Depths of Disgrace

A little off topic, but wow. SEC employees under investigation for insider trading?! By whom? The SEC? HAH! These guys are supposed to be the watchdogs... What a disgrace.

Canadian Smokers (sorry, drivers) up in Arms

This article is great. It reminds me a lot of the "Great Whinge" that smokers kicked up when the tide of public opinion turned against them a decade or two ago. Front page on the Globe and Mail National Section, the article is a good whinge about how automobile lovers are under attack from all sides in the city of Toronto. The hilarious hypocrisy that says it all about this kind of view is the Porsche advertisement at the bottom picturing the automobile drivers wet-dream of a road - fast, scenic, pedestrian free, even sidewalk free, and no other vehicles on it except your own, not even a motorcycle. This is a dream that not only excludes all non-drivers but is also fundamentally unattainable. Yet, this is the very dream that generations of last century's Americans were sold, came to pine for and ultimately paid billions in real money in an utterly vain attempt to attain, the only lasting legacy of which is horrific snarling traffic, chronic sedentarism, pollution, the ongoing liability for maintaining these automobile dystopias left for future generations, and half a century of neglect for non-auto transportation infrastructure. I could go on, but you get the picture. I think this article shows the level that the auto-crowd have fallen to. Like the smokers complaining bitterly when the public first began to call for bans on smoking in pubs and restaurants a few decades ago, the next step is capitulation. Let's take it all the way.

53 Miles Per Burrito

Interesting little article linked above - a reminder of the efficiency of different forms of transportation. Makes you wonder why many roads are effectively designed to make life difficult for cyclists.

Norway Considers Ban on Gasoline Automobiles

The fact that Norway, the world's 6th largest oil producer is seriously considering banning automobiles run on fossil fuels from 2015, should be a wake up call for Japan.




This sort of pressure is only going to get stronger so as one of the world's primary automobile producing countries, Japan really needs to pay attention. The writing is on the wall.

It also goes to show that even countries with a large stake in the old "dirty" economy need not hold back from striving to become leaders in the new green economy. As usual it takes a combination of legislation, popular/consumer support, and innovation.

In Japan the popular support definitely exists, as does the corporate innovation. All we need now is politicians and bureaucrats who can take the necessary legislative and regulatory steps.

Liquidity Crisis or Solvency Crisis ?

The auto industry is where the argument that this crisis is one of liquidity alone breaks down. Increasingly, people are discovering that even with tens of billions of dollars in money from the US federal government, the auto industry is just not viable. Why? Because citizens (aka "consumers") are turning away from automobiles and in particular automobiles made by failed automobile companies.

Liquidity crisis it may also be, but ultimately it is the solvency of such companies as GM and Chrysler, together with the many outer-suburban sprawl related real estate industries (and the banks that supported them and lent to them) which is in question here.

We can only hope they all are liquidated before more money is wasted trying to sustain a failed business model, so that the government can spend its money productively helping to build the new, sustainable green economy rather than propping up old mistakes from a former era when the automobile industry was King.

Does that sound radical? Perhaps, but it might also be said that there are two kinds of radical ideas in the world: the kind that would take us on a path which diverges significantly from that which we have followed to date (for better or for worse); and the kind which diverges significantly from the generally accepted practices or beliefs of the population.

If you read the next post here about Norway considering a ban on fossil fuel burning automobiles from 2015, you will note that these ideas is increasingly only radical in the former sense - that it marks a departure from previous behaviour, but with increasingly strong popular and legislative support.

Pedaling for the planet - Join the Danish Ambassador in Historic Ride

Wheel time: Franz-Michael S. Mellbin, the Danish Ambassador to Japan, on one of his twice-weekly early-morning bicycle rides. "In Denmark," he says, "people would be probably more impressed if you say, `I bike 20 km to work every day' than to say, `I've got this nice Mercedes and I go to work in this every day.' " TOMOKO OTAKE

WEEK 3

Pedaling for the planet FULL ARTICLE HERE

Join Denmark's ambassador on a cycling tour he's hosting in Japan to mark a climate-change meet back home.

For more information about the COP15 cycling events, call the Japan Cycling Association at (03) 6229-2715 or the Danish Embassy at (03) 3496-3001, or visit www.cop15.jp

Great video interview by NHK (in English) HERE

There will be nine consecutive stages around Japan from Sapporo to Kyoto with kick off in Tokyo on 23 May. A 10^th stage will take place in Copenhagen, where messages on climate change collected from people taking part in the stages in Japan will be handed over to the prime minister of Denmark, the co-chair of COP-15. More information about the events in the enclosed flyer and on the Embassy’s homepage: http://cop15.jp/Default.aspx?ID=25

.

This on the top page of Reuters. Yahoo. Sounds like we are finally getting somewhere - and we are not going by car!

America's road hogs veer off freeway 6:00am ET

Car ownership and the serendipitous pleasure of the highway have been a celebrated part of American life. But several signposts suggest America's love of driving is stalling. Full Article

"serendipitous pleasure of the highway" is a bit too poetic a description for the horror of the highway, but there were a few choice quotes in this article:

> "I see people cutting back who don't even need to cut back."
Duh. It is called a fundamental shift in consumption patterns.

>"It was as if people had started a new travel behavior, a new habit," Miller said. "And they have stuck with their habit."
Yup. Get used to it. Auto advertising dollars are like water on a ducks back these days.

>"We were road hogs," said John Townsend, spokesman for the American Automobile Association's mid Atlantic club.
Spoken like a true recovering alcoholic. Damn right you were.

