Friday, August 14, 2009
Bike Coalition will lead guided SF commutes
With the threat of a BART strike looming, the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition will turn lemons into lemonade (ish) with a "Bike the Strike" campaign beginning Monday morning.
What: Three "Commuter Convoy" rides on Monday morning to help groups of bicyclists find the best route into downtown. The SFBC will also staff an all-day information station at the corner of Battery and Market Streets in the Financial District to provide bicycle map and resource information to who are interested in bicycle commuting.
Where: Commuter Convoys will depart the Glen Park, Balboa Park and 24th Street BART Stations
When: 8:30am Monday
Why: More than 70,000 daily BART trips—almost a third—occur within the city of San Francisco. 70 percent of all car trips in the city are under two miles long, a distance easily traveled by bike.
Get a jump start: During rush hour this afternoon, SFBC volunteers will be distributing bicycling information outside the Powell and Montgomery BART stations to provide southbound commuters with help and information on how to commute by bicycle on Monday morning.
Ed note: Could we please get a bike lane on the new Bay Bridge for just this sort of eventuality?
| Aug 14 at 05:13 PM
Web roundup
It's hard to keep up with all of the environmental news, so each Friday TGL brings you a quick roundup of the most significant stories not otherwise covered on SFGreen.
• Research has shown that warming climate has increased hurricanes—but a new study questions those findings, New York Times
• First there were forged letters from the coal lobby, now the oil lobby's got a national strategy to fake opposition to cap-and-trade, Guardian
• What exactly is a "known" carcinogen, and can a strong lobby change the definition? The ongoing battle over listing styrene, SacBee
• Golf courses use—and save—a lot of water, New York Times
• California green building code will take effect this month, SacBee
| Aug 14 at 01:33 PM
Clinton urges universities to go green
Critics of Bill Clinton got a bitter pill when the silver fox heroically rescued two Bay Area journalists from politically motivated 12-year sentences in North Korea.
Clinton triumphant
The Southern charm was back! And it was in full force in a recent speech the former president gave to another group of presidents: the American College & University Presidents' Climate Commitment.
"For all the good we're doing, we're just piddlin' compared to what we could be doing," he said of the university presidents' efforts to green their campuses. "All this work is out there laying on the ground, begging to be done with absolutely certain rate of return."
Established in 2006, the Presidents' Climate Commitment has, up to now, been largely talk.
Supporters of the former president's call to arms, which comes as part of his work with the Clinton Climate Initiative, argue that retrofitting old college buildings for efficiency would bring huge savings, though new green buildings meet with more fanfare. They also make the case that taking action on campuses that generate important research on climate change and energy efficiency would add "credibility to [those] scientific findings."
Another credibility problem is that the nation's leading universities are conspicuously absent from the project's list of signatories. The University of California system is among the most prestigious participants.
| Aug 14 at 01:02 PM
Locals try 'Low-Car Diet'
In San Francisco, we have the benefit of two car-sharing services, which allow residents to forgo car ownership without giving up driving altogether.
Zipcar, the only nation-wide service, hit some stumbling blocks recently about whether its mission is actually green, or whether it seeks to increase driving by recruiting transit-riders and walkers. (City CarShare is a local nonprofit, whose per mile fee is the source of some green pride.)
But Zipcar's national Low-Car Diet—a month without driving a privately owned car—sought to sway would-be drivers to the car-sharing ideal. The last day of the challenge was yesterday. I asked a few participants about their experiences.
Tali Fischer
San Franciscan Tali Fischer, who does PR for the video games industry, was a long-standing transit rider. But she and her husband had just had a baby, which, she said, "made it clear that we need to have access to a car once in a while. But we still live in the city, in a place where parking is near impossible or ridiculously expensive."
What was your overall experience of giving up car ownership? Easy or hard? Are you going to do it permanently?
We actually didn't own a car here in San Francisco. We just took the bus everywhere and with a newborn in tow it was starting to be a real pain. We were seriously considering car ownership but Zipcar made it so we didn't have to buy one when living in the city...Unfortunately, we are moving outside of the city to an area that has no Zipcar so it looks like we will have to actually buy a car.
The other huge benefit for us was being able to drive all the different cars Zipcar has to offer. It really helped us to decide and evaluate the kind of car we want to buy. We know what works for us and what doesn't, which car can fit a stroller and all of our grocery bags...and even which car is a gas guzzler and which one is most efficient.
What was the high point of your experience?
