Sustainable Transportation Blog

For almost a century, our transportation planning in North America has been premised on universal automobility, or, rather, the notion that it is universally aspired to. The car, possessing as it does a host of attributes considered desireable, commodious and sexy, is placed as the top of the hierarchy as the premium transportation mode. Our cities and all attendant functions and services are designed to facilitate cars, while below the automobile in status and practicality lie rail transit, busses, taxis, and then, finally, bicycles and walking. To be without a car is accorded such low status in our society that it can affect our self-worth, as illustrated in a recent Globe & Mail essay in which "Mom without Wheels" Bonnie Goldberg professed "pricks of hot shame" at not being able to drive her daughter to school.

However, if we want to move towards sustainability – universal mobility over the long run – we have to reverse this hierarchy of transportation modes. Active Transportation – walking, cycling and other physical forms -- offer the greatest environmental and social benefits in terms of emission savings, travel costs and personal and ecosystem health. Each of those savings is enormous as there are no real emissions or fuel costs and large benefits to health and to health care budgets associated with Active Transportation. The only costs are the relatively low investments in infrastructure that can have multiple uses for human access. Transit, car pooling and other shared usage strategies deliver the next level of benefits, particularly if these strategies involve grid tied transportation or future EV, PHEV or hybrid vehicles. Single occupancy vehicles (SOV) offer the least emissions reductions but even they can be competitive in scenarios where PHEVs and EVs are utilized. 

To make this new hierarchy apparent and viable, we need to serve the pedestrian, cyclist and transit rider so well and so lavishly that drivers will envy them. This may seem like it will require a massive cultural shift, but the fact is it is already underway.

One sign of this is that the marketing of bicycles is beginning to more closely resemble that of the automobile. For example, bicycles are now sold under the Cadillac brand, and the ad copy for them is every bit as colourful and seductive as that used for their cars: 

"Cadillac Bicycles provides a breakthrough line of bicycles and accessories to the client who values quality, style, performance, and luxury. Built with the finest materials and craftsmanship available, Cadillac Bicycles is the benchmark for a smooth, comfortable ride for a lifetime of cycling excitement. We combine traditional as well as innovative bicycle designs with classic styling and timeless finishes to form an elegant package with an instant brand recognition that stands for quality."

That the bicycle -- long disregarded in North America as a legitimate mode of transportation -- can now be associated with that most premium (and gas-guzzling) of automobiles is, perhaps, ironic; yet it also marks what may be a shift in consciousness regarding our transportation identities -- a sign that human powered vehicles can also be status symbols.

(This desire for luxurious human-powered vehicles has already taken what may be its most extreme [and whimsical] expression in a recumbent bicycle tricked out to look like a Cadillac that was featured at the 2008 Toronto International Bike Show).

Another sign that human power is getting more respect these days is the number of cities and hotels offering bikesharing programs aimed at boosting their tourism industries. According to the Globe and Mail, bicycles are the new "key to the city":

"As urban cycling gains in popularity, following the European example, cities and hotels are offering bike-sharing and bike paths – along with bikes as amenities for guests – as a way to attract visitors and open up a new tourism experience."

I (MD) recently experienced first-hand this new change in status. This past month I cycled through the rain to a conference held at the downtown Delta Hotel here in Winnipeg. I got off my bike and saw to my dismay that there were no bike racks and immediately started writing in my head an irate letter to the management of the hotel. As I began to lock it up to a sign post, the doorman came up to me and told me that I shouldn't lock it up there. I added a new paragraph to my mental letter.

"Are you staying in the hotel?" he asked through the rain.

My brain stopped writing for a moment. "I'm attending the conference."

"Well then, take your bike into the lobby, go to the desk and they'll check your bike in and store it for you."

Stunned, I wheeled my bike into the hotel lobby. Sure enough, the bellhop approached me, wrote out a number on a tag and passed it to me, and then, smiling, wheeled my bicycle away. The doorman then took my poncho, coat, rain pants, helmet and pannier, offered me another tag, and took them into the coat check. Dry, unencumbered and immensely pleased, I attended the day's sessions, never once worrying about the security of my bicycle, or bothered by having to carry around my gear.

Surely none of the delegates who drove the Delta that day were treated half as well!

Yes, there are signs of positive change, but the truth is that our automobile culture has been with us for over a century and will not go away quickly, even if we were to run out of oil tomorrow. The modes of transportation that provide the greatest public good, to say nothing of keeping people happy and healthy and out of the medical system, have for too long been ignored and misunderstood. The time has come to treat cyclists, walkers and transit users as the champions they are and that means providing them with the high quality infrastructure and services they need.

