Samantha,
"People said" no one would ever take a train or subway in LA too. You've done better before as the Devil's advocate.
DART says they had 10.3 million trips in May, 2008. Unless that's a fabrication, an average of 332,000 trips a day are made by transit for a city of 1.3 million people of all ages, or 13% of the total population without getting into the number of people actually making trips or transit trips originating outside the City of Dallas.
Saying only 2% of the population uses DART Rail belies the fact that this amounts to 39,000-65,000 daily trips on average (1.5-2.5%) in a broadly defined northeast-southwest corridor and Fort Worth - Dallas commuter line. This corresponds with using the City's population. Maybe when opened the Green Line will boost that percentage into the realm of statistical significance. To make rail relevant for the whole urban area you need more lines.
Harvey
The population of the Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex, which is served by DART, TRE, and the T, is approximately 6.3 million people. Most people do not use public transit because they don't live near them nor are they going where it goes. But they pay for it every time that they buy something that attracts sales tax.
As expected, a higher percentage of people who live near one of the rail or bus lines use the system if they are going where the tracks or bus routes go. And the number of riders on the three public transit systems in the Metroplex has increased significantly over the past year. But the percentage of people in the Metroplex who use public transit remains low. The North Texas Central Council of Governments reports that approximately two per cent of the Metroplex population uses public transit. Having lived in North Texas for more than 32 years, this squares with my experience.
Interestingly, approximately 40 per cent of the people who use the buses, as well as 20 per cent of those on the light rail line and 13 per cent on the TRE, are captive riders. They are low income people, for the most part, who do not have an alternative.
The opening of the Orange and Green lines will increase ridership on the light rail line. And DART will make a big to do about it. What they won't broadcast so loudly is the fact that a significant percentage of the new riders will be coming off buses that are re-routed to connect with the new rail lines as opposed to going downtown or to another end point. Nevertheless, the lines will attract new riders, especially if gasoline stays at $4 a gallon, until they can switch to more efficient vehicles or ones that are powered by alternative fuels.
The challenge for public transit in Texas is the pattern of our cities. They are spread out for a variety of reasons and lack the density that makes public transit, especially rail, a good option. To get a significant portion of the population to use public transit would require a massive shift in housing patterns and lifestyles. I am skeptical that it will happen, although some folks will move to town and some will move to new multiple dwelling units near the new rail lines.
I support rail where it makes sense. I was a strong supporter of DART, and I was involved in getting the referendum passed to bring it about. But the cost of light rail is high, and because the population densities are relatively low, the subsidy required to support it is high. I have concluded that while light rail is viable in some situations, primarily where traffic congestion makes building more highways cost prohibitive, rapid bus technology may be better suited for many if not most public transit environments in Texas.
Samantha wrote:You might be be correct. Or you could bewrong. No one knows for sure what tomorrow will bring. I am betting your prognosis is wrong. So are a lot of other people.
You might be be correct. Or you could bewrong. No one knows for sure what tomorrow will bring. I am betting your prognosis is wrong. So are a lot of other people.
Ok, on what evidence are you and "a lot of other people" using to assume that my prognosis is wrong? I honestly hope that my prognosis wrong too, but from the facts that we are looking at it is foolish at best and wreckless at worst to bet against it.
Before we wrap up this discussion I would like to recomend an interesting book that sums up my side of this argument, it is called:
The Long Emergency
by James Howard Kunstler
Copyright 2005
printed by Atlantic Monthly Press
ISBN 0-87113-888-3
There are other books about peak oil and its consequence but this one is by far the most interesting. Of course turn about is fair play Samantha, if there are any good books you can recomend to me that support your view that future technological advancements will save us all I would like very much to read them.
Thank you
Scott
Scott:
As the immediacy of Peak Oil is an important concern to you, evidenced by your citing James Howard Kunstler, what is your opinion regarding the 2700 BTU/passenger mile energy usage of Amtrak (equivalent to 46 passenger miles per gallon)?
For sake of argument, lets assume that every automobile is occupied by only one person. Is it your opinion that if everyone switched to a 46 MPG transportation conveyance, be it an Amtrak ride or a ride in a hybrid vehicle that this would save us from the consequence of Peak Oil or the Long Emergency?