The high point was just the convenience of being able to get things done without it being a huge financial drain. There was no ordeal everytime we needed a car of heading out to some far off location where there was car rental and paying a fortune in liability insurance and parking. It made our apartment hunting so much easier. It made shopping for mega-packs of diapers and formula so much easier. Basically, it made life easier and much cheaper.
If I had to pick one high point it would be finding the new place we are moving into. The ad went up on Craigslist and thanks to Zipcar, we hopped into the car immediately and ran off to see it. By that night we had the application in. Without Zipcar, there is no way it would have been that easy to do.
What was the low point of your experience?
I can't really say I had one. I mean...it is hard to have a negative experience out of something so easy. It really was pretty simple.
How many hours a week did you use a Zipcar?
That depended entirely on the week. Sometimes we didn't need one at all and others we would take one out for a whole afternoon. It really varied immensely.
Did you save money, break even, or lose money vs. car ownership?
At the end of the day, owning a car can cost you upwards of $600 a month (car payments, parking at home, parking at work, gas, insurance). Zipcar would cost us maybe $40 a week if we took a car out for a weekend afternoon. We totally saved money.
San Francisco attorney Natalie Leonard lives in a co-housing complex in Berkeley, where 29 others also participated. She saw the "diet" as "a chance to focus on what's good about being green, not what I'm giving up."
What was your overall experience of giving up car ownership? Easy or hard? Are you going to do it permanently?
Giving up a car was like trying a new sport: It was easy once I had the right equipment to do it—lots of maps, 511.org, sensible shoes, and little foldup bags to tuck in my purse. The hardest part was asking people in the East Bay to walk or take the bus to events with me. There's lots of peer pressure to avoid the bus!
What was the high point of your experience?
A date to Cayuga Park with beautiful sculptures—a place I never would have found but for a special someone thinking of a car free picnic idea. Visiting old law school friends on BART.
Or going to the Transbay Terminal to take the bus from Freight and Salvage. I explained that I hadn't taken the bus from there before and that I was doing the Zipcar Diet. They laughed, took a picture, and the bus driver sat me up front with her and told me hilarious stories about learning to ride the bus. I laughed all the way and got dropped off right by the concert hall. It's also really beautiful to drive over the bridge from up high on BART.
What was the low point of your experience?
Trying to take a quick trip to the South Bay on transit. Zipcar was better there.
Also, getting a 100 pound kitchen cart delivered to my work and having to roll it home on BART and a dolly! I should have used a Zipcar pickup!
How many hours a week did you use a Zipcar?
Just for little errands.
Did you save money, break even, or lose money vs. car ownership?
I definitely saved money and exercised more.
Josh Emrick and his girlfriend Meg chose to ditch their car when moving to the Outer Sunset from auto-centric Flint, MI.
Josh and Meg
What was your overall experience of giving up car ownership? Easy or hard? Are you going to do it permanently?
Moving across the country was such a big change in itself that giving up my car didn't feel so difficult. Looking back on my life as an undergraduate, a car was not a necessity, it was a luxury. As long as I can (probably as long as I live in the Bay Area) I will be car-free.
What was the high point of your experience?
I would say the high point of my experience was being in a place in the country that has good public transportation and where owning a car is not necessary. Unfortunately such was and is not the case in Flint, MI, where due to the (auto-centric) history of the city, public transportation is not typically utilized by those other than the lower class.
What was the low point of your experience?
The low point of my experience was realizing that both public transportation and Zipcar are not flawless, and issues arise when using either. If a [user] is running behind and one is becoming late then I would advise using some stress coping mechanisms as opposed to becoming frustrated!
How many hours a week did you use a Zipcar?
I used Zipcar 3 hours a week on average. However, I would have used Zipcar less frequently had I not been provided with a generous credit. I am grateful, however, as I was able to explore Marin County and the City weekly.
Did you save money, break even, or lose money vs. car ownership?
I saved money, hands-down, using Zipcar compared to leasing, maintaining, and using my own personal vehicle.
| Aug 14 at 12:04 PM
Thursday, August 13, 2009
What to do if BART strikes
BART management and the union representing train operators and station agents are battling it out, with the union saying it may strike as soon as tomorrow. [Update: The union plans to strike Sunday at midnight.]
[Update 2: For more information on the union and management's disagreements and the terms of the imposed working conditions, read this Streetsblog post.]
While this is certainly not good news for anyone who lives on one side of the bay and works on the other, there are viable ways to make the trip without BART.