Michael Dudley and Arne Elias

For years there has been a relentless campaign against both light and heavy passenger rail transportation in the U.S.. In cities and states across the country when ballot initiatives to fund rail transportation are tabled there is invariably a heated debate fuelled by op-eds and position papers, many of which are drafted by fiscally conservative think-tanks such as the Reason Foundation. Rail opponents argue that rail will be too expensive, will not meet the needs of most Americans and will have a minimal impact on their ostensible goals, such as greenhouse gas reduction. Another common tactic is an appeal to faux populism:

"First, virtually nobody who’ll ride light rail could afford it if they had to pay the full cost. That’s right: people in rural Tennessee are paying for Charlotte to have a gilded trolley. Not only did the federal government have to kick in hundreds-of-millions of dollars for the project to have a chance of getting built, but everyone in town had to pay more for many of the things they bought. Even the state chipped in. This is a phenomenon known as 'concentrated benefits and dispersed costs' in which politicians and special interests collude to bring expensive goodies to an area in exchange for their votes, and then stick everyone else with the bill. (Thank you, Mr. Mayor.) "

While this is true as far as it goes, what rail opponents rarely acknowledge is that roads are also heavily subsidized, and no automobile driver comes close to paying the full cost for the roads on which they drive. Yet this argument remains a major element of the anti-rail arsenal, bolstered as it is by populist rage against government spending that continues to gain momentum, aided significantly by sympathetic conservative media, such as Fox News.

It is significant, therefore, that during the same week in which "teabagging" rallies took place across the United States, President Obama set out an ambitious program to build a national high-speed rail system. According to the Washington Post,

"Obama said that the money would be used for two things: to improve existing rail lines so that trains on them could go 100 mph or faster; and to identify and construct new rail lines in major corridors...In his remarks...Obama confronted critics who say the plans are too expensive, don't go far enough, or will shift resources away from the roads and airports. He dismissed all those concerns."

The CST concurs. Our position on Obama's proposal is completely supportive. If anything, he could be faulted for not asking for more. The proposed network will primarily be geared towards intercity travel, typically between 150 - 1000 km, so the speeds being proposed, while falling well short of Japanese standards, will be quite adequate to serve most destinations. We agree with the President that the arguments against it are easy to dispense with, even in lower density areas when high-speed rail becomes the prime mode of travel.

The proposal does however lack one major component: a continental strategy. Canada needs to take this opportunity to jump on the bandwagon. The time is right in every way - this is one of the best stimulus measures, it fits with current infrastructure led policy, offers existing and new industrial sector growth and is part of the natural evolution to low carbon travel (which incidently has large implications for utilities and renewables). The choice is the same - join in an emerging Advanced Green Economy (AGE) or sit on the sidelines.

However, President Obama and rail supporters across the nation (and continent) must now prepare for what will likely be an anti-rail campaign of unprecedented scale. Fiscally conservative analysts have been swift to post their responses: David Fredosso and Samuel Staley at Reason both argue that Obama's plans for high-speed rail will "go nowhere fast" primarily because, they argue, it will cost vastly more than he says it will, and will never be able to compete with air travel for cost and speed.

Like most megaprojects, American high-speed rail may well indeed cost much more than expected. However, Fredosso and Staley are basing their analysis on a very dubious assumption: that air travel will remain affordable -- to say nothing of even being viable -- into the future, when oil scarcity will probably drive most airlines out of business. In the rail debate to come, it will be essential to take a long view, rather than assuming present conditions will remain unchanged.

Trains are not an elitist form of transportation; they were once the primary means of long distance land-based travel for all levels of society. They only remain more expensive for lack of appropriate government subsidies equivalent to those lavished on roads and automobiles. The Obama announcement represents an opportunity to build a truly sustainable and socially equitable North American transportation system. However, to get there we may need to change the terms of this entire debate.

Michael Dudley and Arne Elias

Resiliency is being increasingly recognized as an essential factor for a sustainable society. In a paper on Resilience and Sustainable Development delivered to the World Summit on Sustainability in 2002, the authors state that

"Resilience, for social-ecological systems, is related to (a) the magnitude of shock that the system can absorb and remain within a given state, (b) the degree to which the system is capable of self- organization, and (c) the degree to which the system can build capacity for learning and adaptation."

Based on these criteria, it is apparent that our present auto-industrial society meets none of them. It has never been capable of self-organization but has always been driven by powerful elites, as well as being deeply dependent on government subsidies to remain viable. There has also been very little capacity shown by the domestic industry to learn and adapt, in contrast to some off-shore manufacturers. Until recently, the domestic industry -- while selling some smaller vehicles manufactured by off-shore OEMs -- has focused on building gas-guzzling behemoths against all evidence that this was folly, and many of us have been only too willing to buy them. Add to this the massive inheritance of built and legal infrastructure, and it becomes obvious that the auto-industrial society as a whole is very resistant to adaptation.