>Some warn the American consumer will revert to old habits if the economy roars back.
If the full power of the money set aside by the US federal government for rail networks, transit and other sustainable transport initiaves is allowed to flower into real "brick and mortar" new public transport and transit systems to support the car-free lifestyles that people are so very clearly wanting, then there is very little chance that America will go back to its bad old ways. And if it does, we are all screwed. China, India and others will be watching very carefully.

>Americans also have started to embrace car sharing. Zipcar, the world's largest car-sharing company that rents cars by the hour or day, saw its membership soar 50.3 percent in the past 12 months.
>Zipcar chief executive Scott Griffith said he sees a major shift in philosophy that could stay in place for a long time.
>He said his firm's surveys show people take 46 percent more public transit trips, 26 percent more walking trips and about 10 percent more bicycling trips after joining Zipcar.
>"To me what their understanding is, I can live a more sustainable life and also save a lot of money by changing my behavior in some ways -- like using car sharing and driving less in total," Griffith said.

Go Zipcar. These are big numbers. More evidence of this change in behavior. The credit crunch may yet be seen as the financial world simultaneously realizing the need to abandon a model of economic growth that had previously supported the US economy for several generations - suburban sprawl. Their reasons for abandoning this model were not altruistic of course. The smarter (and richer) of the financial wizards simply noticed that Americans themselves were slowly but resolutely abandoning that model themselves and that the returns from propping it up and frothing it up were becoming progressively thinner. Hurray for people power. Bring it on.

Funny though, how the options people have affect behaviour in different countries.
The article says "America's road hogs veer off freeway, hop on bus" but I suspect they only use the bus because there are very few real lifestyle-friendly, car-free options in the United States comparable to the compact cities of the old world where kids can walk to school and people use trains and bicycles. 70+ years of auto infrastructure and urban sprawl means the only non-automobile option is a bus, a poor substitute for true sustainable living, but I suspect that it is only an intermediate trend until the infrastructure can be put in place so that people can really enjoy the fruits of car-free life.

Make the most of new transportation opportunities

After years of pushing all-for-the-auto policies, the government is now serious about supporting alternative ways of getting around

For decades, the federal government would fund 90 percent of an freeway project and much less—if anything at all—of a subway, light rail or commuter train line. That changed the face of America, as highways were slashed through the heart of vital communities, breaking their spirit and hastening the exodus of people to far-flung suburbs. In the same period, hardly any federal or state money went toward expanding trains and other alternatives to the automobile. From the end of World War II to the opening of the Bay Area’s BART transit system in 1972, only a few miles of subway lines were added nationally, compared to tens of thousands of miles of interstates and other highways. That gross imbalance may well have affected the growth and character of your neighborhood.

See full PPS article HERE.

Systemic Issues

If ever there was a time that best showed that lack of automobile safety was a systemic issue rather than one of "just a few bad apples" - it is during the Easter break. 3300 drivers caught speeding - and the holiday only just started today!!

Queensland Tilt Train Cancelled Due to Safety Concerns

The Story Here in the Courier Mail. Pretty pathetic really. If only the Australians and Americans could learn from the Japanese. A bit of railway technology transfer could go a hell of a long way...

End of America's Love Affair with the "Exburbs"

Wow. Even Reuters is cottoning on - very thoughtful piece here on the massive change in American attitudes to suburbia. Watch this space. This really is a paradigm shift that has hit the tipping point.

Pity Japan's government is still flogging the dead horse of automobile-centric life. You'd think they would have cottoned on by now. The irony is that in such a small, old-world country with great public transport they have fantastic examples of how great it can be, yet still choose to build more freeways to nowhere despite an aging population.

Call it quits while you are ahead (in less deep?)

Bligh, Queensland's State Premier may be "confident of tunnel project future" according to this article on the ABC regarding the rediculous Brisbane airport road tunnel project, and this sounds a little like government support for more pork-barrel automobile infrastructure (and verbally it is), but the reality is that these are just the sound of politicians placating fat old relics of a soon-to-be bygone era - the auto era. What matters is that the government appears staunchly opposed to committing any public funds - which is as it should be. Thank goodness. It seems that real change really can happen and is happening.

Incidentally, has anyone else heard the rumour that the owners of Brisbane airport intentionally made the airport rail link station as inconvenient as possible, in order to make car parking the most convenient because they could take parking fees from drivers but not from people doing the right thing and using public transport? I would not suggest that anyone could be possible of such money-grubbing, dirty profit-maximising behaviour but the fact does remain that the rail link to BNE airport is intollerably inconvenient by international standards.

There is no such thing as an "environment-friendly car"

This just in on Reuters - in the Environment section, no less:

Hyundai to go ahead with eco cars 12:49am EDT

GOYANG, South Korea (Reuters) - Hyundai Motor Group, the world's No. 5 automaker, will go ahead with plans to develop environment-friendly cars despite the segment's low profitability and an industry downturn, a senior executive said on Thursday. Full Article

****If these people think that developing and selling cars that don't run on gasoline is going to solve all of the many problems caused by automobiles, they are in for a bit of a shock. Let's hope we do not go down that route at all, but face up to the fact that the problem is a systemic one, and the solution must be a fundamental paradigm shift away from the automobile model towards the European/Asian one of higher density urban areas, "un-suburbanization" and more and better public transport.

Faking Places

This funny "April Fool's Day" (or is it...) piece from the folks at Project for Public Spaces:

US Transportation System Revealed to be Giant Ponzi Scheme

Much of the wealth invested in the US transportation system has disappeared into a giant pothole. Recent events have revealed that Americans have been paying into a system of transportation that has been creating wealth on paper, but when communities move to withdraw from their investment, they find only that they are in worse shape than they were before .Based on performance measures for climate, congestion, energy security, land consumption and public health, most Americans would have been better off stuffing their transportation money into a pillow.

