Energy Independence and Public Transport

From Daily Kos

by BruceMcF
Mon Jul 24, 2006 at 03:19:20 PM PDT

All to often, the idea of Energy Independence has its priorities reversed. Scratch under the surface, and all too often the question lurking is, "How can we get as close as possible to Energy Independence without any real changes in the way we live and move?"

Stop and think about that ... really think about it, with your heart instead of your habits of thought. People - good people - are fighting and dying right now in Iraq in an failing occupation, following a successful invasion ... in pursuit of a continued Energy Dependence policy.

In your heart, do you think that is a fair price to pay? If you do, do not read any further.

* BruceMcF's diary :: ::
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The Real Question

The real question is, "What changes do we need to make to the way we live and move to accomplish Energy Independence?"

I have already sketched out the dimension of the problem on another site, starting with Real Energy Independence. We rely in imports for about 27% of our total energy needs ... and that is a value that is rising, as our total domestic energy supply has been stable, and our energy use has been rising.

So what does this mean? We either need to:
* make every single thing 37% more efficient (that is, 100/73, so we can do with 73% what we do now with 100%)
* make three quarters of our energy use 56% more efficient
* make half of our energy use 117% more efficient
* make one third of our energy use 555% more efficient

In other words, the narrower the range of things we change, the more radical the change has to be.

Now, we can make some headway on this by increasing our domestic energy supplies. For example, if Germany, with much higher population density, can obtain more than 3% of their electricity supply from wind, it does not seem impossible for the US to obtain 10% or more. Also, as discussed in another site, domestically grown biofuels ... if they are Bone Fide biofuels, and not Hoax Biofuels like corn-starch-ethanol ... can stretch our crude-oil based fuel supply.

But everything gets much, much easier if we make big gains in a big energy using industry. And that is why I have been focusing on Transport.

This diary focuses on public transport, because private transport is where so much of the problem lies.

Where Is The Feedback Loop?

If something seems like it is going headlong in one direction, without anybody deciding that it has to go that way ... the first step to understanding it is to ask, where is the positive feedback loop?

A positive feedback loop means that the consequence of a driving force has its own impact, which amplifies the driving force.

If something that seems like an obvious solution seems to keep getting stalled, never getting off the ground ... the first step to understanding it is to ask, where is the negative feedback loop?

A negative feedback loop means that the consequence of a driving force has its own impact, which undermines the driving force.

A lot of things built on a positive feedback loop seem to just "go on their own", without anybody doing the driving. They are self-amplifying. And a lot of things based on a negative feedback loop seem to just "run out of gas", without anybody standing in their way. They are self-braking.

One benefit of looking for positive and negative feedback loops is to protect us from going overboard in seeing a conspiracy behind every bush (or maybe that is a conspiracy behind every Bush).

To be sure, people do conspire. However, the burden of proof is on the conspiracy theorist, so it is important to rule out non-deliberate explanations anyway, even if only to strengthen the case.

And more importantly, when you find the aspect of the problem that is not a conspiracy, then nobody is doing that particular part of the problem on purpose. Any substantial change will generate opposition. A modest change that helps turns off a positive or negative feedback loop can therefore be a very strategic change to accomplish.

What are the private transport feedback loops

How did we get so dependent on a single form of transport? No human society has been this dependent on any single form of transport other than walking.

Positive feedback loop: Buy a car. Now there is another car on the road. That increases congestion. Too much congestion leads to demand for more expressways. More expressways mean people can settle further away from work. The further you live from work, the more miles you drive each day. The more miles everyone drives, the more congestion there is. The more congestion there is, the more demand there is for more expressways.

Negative feedback loop: Buy a car. Costs include operating costs and overheads. Public transport charges users for operating costs and overheads. You have an incentive to drive whenever feasible. Public transport overheads are spread across fewer fares, so fares are put up and/or services reduced. More users are encouraged to buy a car.

Positive Feedback Loop: Suppose higher income people are more likely to buy cars. Retailers want to attract these people. They offer free parking, which means paid for by all shoppers whether they need a parking space or not. The parking around retail outlets increase the walking distance. This makes people who can afford them more likely to buy a car.

How Do You Decide to Fight A Feedback Loop

The very, very first thing to bring into this self-interest. For people who like to drive, everything that forces people to drive makes everyone's life more miserable. More traffic congestion, more difficulty finding a parking space, and in places with "plenty" of parking, an endless walk to get from the car to the front door.

This is not about denying people the freedom to choose, it about providing them with the freedom to choose.

And, ultimately, We Americans Decide The Price of Our Gas when we decide how much we are going to burn up. The present high price of gas is demand and supply. We don't have substantial supplies to bring onto the market, so all we can do to push the price down is to take demand off the market.

Every single driver in America that does not want to pay $5, $7.50 or $10 per gallon should be cheering for as much to be done as quickly as possible to seduce some other American into using public transport.

Now, take that and add on top the tragedy of the oil being purchased with the blood of our men and women overseas, and it is not hard to want to change the driving forces. But only if we think about it ... with our hearts, as well as with our heads.

How Do You Fight A Feedback Loop

If we decide to fight these feedback loops, some straightforward steps are possible. I'm going to focus on one.

Now, the roadwork loop works in part by diverting funds into roadworks. If we set up our budget system so that funding public transport routes fights with funding roads for cars, then roads will win.

