Transit rail’s ‘green’ effect
Because “most” transit-rail agencies supplement their systems with feeder bus services that often have low ridership, the systems still have high energy costs and greenhouse gas emissions per passenger mile, according to the study.
“Only a handful of rail systems are more environmentally friendly than a Toyota Pruis, and most use more energy per passenger mile than the average automobile,” according to Randal O’Toole, a senior fellow at the public policy research foundation.
His recommendations? Instead of pursuing rail projects, cities should power buses with alternative fuels, increase the concentration of buses on heavily used routes, build new roads, implement tolls and encourage drivers to purchase more fuel-efficient cars.
(Since this blog is intended to focus on transit rail’s role in reducing greenhouse gas emissions, I will refrain from commenting that building new roads seems to only attract even more people to those roads, not to mention there’s no way we can build highways fast enough to accommodate growing traffic. And, having driven on Illinois’ tollway just last weekend, I feel pretty confident in saying the tolls don’t appear to be reducing highway congestion. But that’s just my unasked opinion.)
I’m sure Mr. O’Toole has plenty of research and statistics to back his claims. But while we’re on the subject, I’ll relay some information that the American Public Transportation Association (APTA) released last month about transit’s ability to reduce greenhouse gases and conserve energy:
• Communities that invest in public transportation reduce the nation’s carbon emissions by 37 million metric tons annually — equivalent to the electricity used by 4.9 million households.
• A single person commuting alone by car who switches a 20-mile round trip commute to existing public transportation can reduce their annual CO2 emissions by 4,800 pounds per year, equal to a 10 percent reduction in all greenhouse gases produced by a two-adult, two-car household.
• By eliminating one car and taking public transportation instead of driving, a savings of up to 30 percent of carbon dioxide emissions can be realized.
• Public transit encourages efficient land use. Creating higher-density development allows for closer proximity to housing, employment and retail, thus reducing driving distances. With its over-arching effects on land use, public transportation is estimated to reduce CO2 emissions by 37 million metric tons annually.
Hey, how’s this for irony: APTA just emailed me a press release about Earth Day, which falls on April 22. Celebrate the day by taking the train or bus to work, or buy a Toyota Prius.
Posted by: 
Angela Cotey | Date posted: 4/16/2008
Comments
Posted by Dave Smith on 4/16/2008 7:43:18 PM
What Angela has overlooked is that the Cato study took into effect the fact that commuters still have to use personal transportation to go from home to railhead and back, while the APTA study omits this important variable. The length of the commute from home to office and back increases when commuters utilize transit vs the solo drive, unless one is lucky enough to live and/or work in close proximity to a transit station. Transit also requires a rigid schedule that may not conform to one's work schedule, or the need to run unscheduled errands. Commuters can multitask variations to their schedules much more efficiently with their own personal vehicles, while transit users must often backtrack after being dumped off at their station. Much like the now discredited ethanol mandate, these so-called "green" initiatives always produce unintended consequences which more often than not result in less "greenism" than the status quo. The bottom line is that transit works well for communal living environments (think Soviet Union), but is counterintuitive to a nation such as the USA predicated on individualism.
Posted by Chuck Welsh on 4/17/2008 10:29:28 AM
Commuter and light rail expansion reduces sprawl. Those who cannot see that are either inept or attempting to live on another planet. These people have the same mindset as those who deny that a Holocaust took place in Nazi Germany. #30
Posted by Larry Kaufman on 4/17/2008 11:08:59 AM
The Cato Institute is known for its Libertarian approach to public policy, and Dave Smith has jumped to be a cheerleader for its latest screed. A well-managed transit system does not run empty buses to/from rail transit points just for the fun of burning diesel fuel. They change bus routes to maximize ridership to/from the transfer points. The measure is total fuel consumed by bus and rail per rider. If more people are attracted to public transit then the carbon footprint will be reduced from what it otherwise would have been. Even GWB finally has acknowledged that carbon emissions should be reduced. Of course, he has offered no program to do so, choosing instead to call for voluntary action. For this, we don't need a President at all. Pardon the political screed, but those who oppose public transit will do so out of the same mindlessness that Bush approaches carbon emission reduction.