Or do you believe that the fuel efficiency of Amtrak could be much better than 46 passenger miles per gallon by more people riding it or by technological changes such as streamlined lightweight trains? Or are you advocating widespread electrification of railroad lines and the required increased production electricity by coal or nuclear? France famously has the TGV as well as 80 percent nuclear electricity -- is this a viable path for the US?
Based on either a historical precedent or the experience of our European and Asian trading partners, what percentage of automobiles passenger miles do you believe can be substituted by transit and trains? If part of the effect of trains is to facilitate higher living densities, what reduction in overall passenger miles do you see by that effect?
In terms of taking action to deal with the Long Emergency and believing in technological fixes, Amory Lovins of the Rocky Mountain Institute believes the problem is real, and he is promoting a technological fix -- he believes that a lightweight carbon fiber hybrid automobile could achieve 200 MPG: so far he has conducted computer simulations, and I understand he is working on a prototype car. I don't have ready access to a copy of The Long Emergency so I will ask you -- does James Howard Kunstler have ideas on the correct response to Peak Oil in the transportation sector, and what does he see as the breakdown in passenger miles and fuel usage between modes now and in 20 years? Does he see major reductions in passenger miles through living patterns and what are those reductions?
If GM "killed the electric car", what am I doing standing next to an EV-1, a half a block from the WSOR tracks?
Samantha wrote: Interestingly, approximately 40 per cent of the people who use the buses, as well as 20 per cent of those on the light rail line and 13 per cent on the TRE, are captive riders. They are low income people, for the most part, who do not have an alternative. The opening of the Orange and Green lines will increase ridership on the light rail line. And DART will make a big to do about it. What they won't broadcast so loudly is the fact that a significant percentage of the new riders will be coming off buses that are re-routed to connect with the new rail lines as opposed to going downtown or to another end point. Nevertheless, the lines will attract new riders, especially if gasoline stays at $4 a gallon, until they can switch to more efficient vehicles or ones that are powered by alternative fuels.
First of all, rerouting busses to act as feeders to the light rail lines is exactly what needs to be done to make mass transit more attractive to more people. I find it bizarre that you are sugesting that this is some sort of "smoke and mirrors" gambit to make transit's numbers look good.
Secondly I am happy to see that you are conceding to the fact that as gas becomes more expensive people will switch to mass transit. Unfortunately you are still stuck on the idea that fuel efficient cars and alternative fuels are going to be a permenant solution.
Hear are some facts that we can not get away from:
These are basic facts Samantha, you can not get around them.
On another note, after reading your all of your statements about why this and that won't work in Texas I am begining to see why your home state seems to be in a dead heat race with Alabama for being the state with the worst public services in the nation.
SRen
I did not say that rerouting buses was smoke and mirrors. It is one of several tactics to get more people to ride the light rail trains and, therefore, help justify the cost. But many people, because they don't understand how the system works, are led to believe that the increase in public transit ridership, following the opening of a light rail line, is attributable solely to the light rail line, when this is not the case.
Interestingly, when the first two DART lines were opened, some people, who rode the bus from their neighborhood to downtown, found their commute time was increased because of the rerouting of the bus and the required transfer to the train.
DART's light rail ridership has been increasing steadily. May 2008 saw an increase of nine per cent over May 2007. But system wide ridership in 2007 was less than ridership in 2006.
The use of words like bizarre, ridiculous, etc. do little to promote discussion. Moreover, email and forum etiquette equates the use of bold letters, all caps, and color, especially red, with shouting.
Clearly, maintaining our roadways in Texas, as well as building new ones, is challenging. To say that they are falling apart is a stretch. Actually, except for those in the center of some of our cities, they are in pretty good shape.
Since we don't know what alternative fuels may be developed over the next decade or two, it is impossible to say how expensive they will be. They could be very expensive, or they could be relatively inexpensive.
The pattern of cities in Texas does not lend itself to wide spread use of rail for public transit. The populations density is too low. Our cities were built around the automobile. This is why, except in a few instances, buses, as well as improveed auto and highway technology, is the wave of the future in Texas. However, where existing rail facilities can be used, I support rail, especially commuter rail, which is what is happening in Austin and Houston.
There is a big difference between funding highway improvements and building light or heavy rail systems. Most of the drivers in Texas pay user taxes, as well as the federal and state taxes, that are used to build and maintain the federal and state highways in Texas. Most of the cost of the light rail systems in Dallas and Houston were or are borne by non-users.
