In New York political time, four years passes fast. But hey, in Bogotá, Enrique Peñalosa was limited to a single three-year term as mayor, during which he built dozens of new schools and libraries, converted a golf course to a public park, laid down 100 miles of bike paths, and of course, built the Transmilenio, the system against which Bus Rapid Transit aspirants worldwide are measured.

Bogotá built out most of the TransMilenio system during Enrique Peñalosa's single three-year term. Photo of estación Jiménez: Joan Byron.

Transportation policy under Bloomberg 3.0: Money's not the problem

The next set of BRT routes needs to fearlessly go where no bus has gone before.

And real BRT will be transformative. New York City today is home to 758,000 workers who travel over an hour each way to reach their jobs. Two-thirds of these folks are going to jobs where they earn less than $35,000. That's not a coincidence -- look at a map, and you'll quickly see that the places poor and working-class people can afford to live are those least well-served by the subway system.

Click to view full versions of the Pratt Center's maps depicting where NYC jobs are clustered, and where workers in different sectors live.

Jobs in health care, retail, construction, and manufacturing are spread across the city and the region, as opposed to the high-wage sectors concentrated in the Manhattan core. Manufacturing and distribution jobs are especially isolated from the transit network. Talk to workers (or employers) and you'll hear about dollar vans, livery cabs, employer-paid shuttles, and other work-arounds for a transit system that bypasses these vital centers of living-wage, blue-collar employment. The hospital belt in Central Brooklyn -- SUNY Downstate, Kings County, Kingsbrook, and Brookdale -- employs 18,250 New York City residents. More than 35,000 New Yorkers work at JFK airport, but most of them drive there, because the transit connections are expensive and inefficient.

So here's the good news. DOT and the MTA are on the right track, and they're picking up speed. Jay Walder really understands the importance of buses -- with good reason, since much of London is built at densities comparable to Brooklyn, Queens, and the Bronx, with subway coverage to match. In London, buses are now a primary mode, prioritized by street space allocation, enforcement, and technology. DOT and the MTA have stated their mutual commitment to making New York's bus system perform for its 2.3 million daily riders. Last year, DOT Commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan announced that the agencies would complete their 5-route "BRT Phase 1" by 2013, and simultaneously develop plans for "BRT Phase 2." These additional 8-10 routes would combine with Phase 1 to create a citywide network connecting underserved residential neighborhoods and employment centers, shortening at least some of the city’s worst commutes. This summer, the agencies launched a workshop series that was a great first step in engaging affected communities in the earliest steps of their planning process for BRT Phase 2.

The key ingredient: Vision

Aside from a relatively modest level of investment, what we need now is vision. There's no shortage of that at either DOT or the MTA. These are the folks who brought us the Bx12, the modestly-named "Select Bus Service" that has chopped 20 minutes off thousands of Bronx commuters' trips, and done so with little more than ingenuity and duct tape.

DOT, the MTA, and advocates need not only to get boots on the ground, but to get listening ears into neighborhoods. Pay attention.

But even the clearest BRT vision will be gridlocked without political support, and the will within the administration to build it. What we also need, and what may be in short supply for Bloomberg 3.0, is more than political capital (this administration is nothing if not savvy about transactional politics). Far-reaching changes to our streets and transit system will require the kind of support you grow from scratch, by getting out there, talking with the people you know you're trying to help, but who may have competing priorities, different perspectives and past experiences with this administration that have fueled their skepticism.

As we learned in working on congestion pricing, you don't surmount those barriers by trying to steamroll legislators with artificial deadlines, or by herding "advocates" (yes, Streetsblog readers and contributors, that would be us) around 250 Broadway and the Capitol to deliver a consultant-crafted message. I only know one way to build the kind of support that both BRT and the transformation of our streets will need. It’s basically Organizing 101: You meet people where they are. If legislators don't have our issues at the top of their list, it may well be that their constituents are more worried about their housing, their jobs, and their kids. Dissing and dismissing electeds who don't put "our" issues at the top of their agenda is not just unhelpful -- it widens the class and racial gap between an "elitist" Livable Streets Movement and everybody else.

New Yorkers have just elected a feisty new class of City Council members -- and re-elected incumbents -- who are likely to be less pliant than their predecessors. This could be the best thing that ever happened for equity in the causes of transportation and livable streets, if we can re-connect with the social and environmental justice roots of our work, and shed some of our elitist baggage.