Posted by Dave Smith on 4/17/2008 7:22:10 PM
Chuck, do you have any facts to support any of your allegations? It seems to me that all the cities with such transit options continue to sprawl unabated. Can you point out a single transit city that has reduced de facto sprawl?
Posted by Dave Smith on 4/17/2008 7:38:45 PM
Larry, I am not the least bit suprised that you worship at the cult of man-made global warming. That certainly explains alot! For the record though (1)since 1998 the globe has cooled 0.1 degree C, and solar scientists to a man are predicting continued cooling due to a cyclical reduction in solar activity, (2) concurrent to Earth's warmup during the 1900's other planets in our solar system also experienced warming, indicating natural not man made causes, (3) CO2 is a small part of the greenhouse effect, and man's CO2 contributions amount to less than 1/11 of 1 percent of that effect, and (4) according to the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics, it is impossible for increased atmospheric CO2 to induce any exponentially increased warming - the effect, such as it is, can only be logarithmic, not exponential. So the real question is this: Why are we continuing down this economically destructive path of CO2 regulation when the REAL science says such actions will have no effect on global warming, or global cooling, or global anything? However, if Larry can articulate a scientific response which can prove that man's carbon footprint is causing unnatural variations in earth's climate, I'd be more than happy to listen with an open mind!
Posted by j nielsen on 4/18/2008 7:23:23 AM
The Cato Institue should investgate,realy investigate, the high cost of gasoline and oil. Your solution requires too much political effort and waste of money and eminent domain issues that the passengers would be the big losers. actually, we need to know what is really pushing the gasoline price up. Not the stuff that is in the daily mass media just to divert serious reporting and fact finding and keeping J. Q. Public in the dark or worse. Or is jusst plain greed and avarice.
Posted by Larry Kaufman on 4/18/2008 10:47:10 AM
Smith, you haven't the foggiest notion where or what I worship. Instead, you offer an ad hominem attack, followed by an incomprehensible locution designed to persuade us (GWB would really be proud of you -- probably would confer the Flat Earth Society award on you) that there is no global warming. At least I think that's what you were trying to do. I don't happen to live near a rail transit line, although one now is being built that I have every intention of using. (When I resided in the East, I did use rail commuter service daily; it was quite relaxing to arrive WTC relaxed and having read the WSJ and NYT.) I do see, when goving to hockey games, however, that the formerly full parking lots near the Pepsi Center in downtown Denver are half empty, while the RTD light rail has standing room only. And before you get off on public subidies and such, you're right, the service is subsidized. It is subsidized by the residents of six counties who voted to tax themselves for public transit, both bus and rail. That's called "democracy", I think. Replacing auto trips with one or two persons per car with more densely loaded public transit is good from a variety of perspectives, fuel consumption, traffic congestion, and carbon emissions being just three of them. Oh, by the way, with just two lines open, the Denver light rail system is exceeding all ridership projections. I'm sure that doesn't impress you a bit, as it conflicts with your dogma and other preconceived notions.
Posted by Robert Fryml on 4/19/2008 4:49:41 PM
A few years ago I remember reading an interesting story about electric cars. The item appeared in either the "Omaha World-Herald" or "The Wall Street Journal." This gist of the story was this. A vice president of the Ford Motor Company commuted to work each day - between his home in Ann Arbor, Mich. and his office in Dearborn -in a late model Ford F150 pickup truck. His vehicle was unique because it was powered entirely by electric batteries. This executive thought he was being virtuous by driving a "non-polluting" means of transportation; and had he been living in Seattle (where the bulk of the electric power used to charge those batteries comes from nuclear or hydroelectric sources) that would have been true. But don't you know that some educated wag in the scientific community saw the issue differently. After factoring in the coal used by Detroit Edison to charge those batteries, he actually would have pumped less CO2 into the atmosphere by commuting in a 4-cylinder Ford Contour -sized automobile instead. Yes, the Denver Light Rail is a wonderful conveyance; but for non-rush-hour times I've ridden it - and face it, that's the bulk of its schedules - the system generates a high number of empty seat miles. Is its existence really improving the air and the quality of life in Denver, or does it represent just a bigger pipe in the Denver RTD ("Rmidegional Tax Drain") budget?
