rewards to retain carpoolers. She was considering "reimbursing them for some of the upkeep on their vehicle, the types of things that help reduce the emissions produced by the vehicle - e.g., oil changes, tuneups, tires, etc."

This has stimulated a variety of responses from other listserv subscribers about what is an effective incentive AND what is appropriate use of taxpayers' dollars.

For example, does "Advertising TDM by giving away gasoline as the reward for energy conservation sends a confused message," as Dennis Eirikis, President of ClearLight Communications, suggests? (Dennis' full post here)

Brenda Williams with the Regional Transportation Commission of Southern Nevada replied "Some may say that using taxpayer dollars for a spa treatment and a massage [to build on the stress reduction of commute options] is improper and unnecessary no matter what our TDM program message is or no matter how our regions are impacted by certain marketing messages. Sometimes what works in one region will not work in another, but the only way to determine the effectiveness of any marketing strategy is to try it after careful investigation of your regional culture." (Brenda's full post here)

These listserv postings come after a similar discussion I had recently on the acceptable use of purchasing movie tickets (from a private company) as part of a Refer a Friend program to enroll more members into the Emergency Ride Home program. Drawing the line as to what is acceptable may also be a "cultural" issue (as well as a legal one). For example, while movie tickets were deemed acceptable, purchasing scratch off tickets for the State's lottery were not deemed acceptable.(Even though the promo opportunities are endless. :) “Carpooling will save you some serious scratch” or “Scratch off one reason for not being able to carpool – E..R..H..” or “Carpooling is no gamble; you are guaranteed a ride home” :) )

I'm not arguing about the decision, simply raising the flag that what may seem acceptable to some, might not be to all.

Finally, testing what works is always a good idea. Offer a variety of incentives, for example, and let the individual select. Or try "gas cards" in one market but "movie tickets" in another and see what happens. Look for effectiveness in achieving your objectives (not just measuring demand for a particular incentive). See which incentive did the best job in what you set out to achieve with the program such as reduce turnover rates in vanpools, etc.

And, by all means, share your results with the rest of us.

Public Transit and TDM Response to Pandemic Influenza

Researchers at the Center for Urban Transportation Research have begun to investigate and seek funding to study the impact of pandemic flu on public transit as well as the potential role of public transit and TDM agencies in such an emergency.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), it is not a matter of if, but a matter of when a pandemic flu strikes the United States. Currently, federal and state governments are developing plans to respond to a pandemic flu. At this point, the Department of Health and Human Services’ (HSS) National Plan only contains a statement referring to the closure of public transportation as a community containment measure.

Health departments and emergency operations centers at the local level will bear the burden of response to a pandemic. The proposed research will develop an action plan for transit agencies to provide resources and assistance in coordination with local emergency responders. This action plan also would help transit agencies safeguard staff, prepare for workforce disruptions due to mass illness, develop contingency systems to maintain essential or altered service during quarantine and mitigate the impact of shut downs. The research will also look at how TDM agencies and organization can help employers prepare response plans that may heavily rely on telecommuting and the maintenance of the communication infrastructure.

Since a pandemic could occur at any time, it is important to provide a useful products as soon as possible followed by products that provide more specific planning strategies. For transit agencies, the first product will be a Transit Agency Checklist, modeled after the checklists designed by the HHS and CDC for families and business. The final product will be a detailed guidebook for transit agencies to customize their own Pandemic Flu Action Plan. On the TDM side, CUTR will look into developing a toolkit that TDM professionals can use to help employers develop a response plan.

We are very interested to hear from others concerning TDM's potential role in responding to a pandemic or how they plan to become involved in the local prepartation process.

CHRIS HAGELIN

Peak Oil and the Army Corp of Engineers

According to a September 2005 report by the Army Corp of Engineers entitled "Energy Trends and Implications for U.S. Army Installations, "world oil production is at or near its peak and current world demand exceeds supply."

The Army Corp of Engineers goes on to say:


"The supply of oil will remain fairly stable in the very near term, but oil prices will steadily increase as world production approaches its peak. The doubling of oil prices in the past couple of years is not an anomaly, but a picture of the future. Peak oil is at hand with low availability growth for the next 5 to 10 years. Once worldwide petroleum production peaks, geopolitics and market economics will result in even more significant price increases and security risks. To guess where this is all going to take us is would be too speculative. Oil wars are certainly not out of the question. Disruption of world oil markets may also affect world natural gas markets as much of the natural gas reserves are collocated with the oil reserves."

