Planning for Density in a Driverless World

Automobile-centered, low-density development was the defining feature of population growth in the United States for decades. This development pattern displaced wildlife, destroyed habitat, and contributed to a national loss of biodiversity. It also meant, eventually, that commutes and air quality worsened, a sense of local character was lost in many places, and the negative consequences of sprawl impacted an increasing percentage of the population. Those impacts led to something of a shift in the national attitude toward sprawl. More people than ever are fluent in concepts of “smart growth,” “new urbanism,” and “green building,” and with these tools and others, municipalities across the country are working to redevelop a central core, rethink failing transit systems, and promote pockets of density. Changing technology may disrupt this trend. Self-driving vehicles are expected to be widespread within the next several decades. Those vehicles will likely reduce congestion, air pollution, and deaths, and free up huge amounts of productive time in the car. These benefits may also eliminate much of the conventional motivation and rationale behind sprawl reduction. As the time-cost of driving falls, driverless cars have the potential to incentivize human development of land that, by virtue of its distance from settled metropolitan areas, had been previously untouched. From the broader ecological perspective, each human surge into undeveloped land results in habitat destruction and fragmentation, and additional loss of biological diversity. New automobile technology may therefore usher in better air quality, increased safety, and a significant threat to ecosystem health. Our urban and suburban environments have been molded for centuries to the needs of various forms of transportation. The same result appears likely to occur in response to autonomous vehicles, if proactive steps are not taken to address their likely impacts. Currently, little planning is being done to prepare for driverless technology. Actors at multiple levels, however, have tools at their disposal to help ensure that new technology does not come at the expense of the nation’s remaining natural habitats. This Article advocates for a shift in paradigm from policies that are merely anti-car to those that are pro-density, and provides suggestions for both cities and suburban areas for how harness the positive aspects of driverless cars while trying to stem the negative. Planning for density regardless of technology will help to ensure that, for the world of the future, there is actually a world

Urban transport sustainability indicators: Application of Multi-View Black-Box (MVBB) framework

In a recent work Nathan and Reddy (2011a) have proposed a Multi-view Black-box (MVBB) framework for development of sustainable development indicators (SDIs) for an urban setup. The framework is flexible to be applied to any domain or sector of urban system. In this paper the proposed MVBB framework is applied for transportation sector of Mumbai city. The paper begins with a discussion on transportation sector and its unsustainability links and trends. It outlines the concept of sustainable transportation system and reviews some of the prominent sustainable transportation indicator initiatives. In order to formalize sustainable development indicators (SDIs) for transportation sector, the study collates the indicators from literature, placed them in Mumbai's context and classified them into the three dimensions of urban sustainability-economic efficiency, social wellbeing and ecological acceptability.Sustainable transportation system, Potential indicators, Urban sustainability, MVBB, Transport indicators, Economic efficiency, Social wellbeing, Ecological acceptability

Los Angeles, Mexico City, Cubatao, and Ankara - Efficient environmental regulation : case studies of urban air pollution

The authors review the economic principles that should guide the efficient choice of targeted policies for environmental protection. They recommend policy instruments along three dimensions: (1) whether they use economic incentives; (2) whether they target environmental damage directly; and (3) whether they specify prices, quantities, or technologies. This distinction is helpful in guiding policy choices because many discussions in the economics literature on environmental policies mistakenly claim advantages for incentive-based instruments by showing, for instance, that direct policies of this sort are less costly than indirect non-incentive measures. After analyzing efficient responses to the air pollution problem, the authors come up with somewhat surprising results. For three of the cities (Ankara, Los Angeles, and Mexico City), the efficient instruments selected by this (admittedly limited) exercise are similar: indirect incentive-based policies. Only Cubatao differs in that direct non-incentive regulations are the efficient policy choice. But choosing indirect policy instruments is not without its problems. This category is the broadest one. For instance, while there is only a single direct incentive-based price instrument (emissions taxes), several indirect incentive-based price policies exist including taxes on inputs and on complementary and substitute products. Indirect policies also cannot simultaneously target the incentives to reduce waste generation, production efficiency, and reduce output to reduce pollution. A combination of indirect policies will then be required to control pollution. But if the regulatory costs of controlling additional variables are high they may outweigh the cost of monitoring and enforcing a single direct policy. Finally, indirect regulations may be accompanied by perverse incentives, such as new source bias or reduced marginal costs of polluting. Efforts to offset these perverse incentives by regulating additional variables may be subject to second-best problems: two regulations with opposite results can be costlier than no regulation at all. The main lesson the authors draw from the cases examined: Once decisions are made - whether to concentrate industry, to rely on private vehicles for transportation, to subsidize a particular energy source, or to use a certain environmental policy - they acquire a certain performance. Capital is invested and workers are trained under the prevailing laws, and these are costly to change. Los Angeles cannot reverse its emphasis on the automobile; Brazil cannot easily move its industrial center away from Cubatao; Mexico cannot quickly reduce the concentration in its capital city; and Turkey's development would suffer if energy subsidies were removed abruptly. For this reason, it is important to design policy with an eye toward longer-run concerns. It makes sense, for example, for cities such as Ankara to begin to enact policies to prevent mobile source pollution from worsening over the next decades. The authors also point out the dangers of ignoring intermedia substitution of pollutants. In places such as Cubatao, where air quality has been cleaned up, the improvement may have come at the expense of water quality or the accumulation of hazardous wastes.Environmental Economics&Policies,Energy and Environment,Transport and Environment,Economic Theory&Research,Water and Industry