By Ethan Kent

Read More »

Human Powered Forklift

This link just in from the World Carfree Network mailing list, is a link to a tidy looking little human powered forklift. Very neat - and made in Japan.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?gl=JP&hl=ja&v=NlLLEdXUEWY

I did a quick search online and found what I think is the manufacturer here. Click on the photo to get a pdf catalogue. Another site showing the forklift here lists the price at 200,000 yen. Quite a steal if you think that the operating cost is basically zero. And here is one more advantage - you don't need a licence to operate it.
人力エコフォークリフト

Reinventing America's Cities - The Time is Now

Incredible piece here in the New York Times about exactly the kind of change that is needed in America's cities. The only disappointment is that it is in the Arts section. This would be equally as relevant in the Politics section or the Business section. Well done Nicolai Ouroussoff. Here's hoping America is listening.

For that matter, let's hope Tokyo is listening. For all the talk of a green Olympics bid, there is scant evidence yet that the road building juggernaut has got the message.

Japan Rail Starts Car-Sharing

OK, here is something Japan specific. And wow. This could really change the way things are done around the place. From "Terrie's Take" (thanks Terrie):

-> Trains and car sharing

It seems that car sharing is really starting to catch on,
with East Japan Railway (JR East) announcing that it will
enter the business and make a small initial fleet of 6 cars
available in Tokyo and Kanagawa. Subscribers will be able
to unlock the cars using the unique ID on their Suica
commuter card. Apparently JR East will extend the service
to over 12 stations in Tokyo over the next 24 months. The
price will be JPY630 for every 30 minutes of use, plus the
usual registration and monthly subscription fees. ***Ed:
Obviously a small experiment to start with, but imagine if
JR East started doing this service at stations popular with
tourists -- outside Tokyo.**

http://www.nni.nikkei.co.jp/AC/TNKS/Nni20090313D13JFA17.htm


Damn right! Just imagine. And it isn't such a leap from there to imagine JR getting into the bicycle sharing gig also. Just imagine if you could glide into any JR station in Japan and take your pick of car or bicycle depending on the needs at the time. Now THAT is seamless, safe, efficient, ecological transport integration. Enough! highways - THIS is what we really need.

Amazing Video Selection

Sorry. None of this is Japan specific content - just recycling from Streetfilms, but some VERY very cool stuff so I had to pick out a few favourites...







And hooray for more of this!!



And this...! Damn, it is no wonder cars are not selling.



So it is not rocket science, but it WORKS. Talk about 1st class service! If you make the effort to ride your bike, then free vallet parking is the least we can do to reward you!




And this is absolutely INCREDIBLE.






All these great videos from Street Films:
http://www.streetfilms.org/

Carfree Communities Are Child's Play

Great stuff this - and how simple it is. It reminds me of the times when it snows in Tokyo, and the back streets become playgrounds. Kids come out of the woodwork and you wonder where they all were before the snow. Of course, before long the snow melts, the cars are back, and the kids are chased back to their computer games. But if we can only redesign communities to restrict automobile access within certain areas...

- Carfree Communities Are Child's Play
Traffic prevents children from playing. Between 1973 and 2006, the proportion
of children playing on UK streets fell from 75% to 15%. Two charities, Sustrans
and Play Wales, are calling on planning authorities to lead the UK to build
carfree housing estates, which gives a high quality of life for all its
residents, particularly for children in traffic-clogged urban areas allowing
them to play safely outside their front doors and travel independently. The
proposals would also help cut obesity in children who are unable to play in
traffic-clogged areas. The plan envisages that car parking in the new
developments would be limited and situated away from people’s homes.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/em/fr/-/1/hi/wales/7865865.stm

Everyone wants a piece of the stimulus action

Even good old oil companies: NPR story here about how Shell is arguing that they need offshore drilling as they expect demand for oil will double by 2050. Well if that is allowed to happen, then look out. Business as usual for another half century does not sound like sound policy considering what scientists are telling us about the state we are in already.

An example

Here is a perfect example of how NOT to stimulate the economy. Just as the Japanese government is faced with falling tax receipts, and drastically increasing costs with an aging population, they do something as stupid as THIS and reduce the cost of driving presumably to encourage people to drive more which no doubt would have some overall effect on an economy. The rational is perhaps that if the export market is tanking we should stimulate domestic demand. But this fails to recognise two things: (1) Japanese do not traditionally buy the same things they export, nor is it necessarily a good thing to try to make them do so, and (2) there may be a very good reason that foreign countries are cutting back on their imports of these items, and stimulating demand domestically will just put Japan well behind the curve in terms of adapting to the changing world. This is a very great pity, because Japan has traditionally been ahead of the curve in its focus on family, lifestyle and culture over purely economic factors. But the pointy heads seem to have forgotten that efficiency in an economy is not simply the efficiency with which we can create crap that other people will buy - no. Efficiency at the national level is what matters. Indeed efficiency at a global level may be required to meet environmental targets, but it is national efficiency that is increasingly important for a country wishing to be competitive. And when it comes to transport systems, nothing is more efficient than rail (and the high-density cities that come with it, thus walking and cycling, which add further efficiencies by improving the health of the population, not to mention the land use efficiency when cities dependent on motor transport find a quarter or third of their land devoted to the automobile). This is why I find news like this- that the Japanese government would subsidize driving at a time like this extremely disappointing.