The document can be found via the Association for the Study of Peak Oil at:

http://www.peakoil.net/Articles2005/Westervelt_EnergyTrends__TN.pdf

What this says to me is that the idea of peak oil is gaining greater credibility and already part of the working assumption of the US Army.

And as I have been saying for the last couple years, the TDM community needs to jump on this and makes sure that TDM is one of the first strategies that federal decision-makers think of in terms of how this nation responds to mitigate the impact of peak oil. The question is what is the best way to promote TDM as one of the most cost effective ways of not only dealing with congestion, but also America's oil dependence. What are your thoughts?

CHRIS HAGELIN, CUTR

Linking TDM, Oil Dependence and National Security: The Time to Act is Now.

As I presented at the 2005 ACT Conference and in prior papers, it is my strong belief that the TDM community needs to address the link between oil dependence and national security and position TDM as one of the primary strategies to reduce oil consumption and improve national security.

Since Bush Administration has publically acknowledged America's addiction to oil in the recent State of the Union address, it is time for the TDM community to act. We need to convince policy-makers from local governments all the way to the White House that TDM is one of the most cost-effective means for reducing oil demand by reducing vehicle trips and miles, shifting trips from peak hours to reduce traffic congestion, and eliminating trips all together.

America can no longer afford to spend our precious resources on trying to build our way out of congestion or militarily securing access to oil. We need to change the course and invest in a multifaceted approach that employs not only TDM but also improved fuel efficiency standards, changes to land development codes and practices, increased investment in transit, and a massive investment in the research and development of alternative/sustainable/renewable energy resources.

If you would like to learn more about the link between TDM, oil and national security, a streaming video presentation on my research that uses Real Player, is now available:
here

I would also recommend watching the documentary, "End of Suburbia" (www.endofsuburbia.com), visiting the Association for the Study of Peak Oil at www.peakoil.net or reading Matthew Simmons' "Twilight in the Desert".

For the visitors to TDM Blog, my question for you is how can we effectively market TDM as vital to national security? Is an appeal to patriotic nature of ridesharing or bicycle commuting overreaching?

Thanks for listening,
CHRIS HAGELIN

Are the declines in carpooling significant?

Use of commute alternatives continues to fall according to new State of the Region report released by Southern California Association of Governments (SCAG) released on January 5, 2006. SCAG reports that "Between 2000 and 2004, carpooling share of work trips dropped by almost 3 percent with corresponding increases in drive-alone commuting."

Using the data from the American Community Survey for 2004 for some select MSAs, it appears that LA isn't alone. However, only three other of the MSAs shown below had a statistically significant change (decrease) from 2003. Three MSAs appeared to show INCREASES in carpooling - Salt Lake City, San Diego and Tampa Bay MSAs - but those changes also are not statistically significant. An * indicates that the estimate is significantly different (at a 90% confidence level) than the estimate from the most current year. The bottom line is that communities should use care when examining these changes from one year to the next. Long term trends may be more revealing.



It would be interesting to compare changes in travel behavior based on the investments made in those options. But that's a topic for another post.

GMC Pad - a response to long commutes and high housing prices

Thinking out of the box or just moving it? Instead of moving the commuter to work, move the commuter AND his home to work. Autoblog reports that General Motors' GMC Pad , winner of the California Design Challenge, is an "urban loft with mobility, or a modern alternative for those priced out of Southern California’s escalating housing market.” Talk about taking your work home with you. The Pad is "where you live, where you work, or merely where you want to be. Whether located in walking distance from your job @ TBWA\Chiat\Day, spending a couple evenings along PCH, or wintering at Mammoth, with the GMC PAD, home is where you want it. And commuting is what other people do." With the PAD, your LA Adventure is your next stop. It’s where you live, where you work, or merely where you want to be. Whether located in walking distance from your job @ TBWA\Chiat\Day, spending a couple evenings along PCH, or wintering at Mammoth, with the GMC PAD, home is where you want it. And commuting is what other people do."

Looks like the solution is to throw everything AND the kitchen sink at improving the commute. "The Pad also features onboard fuel and water supplies that can last weeks or even months thanks to onboard resource management technology, and while you’re waiting for the water to run out you have Direct TV, OnStar, XM, and Satellite Wi-Fi to keep you company."

Will the Pad qualify for Household Only Vehicle lanes?