Whether Texas spends an appropriate amount for social services has nothing to do with a discussion of transport solutions. Numbers, however, can be deceiving. Many of the social services that are delivered by government agencies in other states are delivered by community organizations and churches in Texas.
Unless I am quoting from a national document, i.e. Amtrak's Monthly Reports, FAA Annual Report, etc. I confine my remarks to what I know best, which is Texas.
The United States is the third largest country in the world with the third largest population. It is the largest multi-cultural society in the world. It is diverse. I would not have the nerve to comment on conditions in a part of the country with which I am not familiar. That includes most areas outside of Texas, although I have lived in seven states as well as D.C. But times have changed, so I confine my comments to Texas.
SRen,
One book a trend does not make. All kinds of people get their views published. Some of them are creditable; some of them are not.
As I have said repeatedly, I don't know what the future will bring. However, I don't think that Armageddon is just around the corner. Neither do most of the people with whom I worked or with whom I interact at the University of Texas.
I worked for the electric utility industry for decades. This is the world that I know best. We faced and face many challenges. But from the Edison Electric Institute to my company's first line supervisors, which includes hundreds of engineers, technicians, IT people, etc., everyone that I knew and know believes that we can overcome the many problems that beset the industry. And technology will be the enabler. The same applies to the other problems that are and will be a challenge.
When someone claims that there is only one scenario for the future, I am suspect. No one knows the future; they can only put together likely scenarios of how things might be.
"The Art of the Long View" by Peter Schwartz and "The Fifth Discipline" by Peter Senge are excellent introductions to scenario planning and systems thinking, which are important models for developing and assessing scenarios.
Paul Milenkovic wrote:Scott:As the immediacy of Peak Oil is an important concern to you, evidenced by your citing James Howard Kunstler, what is your opinion regarding the 2700 BTU/passenger mile energy usage of Amtrak (equivalent to 46 passenger miles per gallon)?For sake of argument, lets assume that every automobile is occupied by only one person. Is it your opinion that if everyone switched to a 46 MPG transportation conveyance, be it an Amtrak ride or a ride in a hybrid vehicle that this would save us from the consequence of Peak Oil or the Long Emergency?Or do you believe that the fuel efficiency of Amtrak could be much better than 46 passenger miles per gallon by more people riding it or by technological changes such as streamlined lightweight trains? Or are you advocating widespread electrification of railroad lines and the required increased production electricity by coal or nuclear? France famously has the TGV as well as 80 percent nuclear electricity -- is this a viable path for the US?Based on either a historical precedent or the experience of our European and Asian trading partners, what percentage of automobiles passenger miles do you believe can be substituted by transit and trains? If part of the effect of trains is to facilitate higher living densities, what reduction in overall passenger miles do you see by that effect?In terms of taking action to deal with the Long Emergency and believing in technological fixes, Amory Lovins of the Rocky Mountain Institute believes the problem is real, and he is promoting a technological fix -- he believes that a lightweight carbon fiber hybrid automobile could achieve 200 MPG: so far he has conducted computer simulations, and I understand he is working on a prototype car. I don't have ready access to a copy of The Long Emergency so I will ask you -- does James Howard Kunstler have ideas on the correct response to Peak Oil in the transportation sector, and what does he see as the breakdown in passenger miles and fuel usage between modes now and in 20 years? Does he see major reductions in passenger miles through living patterns and what are those reductions?
Paul,
In order to do justice to Mr. Kunstler I will have to quote him at length. Please keep in mind that the transportation chapter is toward the back of a book in wich he explains why there will be a "Long Emergency", to get the full story I recomend reading the book yourself. Ok here it goes...
On the topic of automotive transportation Mr. Kunstler writes:
"The twenty-first century will be much more about staying put than about going to other places. This idea is astonishing to many Americans today, who have been in motion on wheels more or less continuously for their whole lives, whizzing from driveway to parking lot to curb-cut carwash to big-box store and home again, often several times a day, year in and year out. Not many years from now, the automobile will be a much-dininished presence in our lives. I believe cars will still exist, but in far smaller numbers. They may run on various things, including whatever non-cheap gasoline or diesel is still available. As discussed in Chapter Three, replacing the curent internal combustion car fleet with hydrogen-powered fuel-cell cars is unlikely to happen under the current laws of thermodynamics. Cars using regular electric motors are a better bet, though the battery problem limits their range, and to some extent their existence in any numbers is predicated on a renewed nuclear power effort. That in itself may be impossible to accomplish in a nation with an impotent central government....