DOT, the MTA, and advocates need not only to get boots on the ground, but to get listening ears into neighborhoods. Pay attention. If the arguments of pols demagoguing against good initiatives from the agency gain traction, it's coming from someplace. Perhaps it's a response to past failures to deal with pressing neighborhood issues -- like truck traffic, hideously bad local air quality, and so on. Get out there, learn about what people are living with, and meet them where they are. Work with local organizations that are credible because they've been listening to their communities, and don’t treat community-based organizations as messengers to "help us get the word out," but as partners whose input adds value and whose concerns get addressed.

I don't know what the internal budget and management constraints might be, but my fondest hope for BRT, as well as for the expansion of safe space for the vast majority who walk, bike, and take transit, is that NYC DOT will find the means to double, triple, or quadruple the number of field and office staff who work in these essential areas, and deploy these folks in the neighborhoods where most New Yorkers live, where people are being run over by cars and trucks, where kids can’t play for fear of asthma attacks, where workers are waiting for packed buses. In short, where people are literally dying for the kind of attention that’s been paid to high-profile areas in Midtown. When organizations from those neighborhoods step forward with both their problems and their ideas for solutions, they shouldn't be told to wait for their turn, which will be sometime next year.

In short, to NYC DOT under Bloomberg 3.0: Keep doing what you're doing. But do it faster, cover more ground, and devote acute attention and resources to the most underserved communities in the city. If you do it right, you can be assured that those communities will have your back.

Image: Census Bureau via Economix

Bike Pittsburgh has posted some great, sortable data about how commuters get to work in major American cities, drawn from a Census Bureau report. As you'd expect, New York comes in as the city where the least amount of people commute solo by car -- only 23.3 percent, followed by 37.2 percent in Washington, D.C. and 38.4 percent in San Francisco. Wichita, Kansas ranks as the place with the highest percentage of drivers: 85.1 percent of commuters use a car to get to work. The unfortunate national median for commuting by car is 74.15 percent.

There's also an interesting chart on bike commuting trends by gender, in response to a Scientific American article which posits that cycling needs to be made more attractive to women in order to boost overall urban cycling numbers. The argument seems to check out: according to Bike Pittsburgh's data, even in cities with relatively high levels of bike commuters, men cycle to work significantly more than women.

Data: IBM's CPI

When asked what value they would place on every 15 minutes sliced from their daily commute, 36.5 percent of CPI respondents said between $10 and $20. That's about five times the recent trading price of a ton of carbon emissions on the nation's climate-change exchanges.

And the price of a shorter commute was higher in more congested cities. In Los Angeles, 22 percent of residents said every 15 minutes not spent en route to work would be worth between $31 and $40 -- or more than $100 per hour.

What does the data mean? For one thing, those who fear that voters would revolt if asked to pay more for a more efficient, less congested transport network shouldn't let that stop policy-making. As every successful politician knows (and the president is re-learning on health care), messaging is the key to winning over the public.

In other words, Democrats who feign unwillingness to subject voters to higher gas taxes are ignoring their ability to control the message. When a greater contribution to transportation is pitched as a way to shorten commutes and give workers more free time, the prospect becomes more desirable.

And it's not that lawmakers don't know how to decrease congestion, particularly in the urban areas that were polled to produce the CPI. Reducing the number of car trips and lowering demand during peak travel times are proven to be a cheaper and more effective method of battling congestion than expanding highway capacity.

Is it time to nickname the White House's Sustainable Communities Initiative the "Shorter Commutes Initiative"?

Cyclist Rachael Myers, a librarian from the Bronx, won Transportation Alternatives' 8th Annual Great NYC Commuter Race this morning, taking 20 minutes and 15 seconds to cover the 4.2 mile route between Aubergine Café in Sunnyside, Queens and Columbus Circle in Manhattan. Transit rider Dan Hendrick (35:16) finished second, with taxi rider Willie Thompson (47:11) bringing up the rear.

"As soon as I saw all the traffic backed up on the Queensboro Bridge, I knew this wasn't going to be a fair fight," boasted Myers, who rode her Iro bicycle to victory. "I actually was able to finish a cup of coffee before anyone else made it to the finish line."

"I ride the subway to work from Sunnyside every day, and I'm a die-hard transit rider," said Dan Hendrick of the New York League of Conservation Voters, who took the 7 and 1 trains. "Still, I'm trying to wrap my brain around what I would do with an extra 15 minutes every morning."

