Child and Youth Friendly Land-Use and Transport Planning - Part 2

Last year we posted about Child and Youth Friendly Land-Use and Transport Planning. Anyway, we received the following in our South Fraser OnTrax Mailbox:

Over the last few years, the Centre for Sustainable Transportation at the University of Winnipeg has been developing ‘Child- and Youth-Friendly Guidelines for Land-use and Transport Planning.’ The Guidelines are primarily for the use of municipalities, specifically councillors, their planning staff and consultants. This work is funded by the Public Health Agency of Canada, whose interest is in fostering environments in which children and youth are more active.

The aim is to have one set of Guidelines for all of Canada, but a different Guidelines document for each province, reflecting particular circumstances and legislative contexts. Each provincial document is being developed through a process of consultation, including numerous meetings with officials, sharing of drafts, and one or more workshops.

This is a note to let you and your colleagues know that a new, near-final draft (Draft 5) of the British Columbia version of Child- and Youth Friendly Land-Use and Transport Planning Guidelines can be downloaded from the project’s Web site at http://www.kidsonthemove.ca (click on BC in the list on the right of the home page). There is more information about the project at the Web site. If there is difficulty in downloading the document, contact me at mail@richardgilbert.ca and I will be pleased to email the document.

Our deadline for producing all the provincial documents is March 31, 2010, and so we would appreciate receiving comments by March 12.

Our last task will be to produce a brief bilingual document entitled ‘Canadian Guidelines for Child- and Youth-Friendly Land-use and Transport Planning.’

With many thanks in advance for your cooperation,

Richard Gilbert
Research Associate
Centre for Sustainable Transportation
University of Winnipeg

Ministry of Transportation and Infrastructure Service Plan

I read the Ministry of Transportation and Infrastructure Service Plan for the next few years and wanted to share some highlights. The first highlight is the almost schizophrenic messaging in the service plan. On one hand it talks about the need to reduce carbon emissions, improve transit, and reduce single-occupancy vehicle usage:

Transportation accounts for about 40 per cent of the greenhouse gas emissions in the province; automobiles alone account for 16 per cent and provincial strategies for reducing emissions must entail significant investment in transit infrastructure and services and cycling facilities.

On the other hand, the Ministry of Transportation primary mandate is to “builds highway infrastructure to fulfill the economic and social needs of British Columbians.” This is evident by the list of projects that the Ministry’s plans for the next few years.

If we look at the operating budget spending, $103m will go to transit (up from 2009), $169m for BC Ferries (down from 2009), and $459 (down from 2009) for highways. I have to give credit to the fact the transit operating spending is one of the few areas in the Ministry's budget that will be increasing.

On the capital side of the budget:

Oil and Gas Rural Road Improvement Program – Rehabilitating the existing public road infrastructure in the Northeast region of the province to help eliminate seasonal road restrictions and extend the winter drilling season for oil and gas exploration, thereby attracting new investment and creating jobs. This rehabilitation is being done in partnership with the Ministry of Energy, Mines and Petroleum Resources. An investment of $51 million will be made in 2010/11.

It seems like the province wants to reduce carbon emission and increase carbon emission sources at the same time.

Bike BC – Identifying and building cycling facilities of regional and provincial significance while continuing to assist local governments to develop their local networks. Bike BC is a comprehensive provincial cycling investment plan, which will complement the Provincial Transit Plan in reducing traffic congestion and greenhouse gas emissions by providing convenient and attractive alternatives to car travel. Bike BC will also improve public health and fitness by promoting physical activity. The Ministry will be investing $18 million over three years to help make cycling a safe and attractive alternative transportation option for commuters. This investment will be further leveraged through cost-sharing agreements with local governments. Additionally, the Gateway Program includes a $50 million investment to construct cycling facilities on the Gateway corridors, and the Provincial Transit Plan will establish up to 1,000 new bike lockers at key locations by 2020.