Why we cannot be slave to the economy

Crazy opinion piece here in Reuters suggesting that the fastest way to revive "the economy" is to legalize drugs and tax them. There is probably little doubt that this would "work" in a sense. But it is equally obvious that it cannot be done without forever transforming that "economy" into something very different to what it was before. This example highlights the obvious, but often forgotten fact that economies should not be judged purely on dollars and whether it is in overall growth or contraction as financial economists would have us believe. The lesson is especially important in times like these when our economies are contracting. If governments must experiment with fiscal stimulus, then at least do it in ways that will improve quality of life in real tangible ways rather than just trying to push the lever of growth over substance. If you have followed this blog, you will know what we mean by that - things like urban redevelopment into walkable safe car-free communities, better train systems, mass transit, Velib type programs and the like.

Nice Little Video

It's Your Ride from Cinecycle on Vimeo.

Thanks Alastair.

Of course, there are probably a few too many grungy shots of the bike going over broken glass or through big scary black-hole puddles - but it is a tyre commercial after all.

Pedestrians as endangered species

A warning to the world

This article should stand as a stark warning to Australia, Europe and the USA, about to embark on probably the worlds greatest ever experiment in fiscal stimulus.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601101&sid=aYomskNBwinE&refer=japan

I expect that more of the same "business as usual" economic stimulus such as this will do nothing but create facilities that are an ongoing liability to the nation. Money for projects that have no popular support but are funded simply because they inflate the economy will entrench a pork-barrel industry addicted to the swill of easy government money for useless projects that bankrupt local governments with ongoing costs liabilities. Japan is even today faced with the ongoing issue of dealing with these problems, and should stand as a stark warning to the rest of the world -

choose your projects very carefully, because they will define your country and its future for decades to come.

So what will it be? Highways, tunnels, airports, more cars and more sprawl? Or investment in trains, subways, and safe walkable communities?

The Catch-up Game

Yesterday I was riding a JR train, and in front of me was a map of the JR lines. To pass the time, I counted how many lines there were and was amazed to find that there are no less than thirty six (36) different Japan Rail train lines in the Tokyo area. Now that is just the lines owned and operated by East Japan Rail. After switching to the subway for the last leg of my return journey home, I counted the subways. There are also fourteen (14) subway lines (private and public) that crisscross Tokyo. Now that is a round FIFTY (50) DIFFERENT TRAIN LINES in just the Tokyo area! Next time when I have a LONG train ride I might even count the number of stations, but at a very conservative 15 stations per line that is no less than 750 train stations just in Tokyo. Absolutely incredible!

Now Tokyo has its own transport problems - not least of them being the fact that it actually lets motor vehicles into the city for free despite all this public trasport, that it does not have any bicycle sharing program and that people are brought up to give cars right of way everywhere and in every situation. But despite all of this, public transport in Tokyo wins hands down on both convenience and cost - not to mention all the knock-on improvements in individual health and sense of community that use of public transport bring at a societal level.

All this made me think just how much infrastructure development work other cities around the world have ahead of them if they really want to improve public transport to a level that makes it compete favorably on convenience. New York, Sydney, London - man, oh man you guys have a LOT of work to do.

Shop, Damn it SHOP!

Is this what government was created for? To encourage people to shop more?

No. I have no doubt that, in the long term, the credit crisis will be a good thing for society - or it would be if the governments of the world could just accept it rather than try to prop up the status quo with free money for banks and automobile companies so that they can keep doing what they have been doing, and what we now are coming to realize was probably the wrong thing.

In the USA, Obama seems to have realized that while Keynsian infrastructure spending may be necessary to avert a "car crash" in the economy, this money must be spent in ways that will transform US cities from auto-culture to networks of walkable communities. This is a none to easy task given the cumulative effect of about 80 years of money and effort already spent on developing auto-culture and the sprawl, pollution and waste that goes along with it. This article from Reuters highlights the fact that the fight is still far from won.

States want to use Obama's stimulus for roads, not rail
U.S. President-elect Barack Obama is striving to revolutionize infrastructure through a proposed stimulus that may reach $1 trillion. States, however, seem to have other plans. Missouri, Utah and other states are planning to use the federal funds on highways rather than the environmentally friendly mass transit and rail lines that Obama envisions. Bloomberg (24 Dec.)

National governments now understand what needs to be done. Local governments mostly understand what needs to be done. This fight needs now to be taken to State governments as it appears this is perhaps the last stronghold of those dreaming of a return to the failed pork-barrel auto-dream of last century.

Electric cars are not the answer

Interesting little piece from Reuters HERE, again suggesting that electric cars are not the answer to environmental problems caused by automobiles. And hydrogen cars are not either as you must factor in how the hydrogen itself was generated and of course its transportation to refueling stations. No - in modern urban societies we must look to options that are more efficient by design.

I have not verified this yet, but I recently heard on the radio that in order for a highway to carry the same capacity of people at the same speed into town as a regular commuter train line, it would need to be 60 lanes wide. Even if I misheard and it was only 20 we are talking many times if not orders of magnitude greater efficiency by rail than by car. It is simply that efficiency which makes it more friendly to the environment than the automobile.

Must try to look into that line a bit further. It is a compelling one.

The Santa Claus Principle

Is the Government like Santa Claus? Very interesting story HERE by a Financial Times related blog, suggesting that all this bail out of industry and finance may ultimately do more harm than good as industry comes to think that the government is a reliable Santa Clause who will come and bail them out when they want - until Santa has nothing left.

There is a lot at stake and the signs are not good. From the front page of Reuters today, just a week after the auto bailout, these stories:
Post Bailout Chrysler Still at Risk
Commercial Property Seeks Bailout Aid

Jeez, and people say they don't understand GenX or GenY ! The boomers seem to want to have their cake and eat it - and if there are any consequenses, they should be held off at all cost until the boomers are long gone. That seems to be the attitude.

