Climate Change
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16 Cities That Are Leading the Way in the Climate Change Fight
Long before Congress started to take the threat of climate change
seriously, American mayors were already recognizing the need to
decrease fossil-fuel consumption, promote efficiency, and generally
create more livable places.
October 20, 2009
How Climate Change Affects Transportation Infrastructure
A sobering post today from the Streetsblog Network on the importance of preparing our transportation system for the effects of climate change. Megan McConville at The City Fix reports on a panel titled "Perspectives on Adaptation to Climate Change," hosted by the Engineers Forum on Sustainability.
October 20, 2009
Transportation Allowances in the Climate Bill: A Tale of Two Modes
To understand why the climate change bill is a top priority
for urbanists, it's crucial to understand the emissions allowances that
the legislation distributes. The allowances essentially put the "trade"
in "cap-and-trade" --
whichever industry or state government holds them can benefit from
their monetary value or use them to emit pollution under the "cap."
October 16, 2009
What Washington Can Do For — And Alongside — Metro Area Planners
At one point midway through yesterday's Brookings Institution forum on metropolitan planning, moderator Chris Leinberger
quipped that Portland was deliberately not represented. It's not that
Portland isn't a model of sustainability, he explained, but that "we
all have Portland fatigue" -- that urban policy thinkers are eager to
expand the models of local development beyond Oregon.
October 14, 2009
Congestion Pricing: Still Good For Basically Everyone
Urbanists often find themselves falling into a pattern of thinking
that boils down to the dictum that what's good for drivers must be bad
for walkability, and sustainability, and all the things that they prize
about well-designed cities. Drivers seem to believe this too, which is
interesting because it often isn't true.
October 13, 2009
CNU Summit to Focus on Reforming Transportation, Planning Principles
The Congress for the New Urbanism will meet in Portland, Oregon, in early November for the annual Project for Transportation Reform, a summit to further define and clarify emerging urban transportation policies that embrace entire networks, rather than interdependent transportation segments, and that seek to balance modal transportation splits and reduce overall vehicular miles traveled (VMT).
October 9, 2009
Two More Senate Dems Back Plan to Devote Climate Money to Transit
This week has brought news of a brewing compromise on the Senate climate change bill, introduced last month amid signals that the upper chamber would give only a bit more to clean transportation than the House's meager 1 percent set-aside of revenue from cap-and-trade carbon regulations.
October 8, 2009
Senate Climate Bill Released With Much Fanfare, Little Focus on Transport
Flanked by fellow Democrats, members of the military, and a crowd
hoisting signs with buzzwords like "clean energy" and "green jobs,"
Sens. Barbara Boxer (D-CA) and John Kerry (D-MA) today released the
first draft of their legislation to curb U.S. emissions and combat
climate change.
September 30, 2009
Senate Climate Bill Leaks: The Good News and Bad News for Transport
The Senate's climate change legislation will finally
make its debut tomorrow, courtesy of environment committee chairman
Barbara Boxer (D-CA) and foreign relations committee chairman John
Kerry (D-MA). But the Washington Post has already obtained a
"close-to-final" version of the bill [PDF], which provides some details but leaves unanswered the key question of how much aid will go towards clean transport.
September 29, 2009
Growth of Compact Development Likely, Important for Reducing VMT
About two years ago, the Urban Land Institute published Growing Cooler: The Evidence on Urban Development and Climate Change,
which argued that it will be crucial to build cities in a more compact
fashion if the country hopes to avoid substantial growth in vehicle
miles traveled and carbon emissions over the next few decades.
September 25, 2009