"Anytime I'm in a hurry, I take a cab thinking it'll get me there the fastest. I can't believe I lost by 27 minutes today," said Willie Thompson, a marketing specialist who took a yellow cab.

Congratulations to Rachael (who, unlike last year's winner, didn't have to compete against the currently vacationing Bike Snob).

Photo: Department of City Planning [PDF].

We've said it before and it's certainly worth repeating: This zoning change is a good step forward that will bear fruit in the long run; the missing piece -- and it's a big one -- is bike access to existing buildings. To that end, the Bicycle Access Bill (Intro 871) would provide a much more substantial and immediate benefit to bike commuters by allowing them to bring their rides inside the workplace, if their employer consents. The legislation aims to reverse the policies of New York City landlords and property managers, most of whom don't allow bikes inside. By drastically reducing the risk of theft, the bill could boost bike commuting by as much as 50 percent.

After holding a committee hearing on Intro 871 last fall, legislators are currently tweaking the bill's language. We have a request in with sponsor David Yassky's office to determine when the revised bill will come up in committee.

It’s easy to dismiss City Councilmembers Lew Fidler and Peter Vallone, Jr. as transportation troglodytes. They’ve led the pushback against bridge tolls -- most recently at the City Council hearing this week on the Ravitch Commission recommendations -- yet neither has ever put forth a workable alternative for reducing job-killing, community-wrecking traffic congestion. Judging by their anti-toll rhetoric, you’d think that half their district drives to jobs in the Manhattan Central Business District, yet the actual percentages who do so are surprisingly meager: 5.3 percent for Fidler’s Brooklyn district and 4.4 percent for Vallone’s Queens district (plus another 1.7 percent and 1.3 percent, respectively, who carpool).

But in one respect, bridge-toll opponents may have a point: tolling equity. According to my calculations, 60 percent of the proposed Ravitch bridge tolls would be paid by Brooklyn and Queens residents. Yet these residents make only 36 percent of car trips into the CBD. The disparity would mean a hefty cross-subsidy -- worth a few hundred million dollars a year -- of the region's drivers by drivers from these two boroughs.

Whence the disparity? There are two sources. First, the Ravitch plan imposes no new tolls on auto trips into the Manhattan core that come from New Jersey and northern Manhattan; these constitute almost one-quarter of the total. Second, another 20% of trips into the CBD -- from Bronx, Westchester and other points north -- use one of the Harlem River bridges. Ravitch wants those drivers to pay less than half the standard MTA toll rate that would apply to the four East River crossings -- the Brooklyn, Manhattan, Williamsburg and Queensboro Bridges.

Under the Bloomberg congestion pricing plan, Brooklyn and Queens actually bore a fairer share of the burden than in the Ravitch plan, in spite of Bloomberg's controversial “toll-net” provision that heavily discounted autos from New Jersey. Even so, under Bloomberg’s plan, auto trips from Brooklyn and Queens, 36 percent of the total into the CBD, would have accounted for 40 percent of toll revenues, making almost a 1-to-1 match-up. That may explain why Councilmember John Liu, from Queens, voted for the mayor’s plan but is blasting the bridge tolls provision in the Ravitch plan.

Was Bloomberg's congestion pricing proposal the last word on geographical equity? Hardly. There’s no need for a cordon toll plan to include toll-nets. Nor should it give Manhattanites a free pass; an easy-to-administer surcharge on fares for medallion taxis, which are overwhelmingly used by Manhattan residents, could swell the toll-revenue pie and spread it over a broader population and income base.

Can’t someone fashion a plan along those lines? Hmm, maybe someone already has.

From the NBC web site:

Tiki Barber: Doesn’t drive anymore, and no longer takes taxis. When he travels for work, he rents a hybrid vehicle. Relies on mass transit while in New York City -- buses and the subway. And he’s found that taking mass transit is more efficient than driving or taking a cab.

Collinsworth and Barber join fellow sports stars Sean Avery (and teammates), Cliff Lee, and several Baltimore Orioles in car-free commuting. How about it, Jeter?

Note to Tiki and Cris: Streetfilms would love to film your commute. Contact Clarence if you're up for it.