At least Obama seems to be saying the right thing - promote the shift to a greener economy ASAP. I just hope it does not end up like the promises of so many NSW state premiers for so many rail and subway networks for Sydney that have never materialized despite billions spent on new roads and tunnels in the meantime.

ps - another article along a similar vein here on Reuters: Fed Unleashes Greatest Bubble of All

Leaner Nations bike, walk and use public transport

Interesting AP Article here noting a recent study showing that leaner nations walk, bike and take public transport more.

I started this blog a few years ago as a celebration of our family life without cars (despite having two small children), but recently with all the auto industry news around the world it has become something of a political commentary on the dangers of giving in to pork barrel support for sunset industries.

So I thought I would post this to get me back on track and remind myself, and readers of just why it is that we are so against cars in the first place. And of all the reasons, this is perhaps the most personal - your own health.

Satellite Data Reveal Full Impact of Beijing Olympic Pollution Controls

Nasa researchers have shown that the highly publicised controls on auto traffic and other pollutants during the Beijing Olympics really did have a significant impact - reducing NO2 by as much as half. Some had argued that the controls had had no impact - but clearly they did, and thanks to NASA for showing us that. Here is the news from the NASA site itself.

But look at this image closely. Hmmm. One small area of China gone from red to green for just one month, while the other red areas are so big... pollution really is a major issue for China... and neighboring Japan... and the USA, where the wind blows....

And of course, pollution is just half the problem with automobiles...

Thanks to Eureka Alert for this one.

A pretty picture...

This is a pretty graph from the Economist. Readers of this blog will recognize the total vehicle-miles graph from the DOT website that I highlighted last month. If you look at it more closely as in my previous blog, the number of vehicle miles has come off by several billion in the last year or two - nice, and shows just how much discretionary driving there is around the place, but just a drop in the ocean compared to the ramp up in car use over the last 40 years. The Economist has interestingly added the number of miles of roads in the US, which looks essentially unchanged since the 1960's. The unspoken implication is that we are drastically in need of more money for roads...

That is, until you think of these things:

1) Once you already have a road network, you don't need ANOTHER one, even if people are driving more. We already know that nearly a third of all the land space in US cities is already allocated to automobiles. What are you going to do - make more space for them? Oh yea, that's what we are doing with the billion dollar cross city tunnels we are building. No - building more roads because people are driving more and the roads are getting blocked is like a doctor saying that a patient with high blood pressure just needs more veins to carry blood - by that logic he'd pretty soon be all veins and nothing else because the underlying condition is not treated. No, what we could really do with is a different kind of network - a proper rail network or a pedestrian roads network, as it has been shown that the only reason that a lot of people drive at all is because there IS no other option. And I am not talking about railway networks that will just carry coal to the coast - which seems to be the biggest rail item on the recently announced Australian infrastructure spending plan.

2) Secondly, just because "Highway System Mileage" has not gone up does not mean that we have not built more roads. If you measured "Highway System Mileage" by miles of lanes rather than miles of roads, then the line would probably look steeper than the other line showing total miles driven. In other words the graph is a complete illusion. Roads and highways in the US have swollen to rediculous proportions like the cancerous growths that they are - so much so that experts seem to agree that adding new lanes actually does not alleviate traffic problems - it has become part of The Traffic Problem. And the new infrastructure - bridges and tunnels etc., that have been built to accomodate those new lanes have cost the nation a FORTUNE. And of course the more such infrastructure is built, the more needs to be spent on maintenance.

To be fair, the thrust of the Economist article seems to be that just such lasting metro rail and other infrastructure should be built in that the US and that it should be paid for by an increased gasoline levy, which would have the added positive effect of discouraging discretionary driving even further.

But at first glance, that is not what the picture says.

Auto crisis predates the credit crisis

The decline of the "auto nation" is not a short term phenomenon coming out of the credit crunch. It is a fundamental world-wide rethink of the long term viability of the whole automobile economy with US automakers at the epicentre. People may still want to ignore it, but it's happening - auto has become a sunset industry in the US, and my bet is it may soon be worldwide. There might be an argument for US handing out helicopter loads of federal money to permit an orderly decline rather than collapse of the industry in 6-months, but "you're gonna pay tomorrow" as the song goes - Americans better be ready to pay the price for bailing out companies that make things nobody wants any more.

Even if they manage to retool, any hybrid or EV market that develops will be a far cry from the scale of current auto markets, because people have discovered that automobile society itself is not ideal. It does not matter what kind of automobile, the just won't sell like they used to. This graph shows that clearly.




And thank God for that. Many people have been praying and hoping for the demise of Automobile society for a very long time. It looks as though they may be heard.

What is wrong about this story?

Cash recipients urged to spend
The Australian - 11 hours ago
KEVIN Rudd has urged the nation's pensioners and families to "go out and spend the money" as the first wave of his cash handout plan to avert a recession hits bank accounts from today.
Spend bonus now ABC Online
Aussie PM pushes Christmas splurge with welfare bonuses USA Today
Sydney Morning Herald - The Canberra Times - Sky News Australia - The Age
all 97 news articles »

This story really reads from the plot of The Story of Stuff, a fast-paced 20minute clip looking at the underbelly of our consumption-driven economy.

Just a little push...

Damned Fools

Now this is just stupid. What are they going to do next, fund the TV networks because they winge that automobile makers are not advertising any more? Oh yea, they already did that with the FIVE BILLION DOLLARS they gave to the automobile manufacturers - foreign owned ones at that.