So flip that around. Bring public transport funding along for the ride. In particular, we can borrow to build public transport routes, as long as those routes are used ... because that investment will reduce our Energy Dependence, help reduce gasoline prices, and overall be good for our economy.

So, for every $1 in federal funding going to roads, $0.10 is allocated to the National Public Transport Fund. The money is allocated on a per-capita basis, for every country and each incorporated town or city. Under very simple rules, they can drawn on the fund so long as:
* they are devoting an equal amount from their own resources
* the infrastructure is used by public transport
* the infrastructure is not used by private transport

This harnesses the roadworks positive feedback loop to fight the vicious circle of declining patronage. The key is the per-capita allocation. The infrastructure subsidy is highest per rider in exactly those places where the viscious circle bites the deepest.

It also helps fight the income-segregation loop. There is a reason why dedicated-route systems attract higher-income riders on average than ordinary buses. A regular city bus that shares the road travels at the speed of traffic, when moving. And on top of that, it stops and starts for passengers. So a regular city bus is always slower than traffic. dedicated route system (Bus Rapid Transit, Light Rail, Monorail, Subway, High-Capacity Rail etc.), on the other hand, is not slowed down by traffic.

People on public transport because they cannot afford the alternative have to take whatever is available. People with higher incomes will take public transport if it offers them a benefit over driving. And its a dedicated route system that can offer a quicker trip to some of these people.

But, public transport is not possible where I live because ...

Public transport is impossible because ... these suburbs are not designed for it. This is a common problem.

Over the long term, it is possible to "infill" development, using availability of mass transit to and between key locations are part of the process. These examples from the Sierra Club give an idea of how this "retrofitting" process might work.

However, in the short term, once you have the support for constructing the route, you can start from the congestion, out, and anchor the "outer end" of a dedicated public transport route in a park and ride parking lot. After all, the purpose of this is to pull traffic off the road, so the target riders can get to the parking lot.

And, indeed, once people get used to that, then a short bus ride to connect to the dedicated public transport route allows them to leave the car at home.

A dedicated public transport route is impossible because ... there is no place to put the route.

"We can't go at ground level because the Interstate is in the way, and it costs too much to dig a subway".

I know for a fact that this is never true, because the Aerobus technology allows the route to be suspended, using suspension cable rather than obtrusive monorails. Pylons in this system can be placed as far as 2,000 feet apart. The present commercial applications are in a pair of locations in China, connecting an island city center to the remainder of the city on the coast, and providing a transport corridor for a city at the fork of a river.

For a technology that can be used to bridge rivers, or get from the mainland to a neighbouring island, getting over an intervening Interstate Highway is a piece of cake.

I have to be careful here ... I am not presenting this as a magic one-size-fits-all solution. There are upsides and downsides to subways, heavy and light rail on the ground, monorail, elevated heavy rail, and suspended light rail. What I am saying is, this is proof that a dedicated route can be put through, so the question becomes how many options are there, and which one to put in.

And I'll go even further than that ... which ones to put in. Once you have people on public transport, they are potential riders for other types of mass transport. Provide the interchange stations and make sure that the fares and ticketing work together. For example, the Bilbao Light Rail system, which provides an interconnection to two different heavy rail lines, and gives access to the major tourist attraction in the city, the Guggenheim Museum.

Public transport is impossible because ... nobody will use it.

This is a common view, but it is based on a simple, basic misperception. Most parts of America depend very heavily on cars for a wide range of transport tasks. It is easy to think, "everyone uses cars" and ask the question, "what system can replace that for everybody?"

This is thinking in stereotypes, where "most" turns into "all" and "few" turns into "none". However, what we need to do is to think on the margin. Out there, somewhere in your town, suburb or city, is someone who is the most likely to switch to public transport.

We know they are there, because $3/gallon gas is increasing public transport use!

Will they switch if you make quicker and more convenient services available to them. Of course they will. Does that mean that, automatically, most people will follow along? No, of course not.

With the kind of changes we will be making in the next ten year (assuming we start changing at all), most will still be driving for most purposes. Relatively few will be using public transport for relatively few purposes.

We are making headway as long as that is a smaller majority driving for a a smaller majority of purposes.

Social Engineering Versus Social Development

What is the bottom line? The bottom line is that I have no idea how much progress we will make if we start trying. But trying clearly offers better hope for success.

And what is the present federal policy: by and large, failing to try.

I am not going to sketch out a transportopia for you here. However, if a community with 5% public transport reliance shifts to 10% ... that is progress. That shifts the incentives to developers to cater to that market. That shifts incentives to retailers to cater to that market.

And the impact of those shifting incentives may not be big ... but they are better present than absent.

And there is more than that modest argument. There is also the point that in some places around the country, trying a little harder will spark off a substantial positive feedback loop. A suburban shopping mall is worried that it is losing business to the traditional streetside shopping, and provides a free door to door shuttle bus to the light rail station ... so people who only used the light rail for commuting can now pop by the mall on the way home ... and the property values of residences convenient to the light rail line goes up ... and developers work out a way for higher density housing to attract a middle class family ...

Or maybe another and completely different positive feedback loop.

That's why the policy has to be across the board, nationwide, no matter what some expert says about "what is the efficient investment". Its necessary to push everywhere, because somewhere, and we do not know where, the transport system only needs a little push to get over a hill and start rolling down the other side on its own.