The American motoring system has been able to work because everyone from the lowiest burger flipper to the richest CEO could participate. The cost of running it were democratically borne by everybody. Will ecomically hard-pressed citizens who can't keep a car going tolerate their taxes going to maintain highways that only the elite can aford to drive on? If tax revenues decline broadly along with incomes, and don't cover the cost of repairing highways, where will the money come from? How will we fund all of those state DOT projects?.....
I believe that the interstate highway system will reach a point of becoming unfixable and unmaintainable not far into the twenty-first century. The resources will not be there to keep up the level of service at the minimum necessary to prevent cascading failure. I think we will all be shocked by how rapidly its deterioration proceeds. It will happen at the same time that the economics of mass car ownership become untenable, and the two failures will be mutually reinforcing...
Not even counting the interstate highway system, there are more than 3.8 million miles of paved roads in the United States, all of it funded politically. Today, while the United States is relatively flush, the federal DOT considers 18 percent of federal highways to be in "poor" or mediocre" condition, whereas 29 percent of the thousands of bridges are "structurally deficient" or "functionally obsolete". In the Long Emergency, the highways will still be there. They may continue to be usable at low speeds by cars and other vehicles for a long time after the initial process of failure begins. But we will no longer buzz around on them unthinkingly at 70 mph the way we did in the late twentieth century" pp. 263-266
About railroad infrastructure Mr. Kunstler writes:
"An obvious answer to the decline of the car-and-highway system would be to revive the American railroad network-once the envy of the world, now a world-class embarrassment....
If we made the choice to rebuild the U.S. railroad system, in an austere economy the infrastructure would be much less onerous to maintain than our vast highway system. The trains could be powered with electricity produced by nuclear power plants. Though I believe nuclear power would soften the post -cheap oil crash, I would not bet on the likelihood of getting a new generation of nuclear plants ramped up in time. Therefore whatever railroad system we manage to cobble together would not be electrified....
If the American railroads are to revive at all under the conditions of the long Emergency, they will probably do so in a piecemeal way as a stitched-together patchwork of regional lines...
One final thing worth noting on the subject of rail: From 1890 to about 1920, American localities managed to construct hundreds of local and interurban streetcar lines that added up to a magnificent national system (independent of the national heavy rail system). Except for two twenty-mile gaps in New York state, one could ride trolley lines from New England clear out to Wisconsin.....The salient point, however, is how rapidly the system was created in the first place, and how marvelously well it served the public in the period before the automobile became establised. Light rail of some kind-which does not require elaborate roadbeds-may become the basis for regional transportation systems of the future. Lines can be laid along the existing right-of-ways of any of our roads, from the interstates to the streets of our towns, and they can usefully transport people and freight...." pp. 266-269
Finally on the subject of comercial air travel, M. Kunstler can be sumed up with just three words "...they are toast." p. 270
Ok, my hands are cramping up, I recomend that everyone should read this book from cover to cover to see why this author believes we are heading for rough waters.
Two more things, first going back to the BTU numbers issue, any technology that can be developed to make a super fuel efficient car could be addapted for rail use. Instead of building 200 mpg cars that will have to navigate busted up roads why not instead build a 200 mpg light rail vehicles that can cary more people on cheaper right of way?
Second, I have already stated my opinion of the 2700/BTU energy consumption stats in earlier posts. I said that these figures do not take into acount the energy and resources needed to suport these competing modes of transportation. I believe I used the phrase "you are comparing apples to oranges here".
What James Howard Kunstler expresses is a valid point of view, that there are signs that we are at Peak Oil and the downslope of the peak will result in wrenching changes. I have concerns regarding Mr. Kunstler, however, from the standpoint of the passenger train advocacy community embracing his way of getting that message out. To sum up the airlines in the words "they are toast" seems like a rather flippant and colloquial way of expressing an opinion on a serious subject.