Car dealers to get $2bn Government lifeline
NEWS.com.au - 3 hours ago
By staff writers THE Government has struck a $2 billion deal to prevent the financial collapse of the car sales industry. Car dealers facing closure as a result of the global financial crisis will now be underwritten by a Government debt guarantee, ...
Car dealers get a $2b bail-out Sydney Morning Herald
Car dealers welcome $2b lifeline Ninemsn
Forbes - ABC Online - CNNMoney.com - Adelaidenow
all 47 news articles »

The Australian government seems convinced that it needs to support the automobile industry in order to maintain the capability to build vehicles in Australia at all. They are probably right. Australia is a small market and it costs money to maintain such large factories there. But why spend 5 billion dollars supporting a foreign owned auto industry in the country, and then another two billion supporting foreign owned dealers? Chances are probably quite high that a lot of this will flow out of the country - or at the very least it will save head office from having to support them themselves.

No - if the goal of the federal government really was to support and maintain a local auto industry, why on earth did they not wait until these companies - Ford and GM primarily, announce they are going to pull out, as they probably would have to without local Australian government support, and THEN step in with a local buyer, pick up the assets at or below replacement cost and Bob's your uncle, you have a locally owned industry - albeit smaller scale than it was before for obvious reasons.

GMAC puts institutional investors ahead of private investors

Oh boy, this is too much. According to the Bloomberg piece below, GMAC intends to leave their "mom and pop investors" out in the cold also.

GMAC puts institutions ahead of private investors
Individual investors who bought SmartNotes from GMAC Financial Services are being left out of a plan by the General Motors financing unit to exchange cash, preferred shares or new debt for existing debt held by institutional investors. In the event of a bankruptcy, retail investors could end up with nothing, analysts said. Bloomberg (01 Dec.)

Putting this another way, not only does GMAC want taxpayers to foot the bill and rescue them when they have finally got themselves stuck in a hole with bad auto-loans after years of massive profits from shafting high priced loans on unsuspecting car buyers with doubtful credit, NOW they want to shaft individual investors who bought the company's debt in favour of their institutional lenders. So if you are a US taxpayer and one of these individual investors in GMAC debt you would get doubly shafted if the bailout were be passed - and if you happened to also be a borrower of one of their auto-loans, you're triple shafted. That's a hattrick. If there was a prize for shocking ethics, surely they would win it.

Auto Slump is Worldwide

It is not just the US automakers that are facing the brink. Japanese automakers will also be facing similar challenges in the coming years - and no taxpayer money will (or should) save them from it.

This article from the Japan Times quotes a 39-year low for auto sales in Japan. All of a sudden people are realizing they don't need new cars, and maybe cars aren't so cool anyway after all.

This auto-slump is similar to the sub-prime mortgage crisis in many ways. For years the auto industry - in cahoots with credit card operators and others in the finance industry have contrived to convince the population that they NEED to buy the latest coolest sexiest extension of their personalities (on credit...). But just like the shiny new hovel in a deadpan suburban outpost miles and miles from the city with no public transport, people eventually realized that the dream they were sold is more of a nightmare - the financial and emotional burden of the debt combined with the un-fulfilled promise of a better life that a sterile suburban existence cannot ever provide.

Time for a little reality folks.

But the interesting thing here is that reality doesn't have to be all that painful. In fact it might actually be pleasant and preferable to our overly hedonistic existence of recent years (decades?). More emphasis on building walkable, livable communities (not "suburbs") has to be a good thing. Ride a bike, lose weight, meet and greet the neighbors on the way to school and work. Frugality can be surprisingly fulfilling.

GM and Chrysler consider bankruptcy to get bailout

Reuters article HERE. I still don't get it. How does declaring bankruptcy entitle them to taxpayer money? Bollocks. How can they spend millions on advertising and still go cap in hand to the government with a straight face? I would hazard a guess that without that advertising demand for autos would fall to their natural "real" level - i.e. one that cannot sustain so many car companies.

No. You have to give them credit for persistence, but hang in there senators. Don't give in to the threats. There is a better way. For example, liquidate and help the workers and communities as they find new occupations and develop new - sustainable economies.

Because, as well all now know (and probably have known or suspected for the last 40 years or more) auto-society is not sustainable. It is not even desirable.

Even Devine, the condominium builder in far off Queensland Australia has realized that the new future is one of localized, mixed-use, walkable, safe, quiet, socially strong communities with good public transport. And that is one where the cars are mostly left in a big ugly building in the corner of the site and only used occassionally.

There is a very limited future for any auto maker - US or Japanese or otherwise, in this world. The price of oil may be down, but Hummers are just as un-cool as they have become lately. This will not change - even if the advertising (taxpayer funded or otherwise) continues.


http://www.reuters.com/article/wtMostRead/idUSTRE4B30XO20081204

Ken Ohyama's Japan Highway Photography

Ken Ohyama's Japan Highway Photography

This has to be about the most beautiful anyone anywhere could possibly make highways look. Does this look like a place fit for human habitat? The automobile is all about getting from A to B and in-between be damned. Does anyone else also get the feeling that everywhere is becoming that "in-between" these days, and that "A"s and "B"s are few and far between?

GMAC wants to become a bank ?!

So, let me get this straight - Ford Motor Credit, Chrysler Finance Corp., and GMAC have already been given access the Fed's commercial paper program and now they want to become banks in order to access federal government bank rescue funds because nobody in their right mind will lend to these auto related companies.

Let's think about this for a second. No-one wants to lend to auto finance companies because car prices and sales are falling rapidly, defaults are rising, and their business is dwindling away.