Photo: NBC

The ribbon cutting for the $2.8 billion project was attended by Congressman John Culberson and Governor Rick Perry. The Houston Chronicle was there and got some choice quotes.

"This project, for all intents and purposes, is complete," announced Delvin Dennis, interim director of the Texas Department of Transportation's Houston District. "Tomorrow morning the (high occupancy-toll) lanes open. If you're not doing anything, take a ride on them."

Perry noted the roar of traffic below, above and around the crowd, which was gathered on a frontage road overpass.

"This is the sound of freedom we hear," he said. "These people need roads to get to work, to church and to school."

One kind of freedom Texans don't need, according to the state and Rep. Culberson, is freedom of choice.

Despite its size, the widened freeway adds "just one new 'free' lane, a pair of toll lanes and no significant transit improvement," said Robin Holzer, chair of the grass-roots Citizens Transportation Coalition.

"Too bad it does not have a space for a commuter rail like our design did," said environmental attorney Jim Blackburn, who tried unsuccessfully to force the state to revise its plans, add mass transit and lessen the project's impact on neighborhoods.

Some still hold out hope for the addition of light rail -- the transit authority chipped in to have overpasses reinforced for train traffic. But the Chronicle reports that Culberson, "whose ability to get federal dollars was crucial to the widening project, pledged not to give up a single freeway lane for Metro rail."

Culberson may not have much of a say after January, though, depending on the outcome of his tightening race for re-election. As it happens, Culberson challenger Michael Skelly made his fortune in wind energy.

Photo: Federal Highway Administration

In a post on Mobilizing the Region yesterday, TSTC says it's time to build on the success of the much traveled Manhattan-bound express bus lane:

The Lincoln Tunnel’s Manhattan-bound XBL is the busiest bus lane in the country, carrying 1,700 buses with over 62,000 passengers on weekday mornings. In fact, it is so popular that it is now congested at times, though it still speeds bus times by 15-20 minutes according to the Port Authority. This has prompted the Authority to study the creation of a bus/high occupancy toll (HOT) lane in the tunnel to alleviate gridlock on the bus priority route.

However, there has been less discussion on how to improve evening rush hour traffic into NJ, which is actually worse. During the average evening peak period (4-7 pm), nearly 15,000 cars travel westbound into NJ; by comparison, around 13,900 cars enter NYC during the morning rush (7-10am). Usage of a Jersey-bound XBL (which would either replace an NJ-bound general purpose lane or be a contraflow lane carved out of NY-bound traffic) would almost certainly rival that of the morning XBL, providing real benefits for the largest share of trans-Hudson commuters and creating further incentives to commute by mass transit.

A Jersey-bound XBL would also help to alleviate some of the problems that the new blocking-the-box crackdown is meant to address. Some of the worst box-blocking hotspots are in Hell's Kitchen, where cars line up for block after block on their way out of Manhattan through the Lincoln Tunnel.

For more ideas about improving bus service on bridges and tunnels, see Cap'n Transit's series on the topic.

Photo of NJTransit bus leaving Manhattan via Lincoln Tunnel: Jumpy/Wikimedia Commons/MTR

Fans are accustomed to the players' lot being filled with expensive rides -- sports cars, HUVs, private jets. But you should check out the clubhouse sometime, or the weight room. There are enough bikes parked there to hold the Tour de France. I keep waiting for players to change into yellow jerseys, though that honor probably should be delayed until they're in first place.

At last count, the cyclists include Guthrie, Luke Scott, Aubrey Huff, Brian Burres, Garrett Olson and Lance Cormier. Nick Markakis dropped out after buying a house in Monkton.

Orioles pitcher Jeremy Guthrie rides to Camden Yards six days a week during long homestands (on Sundays his wife drops him off after church). Here's how he sees it:

"There are some side benefits," Guthrie said. "It's the overall idea of being outside and exercising instead of driving. I hate cars, I hate driving, I hate doing something I don't have to do. For me to drive downtown is a waste of gas; it's a waste of my time. I can ride faster than I can drive."

Granted, he doesn't yet wield the star power of Ford Mustang salesman Derek Jeter or Cadillac Escalade salesman Tiki Barber, but Guthrie's showing he's got the potential to be a force in the big leagues. Trek, Breezer, Specialized: Why not sign this guy up as a spokesman? And don't forget New York Rangers center Sean Avery while you're at it.