The Critical Role of Public Charging Infrastructure

Editors: Peter Fox-Penner, PhD, Z. Justin Ren, PhD, David O. JermainA decade after the launch of the contemporary global electric vehicle (EV) market, most cities face a major challenge preparing for rising EV demand. Some cities, and the leaders who shape them, are meeting and even leading demand for EV infrastructure. This book aggregates deep, groundbreaking research in the areas of urban EV deployment for city managers, private developers, urban planners, and utilities who want to understand and lead change

Reducing air pollution from urban passenger transport : a framework for policy analysis

This paper develops a simple framework to analyze various pollution control strategies that have been used or are proposed in the urban passenger transport sector. The context is the declining quality of air in urban areas, which is among the serious problems associated with the rapid motorization of societies the world over. The paper examines the point of impact of different policy levers and provides a categorization of different instruments that should assist policy makers when choosing between them. A distinguishing feature of this framework is its explicit recognition of behavioral incentives, in particular, the fact that offsetting changes in consumer behavior can often undermine the original intent of particular policies. The paper is organized as follows. Section II presents the basic framework we have used to examine transport emissions. Section III reviews pollutant characteristics and their impact. The resulting policy choices are discussed in more detail in section IV. Several urban transport projects supported by the World Bank are then reviewed in section VI, and section V concludes the report.Montreal Protocol,Environmental Economics&Policies,Air Quality&Clean Air,Roads&Highways,Public Health Promotion,Roads&Highways,Urban Transport,Transport and Environment,Environmental Economics&Policies,Airports and Air Services

Bridging the Gap Between Energy and Climate Policies in Brazil: Policy Options to Reduce Energy-Related GHG Emissions

Brazil is facing a series of important policy decisions that will determine its energy future over the next several decades, with important implications for the country's economic competitiveness, the well-being of its citizens, and the global climate. The decisions concern the direction of approximately 0.5 trillion U.S. dollars of anticipated investment in energy infrastructure over the next decade -- which can either lock in carbon-intensive infrastructure, or advance Brazil's position as a leader in the low-carbon economy. This report examines Brazil's key energy-related GHG emitting sectors through a climate lens in order to offer recommendations for a more integrated approach that can more effectively reconcile energy and climate needs. It begins with an overview of Brazil's past energy and GHG emissions profiles, current pledges and future trends, and a discussion of the implications for a possible allocation of the remaining global carbon budget. Next, it reviews available scenarios for Brazil's energy-related GHG emissions in order to identify key drivers and results and compare them to a given allocation of the global carbon budget. It then focuses on the top emitting subsectors -- transport, industry, and power generation -- to identify key abatement opportunities. The report concludes with recommendations regarding a portfolio of policies and measures that could achieve both climate and energy objectives

Market-based Instruments for Environmental Policymaking in Latin America and the Caribbean: Lessons from Eleven Countries