So because no-one in their right mind would invest in such companies, they cannot access credit. If they cannot access credit they cannot offer credit to car buyers. Doesn't sound like such a bad thing at all really. Do Americans really need to drive three trillion miles a year? And aren't Americans in too much debt anyway? Do most Americans really need to buy that new car right now? The consensus - even in the US itself, seems to be that it is time to ween ourselves off this addiction. More, it seems clear that feeding the addiction will only make the situation worse.

But the government is running scared. If they do fall prey to these threats, and step in to allow these particular companies to access the Fed's commercial paper program, indeed by allowing them to become banks (if they are in fact allowed to do so - I fail to believe that Congress could permit this), the government is effectively bailing out the investors and lenders who have enjoyed wonderful returns for the past or so decade. offering money to these companies so that these auto finance companies can continue to lend money to people with bad credit to buy new vehicles that will fall in value so that they can continue to satiate their addiction to automobile lifestyles - environment be damned, energy security be damned, everything else be damned.

Livable streets - a "how to"

Who hasn't been inspired by these roads with high canopies of tree cover? Cars need wide roads preferably open for visibility at high speed. Everyone else however, enjoys a good canopy cover. This provides fantastic protection from sun, wind and also light rain - not to mention inspiring awe and wonder. Narrower streets are best for good canopy cover.


It is surprisingly easy to make a regular road livable and friendly. A few nice big planter boxes in the middle of the road is all it takes. This road is still accessible by car - but no longer a through road. There is also a special access for emergency vehicles. All of a sudden the stinking noisy screeching dangerous inner city roadside becomes a peaceful oasis - it is itself a part of the park.



Bollards have the same effect. A few of these bollards are removable to allow emergency vehicle through access as necessary (but chained so they cannot be taken far). Locals quickly put them back in place to stop regular traffic (because they have come to value life without high speed through traffic - gasoline-powered, electric or otherwise).


And who said that all roads need to be wide enough for vehicles? Why not have some roads that are just tracks - short cuts wide enough for pedestrians and bicycles. Cars must go around. This encourages people to get out of their comfort zone (lazy zone?) and walk, jog or ride.

In the West, road builders assume that pedestrians are there simply for pleasure, and therefore tend not to make (non-motor) paths straight. Pedestrian-only streets should be reasonably direct particularly if in busy areas - but on side areas it is not impossible to play a little with the design.

Just think - in the West you can drive a car from your street across the entire country with barely a bump in the road. Imagine if there was a similar network of car-free streets where the entire design goal was the efficiency and convenience of non-vehicular traffic. Why is it that pedestrians must "cross" a street? If we thought about it a bit, it could quite conceivably be the other way around - where the pedestrian has a straight and flat, unbroken path which automobiles must "cross" (and wait to do so). Design can assist in facilitating this perception in many ways other than these above, just as it is used now in the West to create the perception that roads "belong" to automobiles. But a picture is worth a thousand words, so hopefully these pictures will give people an idea of the incredible "traffic-calming" potential of these design features.

Incidentally, all of these streets are in inner city Tokyo.

The price of our oil addiction

Deeply disturbing issues are explored mercilessly by Michael Watts in this beautifully written and thoughtful but starkly confronting piece on the CNN website - HERE.

I will not add any quotes because I think you should sit down for a minute or two and ponder all of what he has to say.

A Picture Tells a Thousand Words...

AMERICANS DROVE 1.4 BILLION MILES FEWER IN 08.04 than 07.04.

Sounds like a lot, huh? That is, until you see this graph...



and see just how bad things have become in just the past 25 years. I found this graph, created by the DOT Federal Highway Administration in a Treehugger article. Just in case you can't see the image so well, this graph tracks annual vehicle miles travelled in the USA, counted in the BILLIONS of miles, and shows the change in miles driven since 1983. Americans in 2007 drove some 3 trillion miles. OK, so it is a fairly steep dip right up there in the top right of the graph - that is promising. But if you look at where we are coming off from... WOW. This trend of the last few months might have to continue for 20 years or more before we come back to the levels we had then. Nevertheless, a return to the levels of even 2 or 3 years ago would probably indicate a fairly major shift in lifestyles and attitudes. There is an old saying in finance that "the trend is your friend, until the end." Well this may be the end of the trend that has been friendly to the US auto/sprawl related industry investor, and the beginnings of a new trend that is friendly to a new type of investor - the green investor, the new urban citizens and the farming community. Indeed, many an investor has already bet the farm that this will be the new trend for the forseeable future in the United States.

China, India, South America and Russia/Eastern Europe have become the new battleground - where the old forces of oil/auto/coal/sprawl/consumerism have already taken their investment dollars.

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Nov. 15, 2008 UPDATE - AUGUST DATA HERE
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This strong new trend in US driving (or lack of driving) patterns continues, despite falls in gasoline prices, with total miles driven in August 2008 now 15 billion miles lower than the same month in 2007. Cumulatively this year, Americans have driven over 67 BILLION miles less in 2008 than the same period of 2007. This is a reduction in driving the likes of which the USA has never seen before. Sounds like a lot huh... and yet... again... it is just a drop in the ocean when you look at this graph of what we have done to the country in recent decades. Attitudes towards driving are changing, and fast, but it will take more than this before any real progress is made.

This is why no amount of bailout money will save auto makers

-In late October 130 major European cities pledged to fight climate
change, and sounded out action ideas such as creating new
eco-quarters, developing new forms of mobility and limiting urban
sprawl.

www.euractiv.com/en/sustainability/major-eu-cities-pledge-fight-climate-change/article-176720


Simply reducing tailpipe emissions by switching to some other form of propulsion is not enough. If we are to really get sustainable we need better urban planning. And whether you want it or not, governments around the world are getting serious about it.