As I pointed out before, $863m of spending will go to roads and $173m to transit or about 16% of spending on transit in 2010/11. If we want to dramatically increase transit usage it only follows that funding will also need to increase. BC is a big province and a large chunk of money in the transportation budget is going into keeping roads from falling apart in the interior, but if the province truly wants to increase transit usage in major urban centres, transit spending will need to increase.

Next SFOT Meeting

Next Wednesday, March 10 at 7:00pm South Fraser OnTrax will be hosting our monthly meeting. We will have special guest Eliza Olson who is the founding president of the Burns Bog Conservation Society. She will be speaking on the importance of Burns Bog for the ecosystem in Metro Vancouver and some of the challenges that it currently faces. This is sure to be an informative night. See you next week!

Details:
Wed, March 10, 7pm – 9pm
Yorkson Creek Meeting Room
Township of Langley Civic Facility, 4th Floor 20338-65 Avenue, Langley, BC

BC Budget Transportation Overview

Well, I had a look at the Provincial 2010/2011 budget and wanted to point out some of the transportation highlights and spending. You can also view a copy of the budget for yourself.

First let’s look at transportation capital projects over $50 that have been approved by the Treasury Board (basically projects being built right now).

For Transit: $0
For Roads: $4.5 billion
-Port Mann Bridge and Highway 1 Expansion: $3.3 billion
-South Fraser Perimeter Road: $1.1 billion
-Sierra Yoyo-Desan Road (Northern BC): $187 million

Things look bleak for transit.

Now if we look at “in-the-works”, smaller spending, and operating costs for the next three years:

For roads there is $1.8 billion
26% for rehabilitation, 40% for interior and northern roads, 18% for the Gateway Program, and 16% for other road projects.

For transit there is $822 million
-Evergreen Line: $302 million
-Rapid Transit Projects (Rapid Bus on Highway 1, 7, 99, and in Kelowna; Faregates and Smartcards on SkyTrain): $224 million
-News Buses and Other Projects: $216 million

For cycling there is $9 million which could build about 450km of bike lanes.

About 30% of the BC Budget's 3-Year Plan and 13% in total is committed to sustainable transportation. This isn't very good. The South Fraser gets more buses and no light rail. Also, no way to pay for operating these new buses as TransLink is broke. Cycling funding is very minimal. Maybe the 2011 budget will have money for light rail given the success of the Olympic Line Streetcar?

From Transportation Minister Shirley Bond in the Vancouver Sun:

"We have an incredible incentive after seeing the success of the Canada Line, in particular, during the Winter Games," Bond said. "The transportation system worked exceptionally well."

Transit saves you money

When looking at the benefits of a transportation project, planning types usually use the value of time as an indicator of economic benefit. Example:

Let’s say that time is worth $20 an hour or 33₵ per minute. If 200,000 people-a-day save 5 minutes-a-day for a year, you can say that Project G has an economic benefit of $120 million a year. (PS: this is what was done for the Gateway Program.)

Sadly time savings may not be as important to people as we think. (Otherwise people would be living closers to where they work and commuting less which is not the case save for Vancouver) Todd Litman from the Victoria Transport Policy Institute looked a the real economic benefit of providing high-quality transit. First off, there are two kinds of transit users: captive users (travelers who lack alternatives) and discretionary users. Basic transit does not attract discretionary users. He found that:

This report uses data from U.S. cities to investigate the incremental costs and benefits of high quality transit service. It indicates that high quality public transit typically requires about $268 in additional subsidies and $104 in additional fares annually per capita, but provides vehicle, parking and road cost savings averaging $1,040 per capita, plus other benefits including congestion reductions, increased traffic safety, pollution reductions, improved mobility for non-drivers, improved fitness and health.

Click table to enlarge

So high-quality transit saves $664 per capita annually in actual cash that you can put back in your pocket. Remind me again why we aren’t building more transit?

The Transit Games

I have to say that the last two weeks have been lots of fun. Working downtown, I was able to catch some of the party of these games during the weekday. And of course, I went downtown on the weekend. Even Langley shared in the spirit. I regularly saw the 502 from Aldergrove half-full of Olympic volunteers. If I could say anything about these games, it really was the transit games.

