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January 3rd, 2007
12:04 am - Sometimes I feel like my only friend is the city I live in
Looking over at the floor, I see  this, and I am reminded of earlier crankiness.
I picked up this book quite a while ago, started reading it in the car, then put it down in the trunk at some point and forgot it. When I had the unfortunate SUV incident in August and emptied the trunk before I waited on his insurance to get an estimate, it reappeared, and so I took it to Mexico with me, and read it.
The author says he will present another side to the debate, the one less heard, and asks the reader's forbearance in forming an opinion. Fair enough. He then presents an argument based on the prniciples of libertarianism, which I can appreciate, and supported by statistics gathered by people such as Wendell Cox, who I can't. If Godwin's Law says invoking Hitler ends a debate, then Brashear's Law says if you cite Wendell Cox, you can keep your garbage.
In any case, he pans the Portland plan based on managed growth, higher density and public transit, saying growth has been pushed into nearby Washington areas. There may be truth to that. It doesn't suggest growth can't be managed, necessarily; after all, government's always-expanding hand could after all, simply expand. But that's not my point, and while he does briefly address my thoughts, he quickly moves away, without even dismissing them.
- The cost of pollution isn't accounted for when you buy gas, and can't be given that every vehicle will carry more, or less, with that fuel. He suggests some libertarians suggest the use of pollution credits, and then says nothing more.
- The usual tripe about "just buy everyone a car, it's cheaper than transit subsidies" comes out, veiled slightly. Great. When you're too old or too young to drive, who will drive you?
- Likewise, yes, driving is faster, but I can't reasonably read a book, work, or anything else while driving. I may not be able to on transit either, depending on how I commute, but it's at least possible. And if you gut your transit system to rush-only trips you force even some people who could and would reasonably use it out, if they work even slightly odd hours.
So, for freedom of choice, we are to suffer without choices. It's ok to subsidize highways, infrastructure for more homes, but man, do anything to encourage people who wish to live in a manner which is sustainable to them (remember, not everyone *can* drive) and someone will scream about the money being taken from them.
If you want to borrow the book, ask. It wasn't worth whatever I paid for it.
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Comments:
![[User Picture]](http://p-userpic.livejournal.com/69491904/4346876) | | From: | ![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) clunis |
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| Date: | January 3rd, 2007 02:15 pm (UTC) |
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As a resident of Michigan I'd give just about anything for a transit system -- decent or otherwise. I happen to live in Ann Arbor which has the best bus system in the state but I can't get to the airport or Detroit or Lansing or my preferred grocery store without a car. It sucks.
Of course, I *can* still walk down to the end of my street and get on a train to Chicago (The Wolverine). Isn't Wendell Cox the "down with Amtrak" guy?
Wendell Cox will periodically write to various newspapers with anti-transit crud. Anti-Amtrak is one of those. There's also "only New York City is dense enough to support transit" and some other stuff.
"Pollution credits?" Let me guess: "Since the person over here is doing such a great job of cutting down on pollution through their own efforts, give them some money so you can buy some of his credits so you can have enough and declare you are cutting down on pollution too!" I know it actually goes on, and doesn't work towards the goal of cutting back on pollution even more. It's like buying some credits off of the person who studied really hard and got an A, while you didn't and got a D, so you can raise your score to a C. The problem still exists. The exchanging of pieces of green paper will not lead to less amounts of pollution and a safer and healthier world.
And I agree with you on the subsidizing of highways, et al, being seen as wonderful and right, while doing the same thing for Amtrak and public transit is seen as awful. It's all about the semantics. I have yet to hear (outside of a planning class or a group of people sharing my point of view) that highways and the airline industry are subsidized. I never hear Amtrak and public transit are being funded.
The suburban model is not sustainable in the long run. It takes lots of cheap energy (i.e. oil) to exist. Without it suburbia is dead.
Having to pay to pollute makes it have a cost, which means basically there becomes financial incentive to fix the problem.
If the cost of paying for the pollution credits is less than the cost of doing what you need to do to reduce pollution, then the financial incentive is not there.
The whole point is they're supposed to reflect the cost of the pollution.
I didn't realize until fairly recently how heavily AAA is into lobbying --- not just pro-automobile but ANTI-transit and ANTI-pollution controls: http://www.nrdc.org/amicus/01win/aaa/aaa.aspOf course, I found this out about two days after I wrote the check to renew my AAA membership. Sigh.
![[User Picture]](http://p-userpic.livejournal.com/12396679/522601) | | From: | gwenix |
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| Date: | January 4th, 2007 09:26 pm (UTC) |
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The usual tripe about "just buy everyone a car, it's cheaper than transit subsidies" comes out, veiled slightly. Great. When you're too old or too young to drive, who will drive you?
Oddly, I've been thinking about this line a lot recently. I always wish I had the chance to respond, "So, by that argument, you want blind people to drive?" I just don't actually understand that argument for just that reason. It makes no sense.
Of course, I work with a blind person now, and worked with two blind people at my last employment. So perhaps I am more readily acquainted with the fact that blind people also need to do things that require public transportation, like, say, get to work. |
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