Following up on connections between Mr. Kunstler and rail advocacy, the Midwest High Speed Rail Association had featured him as a keynote speaker, and I did a Google on him to learn more of his perspective. I came across his Web site, which was filled with much stronger words than "they are toast." He seemed very angry with the current Presidential Adminstration, largely, I gather, because that Adminstration hasn't embraced his vision of Peak Oil, and Mr. Kunstler expressed his anger with words I should not and shall not repeat here on this forum. There are many reasons for expressing difference of opinion, grievance, and protest with the current Adminstration, but there are avenues of expression that are decent and honorable and others that are not, and in my opinion, Mr. Kunstler needs to temper the zeal for his cause with some civility. I e-mailed MHSRA about the wisdom of having Mr. Kunstler point and center of rail advocacy by featuring him as a speaker given his Web site, and in response, there was some (metaphorical) restless shuffling of feet.
I contrasted James Howard Kunstler's approach to Peak Oil with that of Amory Lovins. I see Mr. Kunstler as being mainly about words, some of them angry words, others of them words that shall not appear here; I see Mr. Lovins as being about concepts, computer simulations, building of energy-saving prototypes. Were I to have any influence over the passenger train advocacy community, I would much prefer to see Mr. Lovins as a model of how to speak publically for the cause than Mr. Kunstler.
Amory Lovins, who takes Peak Oil and Global Warming seriously as anyone else, has been advocating energy efficiency on all fronts, is advocating construction of a 200 MPG car, and he is at early stages of building a prototype. Is this an example of the type of "technological fix" on the "wrong road" that Mr. Kunstler is decrying? Are people in the train advocacy community so focused on trains as the solution, that we are opposed to efforts to build more fuel-efficient cars?
Apparently James Howard Kunstler embraces trains of all kinds as a solution to all things Peak Oil and Global Warming, but I gather he implicitly assumes that trains are energy saving. David Lawyer, a self-professed environmentalist and also a person who takes Peak Oil and Global Warming seriously (I relate the two because the most direct solution to Peak Oil would be to use coal, either directly in things like steam locomotives as discussed as great length on another Forum page or indirectly through synthetic fuels or electrification or railroads or storage-battery cars). I posted a link to David Lawyer who has some insights into train energy efficiency and whether trains by themselves are the solution to the energy crisis -- Google David Lawyer and you will quickly find his page.
As to the technology to build a 200 MPG train, in my parent post I pointed a path from the current 50 MPG train to a 100 MPG train using off-the-shelf equipment, a path to a 200 MPG train using the Alan Cripe Fastracker streamlined lightweight train, and perhaps a path to a 400 MPG train if this is combined with airline-style ticketing and load factors. This 400 MPG train, however, will not offer dining car, lounge car, sleeping car, or baggage car service, it won't have 125 ton "battering rams" at each end to solve with the grade crossing problem from the perspective of train crew and passengers, it may not ride like a 6-axle heavyweight Pullman, and while it may have more legroom but it will be similarly crowded as an airline experience. I presented these numbers to sound out forum members on to what degree fuel efficiency was an advocacy point for trains, and if it was, what compromises were people willing to make to get there. See David Lawyer on the WW-II era when trains did well, by load factor and passenger miles, but did poorly in terms of public acceptance of the experience.
As to 46 PMPG being an apples-and-oranges comparison because it does not take into account energy to build and maintain the guideway, then everything becomes an apples-and-oranges comparison because one can always draw a larger circle on what contains the transportation system and then throw up ones hands that this larger system is either not quantified or somehow favors trains by some intuitive consideration.
My message to the passenger train advocacy community: this is not the only point, but it is a central point if MWHSRA is featuring James Howard Kunstler as a speaker, is that trains are greatly energy saving over other modes. If we are advocating trains as energy saving, we had better have some data that they are energy saving. If the trains are marginally energy saving, we better have better arguments than to say there is an energy crisis on one hand but 46 PMPG on the other hand is good enough. If there is a case to be made that trains are major energy saving in the guideway, how about having some numbers on that rather than, what I tell my engineering students who indeed want to "save the world" through 'technology fixes", is simply "waving one's arms about." To say that there is some energy saving in the guideway but not support this with quantitative evidence does not clinch the argument.
If trains are only marginally energy saving, I ask that we don't claim that they are greatly energy saving and then turn around and attack people disputing that claim. If energy efficiency is central to train advocacy, I ask that as a community we have a plan by which trains could increase in energy efficiency. If the long-distance trains are primarily about having a "civil" alternative to cramped airlines that is perhaps not energy saving, the advocacy community needs to be open about the long-distance trains having a different purpose than solving the energy crisis.
Hi Paul,
I'm dead beat tired today so I'll have to get back to you on Friday.
Sorry
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