From the beginning of our Olympic bid, the plan was to get people throughout our region on transit and it worked! Sure there were some lineups and even some hot tempers, but all in all it was a very good experience. I have to thank the people of TransLink (and all the operating companies) for a job well done. In fact, I actually got home in better time on transit during the games than regularly due to the added transit service (even on the 502.) It’s sad that these enhanced services are going away. If there was one transit gem during the games, it would be the Olympic Line streetcar that ran between Granville Island and the Olympic Village Canada Line station. Talk about traveling in style: leather seats, wood paneling, and even leather straps to hold onto when standing. The Olympic Line streetcar really opened people’s eyes to what transit can be. You don’t have to break the bank to have good quality services. I hope people's experience on the streetcar will translate into more streetcars being built in our region and the South Fraser. It will be interesting to see how this factors into the transit funding issue currently facing our region. Will people be willing to pay more money for improved service and expansion? Vancouver actually closed down major roads and things worked great. Getting around in a car wasn’t even that bad. I had to drive around for work during the games and experienced very little delay. So let’s get on with building transit, as the games proved, it's worth every penny.

Many have called this Olympics the friendliest games ever and commented on the party atmosphere downtown. This is not chance, but almost by design. Vancouver has a strong sense of place and downtown is all about the pedestrian. Even without the games, downtown Vancouver draws you in. This should be a reminder to our politicians in the South Fraser that building around people is better than building around the car.

US EPA and Climate Change

Well things are getting a bit interesting in the US with greenhouse gas (GHG) reduction regulation. Since 1955, the US has had a clean air act in some form to regulate air pollution. The task of enforcing this act falls into the hands of the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). In April 2007, the US Supreme Court found that greenhouse gases are air pollutants covered by the Clean Air Act and that the EPA had an obligation to regulate GHG. In December 2009, the EPA signed two findings:

-Endangerment Finding: The Administrator finds that the current and projected concentrations of the six key well-mixed greenhouse gases--carbon dioxide (CO2), methane (CH4), nitrous oxide (N2O), hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs), perfluorocarbons (PFCs), and sulfur hexafluoride (SF6)--in the atmosphere threaten the public health and welfare of current and future generations.

-Cause or Contribute Finding: The Administrator finds that the combined emissions of these well-mixed greenhouse gases from new motor vehicles and new motor vehicle engines contribute to the greenhouse gas pollution which threatens public health and welfare.

So now the EPA has developed a set of regulations that will be phased in over the next few years. Starting in 2011 larger stationary emitters (like power plants, factories, etc.) will be regulated. In 2016, smaller stationary emitter will start being regulated. On the automobile front, the EPA will regulate GHG emissions starting with 2012 model year light-duty vehicles. You can read more about this in a letter on the EPA’s website.

Of course this has thrown some groups into a tizzy. Many are claiming that jobs will be lost, and the US will go without electricity, etc. Here is a snip-it from the Politico.

In the House, Rep. Earl Pomeroy (D-N.D.) has introduced legislation amending the Clean Air Act to exclude greenhouse gases — a radical revision of the country’s pollution regulations.

Another powerful lobbying coalition led by the National Association of Manufacturers and including the American Petroleum Institute and the National Association of Home Builders submitted a separate filing.

“These costly burdens and uncertainty will stifle job creation and harm our competiveness in a global economy,” John Engler, NAM president, said in a statement.

Permanently close the Georgia and Dunsmuir viaducts?

As we've been saying for some time on this blog, traffic (whether transit, cars, or cycling) is like a gas and will expend to fill the resources provided. Well according to the Vancouver Sun, there has been a 30% reduction in vehicle traffic since the beginning of the Olympic Games. Roads have been closed and transit has increased, this makes total sense. There is now a request to study closing the Georgia and Dunsmuir viaducts and replacing them with local roads.

Coun. Geoff Meggs said the swarms of people walking, cycling and taking transit downtown during the Games is proof they can live without the viaducts, which he suggests should be knocked down and replaced with local traffic connector roads.

The city, which has agreed to study Meggs' proposal, is expected to issue a request for proposals after the Games, likely in April, he said.