This report is a summary of country studies in Latin America and the Caribbean, addressing the use of market-based instruments (MBIs) and command-and-control (CAC) measures for environmental management in the region. Even though MBIs can significantly add efficiency to existing CAC mechanisms, the scope of MBIs should match the countries institutional capacity to implement them. Gradual and flexible reforms are likely to succeed within the current regional context of continued institutional changes. A key function of MBIs is usually revenue collection, though it does not necessarily lead to successful environmental management. The study suggests that revenues should be channeled to local authorities for an effective MBI's implementation. The report also critiques the regular practice of international donor agencies in recommending the solutions suitable for developed countries, without considering the institutional conditions in developing countries. Further, the study explores both the successes and difficulties experienced in the region regarding regulations, macro-policies, and MBIs; the institutional frameworks of the countries under review; and, the issues considered in the design of MBIs, in order to promote a beneficial dialogue among them

Urban Goods Movement and Local Climate Action Plans: Assessing Strategies to Reduce Greenhouse Gas Emissions from Urban Freight Transportation

This report examines how freight transport/goods movement has been addressed in U.S. city climate action planning. Transportation generally is a major contributor of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, and freight transport represents a growing component of transportation’s share. Almost all climate action plans (CAPs) address transportation generally, but we wished to focus on efforts to reduce GHG emissions from freight transport specifically. We analyzed 27 advanced local CAPs to determine the degree to which freight transport was targeted in goals and strategies to reduce GHG emissions. We found only six CAPs that included direct measures or programs to reduce freight emissions. Many of the CAPs mentioned general transportation objectives such as lowering vehicle miles traveled or reducing emissions from city-owned vehicle fleets, but most did not include strategies or actions that explicitly targeted freight transport. We identified the specific strategies and actions that cities are taking to address GHG emissions from freight transport, such as working with the freight community to promote anti-idling and encourage transitions to electric and alternative fuel delivery vehicles. We also analyzed freight transport plans relevant for the same cities, and found that most do not explicitly mention reducing GHG emissions. Most of the freight plans are focused on improving reliability and efficiency of freight movement, which would likely have the ancillary benefit of reducing GHG emissions, but that goal was not explicitly targeted in most of these plans. Based on our findings, we recommend that cities specifically target freight transport goals and strategies in their CAPs and better coordinate with planners developing freight transport plans to identify GHG emission reduction approaches

Fiscal policy instruments for reducing congestion and atmospheric emissions in the transport sector : a review

This paper reviews the literature on the fiscal policy instruments commonly used to reduce transport sector externalities. The findings show that congestion charges would reduce vehicle traffic by 9 to 12 percent and significantly improve environmental quality. The vehicle tax literature suggests that every 1 percent increase in vehicle taxes would reduce vehicle miles by 0.22 to 0.45 percent and CO2 emissions by 0.19 percent. The fuel tax is the most common fiscal policy instrument; however its primary objective is to raise government revenues rather than to reduce emissions and traffic congestion. Although subsidizing public transportation is a commonpractice, reducing emissions has not been the primary objective of such subsidies. Nevertheless, it is shown that transport sector emissions would be higher in the absence of both public transportation subsidies and fuel taxation. Subsidies are also the main policy tool for the promotion of clean fuels and vehicles. Although some studies are very critical of biofuel subsidies, the literature is mostly supportive of clean vehicle subsidies.Transport Economics Policy&Planning,Environmental Economics&Policies,Transport and Environment,Taxation&Subsidies,Transport in Urban Areas

Bus rapid transit

Effective public transit is central to development. For the vast majority of developing city residents, public transit is the only practical means to access employment, education, and public services, especially when such services are beyond the viable distance of walking or cycling. Unfortunately, the current state of public transit services in developing cities often does little to serve the actual mobility needs of the population. Bus services are too often unreliable, inconvenient and dangerous. In response, transport planners and public officials have sometimes turned to extremely costly mass transit alternatives such as rail-based metros. Due to the high costs of rail infrastructure, cities can only construct such systems over a few kilometres in a few limited corridors. The result is a system that does not meet the broader transport needs of the population. Nevertheless, the municipality ends up with a long-term debt that can affect investment in more pressing areas such as health, education, water, and sanitation. However, there is an alternative between poor public transit service and high municipal debt. Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) can provide high-quality, metro-like transit service at a fraction of the cost of other options. This document provides municipal officials, non-governmental organizations, consultants, and others with an introduction to the concept of BRT as well as a step-by-step process for successfully planning a BRT system