First suggestion: Don't drive. It's not green to drive on a good day, and it certainly won't be green to sit in a parking lot with the other 60,000 additional drivers a BART strike would bring to transbay corridor. John Goodwin of the MTC told me, based on some back-of-the-envelope calculations, that about 30 percent of that additional traffic would occur during the peak periods of 5 - 9 a.m. and 3 - 7 p.m., which is roughly 5,000 additional cars per hour. The Bay Bridge has a maximum capacity of 10,000 vehicles an hour and is already full at peak times. End result: delays of at least a half an hour starting at 6 a.m. and building to 60 to 90 minutes, spilling over onto most major connector roads, including 101, 80, 580, 880 and 24.
By some very rough calculations of my own (using numbers provided here [pdf]), that's an additional 85 tons of carbon dioxide emissions per day.
So what can you do? AC Transit has a number of transbay lines which mainly leave San Francisco from the Transbay Terminal at Mission and 2nd Street. Route F goes to the UC Campus; FS and J hit Berkeley proper. There are lines to El Cerrito and Alameda and, of course, Oakland.
Swimming isn't exactly an option, but Blue and Gold ferries run between Fisherman's Wharf and the Ferry building and Oakland's Jack London Square and Alameda. [added]
If none of these routes will get you where you are going, ask your employer about telecommuting or working non-traditional hours until the strike is resolved.
If you absolutely have to travel by car, avail yourself of casual carpooling. You can share a ride with others going in either direction. Morning pickups occur between 6 and 9 a.m. (sometimes later, depending on the location), and afternoon from 3:30 to 7 p.m. S.F. pickups are near the Transbay Terminal, on Beale between Howard and Folsom. East Bay pickups are numerous. Note: Carpooling etiquette says any conversation should be initiated by the driver.
511.org also has a rideshare organizing portal.
Even if BART doesn't strike, you might consider looking into some of these options to see if they work for you. They might even save you money or time.
In the event of a BART strike, chances are you'll be getting to know this building.
| Aug 13 at 02:26 PM
Clunkers program excluded real clunkers
It was easy enough to read over in the complex legal language of which cars qualified for the Cash for Clunkers incentive, but vehicles built before 1984 were excluded.
Why, when these jalopies (which is, by the way, a synonym for clunkers) are precisely the kind of cars ostensibly targeted by such programs (including California's program buying any running old car)? They pollute as much as 400 times more than newer vehicles with catalytic converters and are often only on the road because their owners can't afford a new(er) car.
Those same owners, desperate to keep their jalopies afloat, are routinely gouged on the price of replacement parts. And the people who sell those parts are the ones who lobbied to have pre-1984 cars excluded. The Specialty Equipment Market Assn., which represents 7,000 car parts makers, thought the program would hurt the market for used and specialty parts.
The lobby prefers the term "classic car" to jalopy, but the exclusion didn't actually help classic car collectors. Firstly, most cars worth collecting sell for significantly more than the $4,500 maximum Cash for Clunkers incentive. And, secondly, if the owner of a collectible car opted to give it over to the government, the value of similar cars would go up.
On the other hand, there are people like Dan Baker, a part-time handyman in South Carolina, who's trying to sell what the LA Times describes as "a brown 1980 Oldsmobile Cutlass SS with a broken air conditioner and rusty fenders" for $1,200.
"It's just an old car with 101,000 miles on it," said Baker. "It is not a classic."
California exempts pre-1975 vehicles from smog inspections, as a result of pressure from the same lobby.
Average people breathing smog and being turned away for help to protect a special interest group: Now that's bad governance.
| Aug 13 at 01:05 PM
Wednesday, August 12, 2009
Military plans for climate change
Military and intelligence groups are increasingly planning for the effects of climate change, according to the New York Times, in keeping with a recent plea from a board of retired generals.
Among the effects experts are eying are: religious conflicts sparked floods of refugees, contagious diseases, the loss of bases due to storms (like Homestead Air Force Base, which was destroyed by 1992 Hurricane Andrew) and rising sea levels, which especially threaten bases on atolls.
Diego Garcia, an atoll in the Indian Ocean, serves as a logistics hub for U.S. and U.K. forces in the Middle East.
| Aug 12 at 12:33 PM
Feds skewed Clunkers results
Edmunds.com
This SUV was the biggest beneficiary of the Cash for Clunkers program
An analysis of purchasing data conducted by Edmunds.com found that the top models purchased under the Cash for Clunkers program were not small foreign cars as government data suggested, but SUVs.