Of course we will need improved transit, but sadly TransLink will be cutting services after the games.

At that time, the system will revert to its previous service levels, meaning West Coast Express will no longer run on weekends, the third SeaBus won't be in service and TransLink will retire the extra 180 buses that have been used to help ease overcrowding and waits.

Robertson said as transit service reverts to previous levels, "the case-building starts for more funding for TransLink."

Climate Change makes my Allergies Worse

Over the past month, I’ve been listening to lectures on sustainability on iTunes U from the University of New Hampshire. A few days ago, I was listening to Paul R. Epstein talking about human health and climate change. His research appeared in the New England Journal of Medicine.

Not surprising, climate change is not good for human health. Extreme weather events will increase with climate change. Extreme precipitation increases the risk of waterborne disease while droughts can cause a food shortages. It will be the poorer countries that will sufferer the most of course.

Mosquitoes, which can carry many diseases, are very sensitive to temperature changes. Warming of their environment - within their viable range - boosts their rates of reproduction and the number of blood meals they take, prolongs their breeding season, and shortens the maturation period for the microbes they disperse.

West Nile virus' rapid spread, according to Epstein, is attributed to climate change. On the positive side, the crow population has seen a large reduction in numbers which has actually increased biodiversity with other song-birds coming back.

The most interesting piece of information was the connection between climate change and allergies.

But even more subtle, gradual climatic changes can damage human health. During the past two decades, the prevalence of asthma in the United States has quadrupled, in part because of climate-related factors. For Caribbean islanders, respiratory irritants come in dust clouds that emanate from Africa's expanding deserts and are then swept across the Atlantic by trade winds accelerated by the widening pressure gradients over warming oceans. Increased levels of plant pollen and soil fungi may also be involved. When ragweed is grown in conditions with twice the ambient level of carbon dioxide, the stalks sprout 10 percent taller than controls but produce 60 percent more pollen. Elevated carbon dioxide levels also promote the growth and sporulation of some soil fungi, and diesel particles help to deliver these aeroallergens deep into our alveoli and present them to immune cells along the way.

I guess me and my inhaler are going to become better friends in the future. Check out the full article in the New England Journal of Medicine.

Scientific Consensus - Climate Change is real and we did it.

Last year, there was a wild frenzy in November called Climategate when email messages from two climate researchers were hacked conveniently before the Copenhagen Summit. Because of these emails, some people decided that all we know on climate change is a lie and part of a large global conspiracy, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) front and centre, to force us to clean up the earth. This of course caused me some concern, so I decided to do some research.

First many people think that the IPCC is some big government organization. This is not the case. The IPCC is an organization that compiles all the research from climate scientist on climate change every few years. In fact, the IPCC has a small staff of about 10 people. The IPCC has working groups of volunteers who compile the research. This is basically how most standards bodies work like ANSI, ISO, and SMPTE. On the topic of IPCC reports, the last IPCC Fourth Assessment Report had “450 scientists from 130 countries served as Lead Authors. Another 800 served as contributing authors. More than 2500 experts provided over 90,000 review comments.” That is what I would call a pretty thorough report!

On the topic of thorough, some people would have you believe that there is no scientific consensus on human-caused climate change. While only half of the general population believes that climate change is caused by humans, research by Peter T . Doran and Maggie Kendall Zimmerman in the Earth and Environmental Sciences department at the University of Illinois at Chicago found that 97.4% of people that research and publish on climate believe it is human caused. That sounds like scientific consensus to me. Download the research from our document archive.

Questions: 1. When compared with pre-1800s levels, do you think that mean global temperatures have generally risen, fallen, or remained relatively constant? 2. Do you think human activity is a significant contributing factor in changing mean global temperatures?

The time for debate on climate change is over, we need to start acting today. It’s not all doom and gloom either. Greening our planet is good for our pocketbooks. Green jobs pay more than traditional jobs, and we’ve barely tapped into market for green. Just think of how many photovoltaic cells (solar panels), sustainably managed forest products, sustainability engineers, green building experts, and the list goes on, that the world needs.