Are Aussies worse than Americans?

Australian government wasted no time bailing out their auto industry... this despite the fact that automobile manufacturers in Australia are essentially foreign owned and build for the most part gas guzzling monsters.

And yet, the government has its detractors on this policy and there are more than a few. Here is one scathing piece:

http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,24643119-664,00.html

The author is right to attack a rediculous bail-out, but wrong to think that electric cars are the answer. I would wager that no new technology is going to fill the gap that is about to be rent open by Gen X and Y forsaking automobiles. Walkable built environments are the answer, not automobiles, electric or otherwise. GenX and GenY know it already, and the oldies are beginning to cotton on also despite having for generations seen car and suburban house as the God-given fruits of life in the New World, are getting the picture.

We don't need to spend money redesigning our cars - we need to spend money redesigning our ROADS so that we don't NEED cars so much.

Bush seeks redemption? ブッシュの罪滅ぼし

President Bush seems to have found religion and seeks redemption as he doggedly refuses to bail out automakers:

Detroit rescue may have to wait for Obama administration
Faced with hardening opposition from President George W. Bush and Republican members of Congress, Democratic leaders said it is unlikely that they would get a bailout for automakers passed in the upcoming lame-duck session. They are increasingly accepting the possibility that a rescue for the Detroit Three, along with economic-stimulus measures targeted to middle-class families and workers, would have to wait until the inauguration President-elect Barack Obama. The New York Times (13 Nov.)

Why is it that politicians seem do the right thing when they have nothing to lose?

...on the other hand, Obama has a lot to lose (political support from auto workers). He probably does not need their support really, but has the boy from Chicago already sold out? -

Obama wants $50 billion for automakers
Faced with warnings that General Motors is on the verge of bankruptcy -- a shock that would echo through the entire U.S. economy -- President-elect Barack Obama is asking Congress for $50 billion to rescue the auto industry. Obama's plan includes creation of a czar or supervisory board to oversee the rescue. To have any chance of passage, said people familiar with the matter, the measure would need the support of President George W. Bush, who has opposed the idea of giving government money to automakers Bloomberg (13 Nov.)

Sounds like a lot of empty threats to me. Hands up those who think that we would all be better off if one or two of the automakers just went under. Well what do you know, even some of the shareholders seem to think so:

Some say GM bankruptcy preferable to bailout: Some experts said a Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing by General Motors might be better for the company and the nation than a government bailout that is gaining support in Washington. They said the money might do nothing more than put off a transformation that GM must go through to become a profitable, competitive company again. One activist investor said he would rather see the money used to help GM workers and train them for new jobs. The New York Times (12 Nov.)

Well, heck - if even shareholders are saying that it should be allowed to go bankrupt, who are we to argue?

Let the company fail, and support the workers in retraining for new jobs. Now you're talking sense.

"No" to Bailout for Automakers

Reuters poll results on the question "Should the Government bail out US Automakers?"

Yes: 25%
No: 75%

http://polls.reuters.com/us/1225981225511

That's three to one. I dare the Democrats to try. They will regret it. But lets look at this level-headedly here -there is no reason to support an industry that has had plenty of opportunity to change since they saw the writing on the wall in the 70's but they didn't for one reason or other (selling cars and SUVs was making so much money!). Well now they are paying the price. And if people don't want as many cars anymore, there's no point paying the companies to keep making them just like they were 5 years ago. We must simply accept that there will be consolidation and pain in the industry and let's do what we can to help the workers find something else to do. And the sooner the better. Build trains. The Japanese do it. The French do it. The Chinese do it. Why can't Americans? Build roads and towns that are walkable and don't even need driving. Imagine if your 10yr old kids could walk or ride a bike to school without you having to worry for their life. Imagine if you could walk to schools, shops, pools, tennis, library, doctors etc without having to get in your car everytime. Instead of being wide, open high-speed rivers of steel, exposed to the elements, imagine if most roads in the city were narrow tree-lined lanes with a canopy of tree cover, to protect pedestrians from the wind, sun and all but the hardest rain.

Imagine...

GM's `Time Is Very Short' for U.S. Government Aid, Altman Says

This is not even a veiled threat. This guy is blatantly attempting to extort money from the US public - "give us money or we will cause untold economic pain".

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aSc56MIykTVk&refer=home

Well, Altman, would you like me to suggest where you stick your cars that nobody wants any more...?

Riches to Rags

Once champions of American style "free-market" economies - auto companies are now going begging. Well, I say let them beg, and go begging. Hell, if private equity won't touch them with a ten foot barge pole, they probably have a damn good reason - why the hell should the rest of us?!

Let em fry.

Listen to this quote from Reuters HERE

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Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm, told reporters that quick loans were needed for the industry to get through the next six to 12 months.

"The bottom line is that all three automakers need some liquidity, some assistance with cash and they need it right now," Granholm said.

"The alternative is worse," Granholm said. "The alternative is the industry doesn't have access to funds and we lose a company or two. We don't want to do that."

*****************
Well DUH, if there are too many cars around, and too many car companies making things that nobody wants any more, then YEA OF COURSE you are going to lose a company or two. THAT IS THE FREE MARKET. Or don't you like the free market so much any more? Hmmm. Want us to prop up a company that makes things we don't want any more, just because it keeps people employed and the wheels of the economy turning? Now you are starting to sound like a cold-war socialist. Fat chance. Listen, either we have socialism where the people can share in the profits to society from advances in productivity, or we have capitalism where companies that don't make things people want are allowed to fail. Attempting to socialize the costs and privatize the profits is a recipe for a mighty angry citizenry.