Posted by Dave Smith on 4/21/2008 7:27:34 PM
Well, no one on my side of the issue is going to engage in ad hominem attacks. I'll just state a few of the more obvious observations: (1)Mr. Kaufman brought up the "carbon footprint" argument, not me. (2)Frankly, I think GWB is a fool for capitulating to climate fraud instead of fighting this nonsense. (3)One should note that one of the characteristics of a cult is an intolerance toward contrarian views, aka "the science is settled, global warming is really happening and is caused by man, and anyone who disagrees is paid off by Big Oil or is a denier, etc ad nauseum", (4)according to NASA et al, there has been no global warming since 1998, rather there has been a slight cooling trend, and solar scientists are predicting a continued cooling of average global temperatures. So yes, right now THERE IS NO GLOBAL WARMING! Whether this cooling continues or we have a reversal and start warming again I cannot say nor would I try to predict. Finally, (5)just once I'd like a transit promoter to admit that proposals for transit are simply a case of "keeping up with the Jones's". This notion that transit will aid in stopping global climate change (it won't) or will stop urban sprawl (it doesn't) or whatever lame excuse is used to force free people onto a "Metropolis"-style life style is anethema to folks like me who prefer personal liberties over communistic nurturing.
Posted by mike peters on 4/23/2008 11:20:00 PM
Build new roads? That would encourage people to drive and to forget about mass transit.
Posted by Brian Urlacher on 4/24/2008 1:03:23 PM
I want to echo the comment about the Cato Institute itself. To say that it's a Libertarian organization ranks right up there with asserting the Pope's Catholicism. As with many "think tanks," Cato has a huge axe to grind and masks it by the alleged impartiality conferred through being an Institute. Just like the American Enterprise Institute, the Hoover and the Heritage Foundation, right wing "academic" centers' main mission is to craft the language for the latest assault on civil society. In this case it's "Hey, those train thingys (which I guarantee you none of the Cato folks have ever been on) really aren't as green as you think!" Gosh, how convenient that this dovetails with a general desire not to gather and spend tax dollars to promote the general welfare. Promote the general welfare...didn't I read that phrasse somewhere? Probably in the Communist Manifesto.
Posted by Adron on 4/24/2008 2:46:42 PM
tsk tsk. There are yeahs and neahs on both sides of this argument. As for city that has reduced sprawl, just come to Portland, Oregon. We've reduced sprawl in almost every direction except in Vancouver, WA where all the fussy NIMBYs and such go running off to and then mooch off of Portland. But otherwise we have very high ridership of transit for our size. We've reduced carbon emmissions (but yeah, we still have problems with it) and for the most part Portland kicks every other city's tale in this way. Besides that it's a wonderfully beautiful city to live in. Don't believe me, come visit. I could go on for days, we have better beer, food, coffee... etc. Because of our general attitude here. But I digress. Want to know more check out the ole' blog at Transit Sleuth.com.
Posted by Jim Loomis on 4/27/2008 12:53:48 AM
The Cato Institute is a Libertarian backed organization. They will say anything and do anything to reduce the role of government, even when there is a demonstrable urgency for government intervention. These people will sacrifice any move toward a coordinated national rail system on the alter of ideology in a heartbeat.
Posted by Rashid Shaik on 4/28/2008 2:49:00 PM
Let's all get real. Where is the real estate to build roads. The only way is to double deck all freeways and that will hold up for a few years especially in California and other big cities. Then what ?