The government data separates models by engine and transmission type; Edmunds does not. Using this method the top 10 models purchased were:
- Ford Escape
- Ford Focus
- Jeep Patriot
- Dodge Caliber
- Ford F-150
- Honda Civic
- Chevrolet Silverado
- Chevrolet Cobalt
- Toyota Corolla
- Ford Fusion
In other words, half of the top 10 vehicles purchased were trucks or SUVs
. Because the Ford Escape, Honda Civic, Chevrolet Silverado, and Ford Fusion purchases include hybrid electric versions, the Edmunds rankings may slightly obscure hybrid sales. The government method, however, tends to underrate truck and SUV sales because most models come in both 2WD and 4WD versions and, as a result, their sales numbers were split.Trucks were also subject to lower fuel efficiency standards under the program, and analysts were initially surprised not to find more gas-guzzlers on the top 10 list. Seems the government stacked the deck to make its program look more environmentally sound than it is.
(H/T j.leader for the tip)
| Aug 12 at 11:44 AM
Tuesday, August 11, 2009
Health care and energy reforms
The conservative disinformation campaign surrounding the attempt to reform our health care system—which costs more and has worse outcomes than that of any other developed country—has reached new lows. Shortly before she called for a civil debate, Sarah Palin wrote this:
The America I know and love is not one in which my parents or my baby with Down Syndrome will have to stand in front of Obama's "death panel" so his bureaucrats can decide, based on a subjective judgment of their "level of productivity in society," whether they are worthy of health care.
Let's be clear: there is no "death panel" in the reform package, nor is there anything even remotely resembling what Palin describes. This disinformation attempts to drum up fear in the uneducated and sick in order to defeat a long-overdue reform. It's an affront to the intelligence and morality of every American.
The charges being lodged against the Waxman-Markey energy reform package by the same conservatives for the same reason—to prop up an industry whose greed has caused it to fall behind in a changing world—are not quite as horrifying, but they, too, attempt to scare the vulnerable into voting against their own interests. Here's but one of many discrepancies between rhetoric and reality. (Source: Campaign for an Energy-Efficient America)
Rhetoric: In response to the Congressional Budget Office's forecast that the Waxman-Markey legislation would cost the average American family an affordable $175 in higher energy costs in 2020, a spokesman for House Minority Leader John A. Boehner (R-Ohio), said that the CBO analysts "got an unrealistically low number for cost per family."
Reality: Had the CBO analysis considered savings from energy efficiency—which it did not—its forecast would have shown a net energy savings per household, not the higher costs alleged. According to a report released last week by the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy (ACEEE), most economic assessments of climate change policies, including the CBO assessment, either ignore or greatly understate the potential advances in energy efficiency — the fastest and most cost-effective way to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The report also finds:
• Energy efficiency can provide up to one-half of the greenhouse gas emissions reductions most scientists say are needed between now and 2050.
• Efficiency can mean substantial energy bill savings for consumers and businesses—reaching $2 trillion by 2050.
• Instead of taking jobs away from the economy, efficiency measures will yield a small but net positive gain in economic growth.
The ACEEE study's results are compatible with those of consultant-to-the-Fortune 500 McKinsey and Company. But there's something besides untruth that unites conservative opposition to health care and energy reform: The Waxman-Markey bill, by providing an economic impetus for the U.S. to move away from coal as a primary source of electricity, would directly improve the health of millions of Americans. Many of the chronic illnesses, such as asthma, linked to particulate pollution are the same ones that are overburdening our health care system.
When things make sense, they make sense. When opponents have to resort to absurd lies about "death panels" to justify their stance, it's because they don't have a reasonable leg to stand on.
| Aug 11 at 12:56 PM
Brothers & Sisters stars plug waterless car wash
Domestic scenes abound in ABC's quality dramedy Brothers & Sisters, whose cast includes legendary actors Sally Field and Rachel Griffiths, along with relative newcomers Matthew Rhys and Dave Annable.
But you may not get any wet and soapy car wash scenes with these hunky actors, because Rhys and Annable are doing PR for Lucky Earth car wash products. It's a small move in the green direction, to be sure, but one Lucky Earth product allows you to wash your car without water. The others are "non-toxic, biodegradable" cleansers for interiors and tires and the like. I have doubts about the politics of making driving seem less environmentally destructive than it is, but I suppose every little bit helps.
An at-home car wash can use up to 140 gallons of water. The Lucky Earth product is spray-on, wipe-off (maybe it should be Ralph Macchio endorsing it?). If you've tried the waterless wash, tell us in the comments if it works. In either case, a commercial car wash uses less water than the hose-it-yourself version.
Lucky Earth
Rhys and Annable
| Aug 11 at 12:25 PM