But clearly, it is concerning the first criteria that our present arrangements are revealed to be hopelessly ill-suited for long-term viablity. As we have seen, the auto-industrial society has been quite incapable of absorbing major shocks, be they from soaring energy prices or the subsequent economic meltdown, and neither government bailouts nor the "stimulus" packages aimed at resuming consumer "confidence" will effect the needed changes. Indeed, as many critics are pointing out, these interventions are little more than misguided -- and probably futile -- efforts to return to "normal."

But such a state may no longer even be possible. Sara Robinson, at the Campaign for America's Future, says that we can't "go back to normal."

"There is no going back. That future was foreclosed on right along with the houses and the banks. You can only believe in the Happy Face story if you willfully ignore the deep structural changes afoot in the way the world works -- the changes that have closed and locked the door back to "normal" behind us for good. There's a small number of overwhelmingly strong global trends that explain why all this stuff is breaking, and why just fixing it isn't even on the table. [W]hen we take full stock of the size and quantity of major moving parts in the machinery that's propelling us on toward the next future, it becomes very, very clear that going back to the 20th Century isn't anywhere among our current options."

Yet this appears to be the philosophy underlying the frantic efforts of the industrialized nations to re-start their economies: to go back to "normal." This is particularly true of the auto industry bailouts,which have effectively made the American and Canadian governments auto industries unto themselves. The two nations' governments have, despite some public opposition, used public money to provide short-term loans to General Motors and Chrysler, and taken the extraordinary steps of actually backing the auto makers' warranties, and in the case of President Obama, ordering GM's former CEO,  Rick Wagoner, out the door.

Konrad Yakabusk, writing in the Globe and Mail, believes that the bailouts undertaken by both the American and Canadian governments are weakened by a "policy paradox" -- that, despite these governments' professed interests in developing a "green" North American auto industry, it may not be possible to both save the industry and have green cars. The Japanese and Chinese auto makers are so far ahead of the "Big Three" that the North American industry will not be able to make electric and plug-in hybrid electric cars in the numbers needed and at a viable price point. The much lauded Chevy Volt, for instance, will be twice the cost of its Chinese counterpart. Yakabusk notes,

"The auto bailouts, for all their expediency, represent a case of government policy at odds with itself... Any move by Americans to smaller cars, much less electric ones, would leave the Canadian industry in straits even more dire than where it is
now."

Emma Rothschild argues in the New York Review of Books that the bailouts can only be justifiable if they were oriented to not boosting a doomed technological model, but rather to ending the "auto-industrial" society altogether:

"An enduring bailout, or a new deal for Detroit, would be different. It would be an investment in ending the auto-industrial society of the late twentieth century. This would involve innovation in public transportation, and in the infrastructure that would enable people to work at home or close to home. It would engage the information industries in making public transport more convenient, more enticing, and more secure. It would be an investment, even, in the old promise of 'automotive' freedom, of owning a car but not having to use it, and of being able to go anywhere at any time."

Such an investment in public transit would be an excellent start. But the auto bailouts are part of a larger problem. Like the Wall Street investment firms whose "toxic assets" interconnected with every aspect of the economy, so too is our auto-centric transportation system a "toxic" force that has distorted the economy, our built environment, and our social relations. We should simply never have become so dependent on a single industry or a single mode of transport.

The reality is that we live in “Motordom”, a car-dominated culture that will take many decades to change significantly, as we build out our public transit and redesign our cities for Active Transportation. While we are doing that, we face an ongoing major cultural shift away from personal vehicles, balanced with the very real need for these vehicles for the many areas that continue to be poorly serviced by other modes. Cars are likely to be here for the foreseeable future and therefore it becomes even more important that they are clean, efficient and appropriate -- even as we pursue policies to minimize and price their use. 

Therefore, instead of the bailout models currently being pursued, what is needed is an outcomes-based approach that would offer support to those businesses who could produce more sustainable personal transportation, rather than simply throwing more money at existing manufacturers who may or may not be able to produce the vehicles of the future. A per-unit subsidy aimed at innovative and smaller-scale manufacturers, or other capable companies such as Magna International, plus subsidies aimed at consumers to purchase the vehicles these companies would produce, would work to both meet "green" vehicle targets and to diversify the economy.

Whatever economy emerges from the present crisis must be one that is far more diverse, and made up of a varied range of entities filling a wider range of functions and connected to each other by more than just ribbons of asphalt. It may not produce profits for a select few, but overall such an economy be a lot healthier and resilient, and would also help to achieve a far more robust and livable transportation system.

Michael Dudley and Arne Elias

Sustainable Transportation is about how we move people and goods as if we plan on staying here for the long term. Follow The Centre for Sustainable Transportation's feature blogger, Michael Dudley, as he comments on moving towards green pastures, here.