Quick, what do a global financial firm and a neighborhood bakery have in common? Bike-friendliness, as you may have guessed. Credit Suisse and Birdbath Neighborhood Green Bakery were recognized by the city today in the first annual Bike-Friendly Business Competition. Credit Suisse won top honors in the "Commuting Cyclists" category for its sterling indoor bike facilities. Birdbath took the prize for "Working Cyclists" thanks to its use of cargocycles to make deliveries.

The winners were announced at a ceremony held by DOT and Transportation Alternatives. "Employers hold many of the cards when it comes to making New York City a bike-friendly place," said T.A.'s Paul Steely White. "When they support bike commuters or conduct business by bicycle, they make it that much easier for New Yorkers to do the right thing."

A photo of Credit Suisse's marble-walled bike parking room comes after the jump.

The Credit Suisse "Bike Spa." From the press release about the awards:

At its buildings at 24 East 24th Street and at One Madison Avenue in Manhattan, Credit Suisse’s entrances provide easy access for those with bicycles. Employees also have access to secure bicycle rooms where they can register their bikes and receive swipe-card access, along with bike identification tags. Air pumps to fill flat tires are located in the room, which also displays promotional materials for cycling activities. Credit Suisse promotes the availability of bike parking to its employees, and they are further encouraged by an employee discount to a health club next door, where showers and lockers are available.

The winners pose with Paul Steely White and DOT Commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan. 

What's happening here goes a lot deeper than the end of cheap oil. We are now passing through the early development of a wholly new geographic order – what geographers call “the spatial fix” – of which the move back toward the city is just one part.

Suburbanization was the spatial fix for the industrial age – the geographic expression of mass production. Low-cost mortgages, massive highway systems and suburban infrastructure projects fuelled the industrial engine of postwar capitalism, propelling demand for cars, appliances and all sorts of industrial goods.

The creative economy is giving rise to a new spatial fix and a very different geography – the contours of which are only now emerging. Rising fuel costs are one thing, but in today's idea-driven economy, it's time costs that really matter. With the constant pressure to be more efficient and to innovate, it makes little sense to waste countless collective hours commuting. So the most efficient and productive regions are the ones in which people are thinking and working – not sitting in traffic. And, according to detailed research by the Nobel Prize-winning economist Daniel Kahneman, commuting is among the least enjoyable, if not the single least enjoyable, of all human activities.

The results are fascinating. Annual price changes in most of the largest metro areas, including New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Miami, San Francisco, Seattle, Baltimore, Washington D.C., and Philadelphia, followed a similar pattern: Values were most stable within a 10-mile radius of the center of the city, but generally worsened with each successive radius ring as far as 50 miles from the center of the city.

"There's a pretty clear pattern of neighborhoods close to the urban core holding their values better than neighborhoods in suburban and exurban communities," said Stan Humphries, Zillow's vice-president of data and analytics. "Where there is a lot of supply and demand changes, there's a quicker effect on housing prices." 

It may seem obvious by now that rising gas prices are affecting decisions about where to live, but don't tell that to the editors at Money. As Greater Greater Washington blogger David Alpert points out, the magazine's latest list of America's best places to live skews heavily toward the sprawling, suburban side. Of course, Money's readers can probably absorb a spike in transportation costs without too much hardship, which may explain why they don't factor it into their rankings.

A completely different picture emerges from Money's own online series about how people are adapting to more expensive gas. The short profiles read like a public service campaign for living arrangements where cars are not required to make even the most basic trips. Here's what Carrie Zukoski, 41, a PR director living in St. Louis, has to say:

I ride my bike as much as I can. Rising gas prices hurt much less at the pump for me. Last fill up was 22 days in between. This year I'll try to bike even more.

In 2007 I commuted by bike about 1,400 miles. Compared to many people, it's not that much, but for a fair-weather commuter who lives less than five miles from work, it's not too bad.

The $7-million bike center in Brisbane's central business district was funded by the Queensland government and the Brisbane City Council, and is operated by a private company. The first of its kind in Australia, it offers swipe-card access and some pretty swank-looking accommodations. The cost of membership is roughly comparable to the local transit fare, depending on what type of ticket one uses.

Local government officials, quoted on OurBrisbane.com, see it as one element in an overall strategy:

State Government and Brisbane City Council have welcomed the centre as part of the battle against traffic congestion. Brisbane City Councillor Jane Prentice said the people of Brisbane now had the perfect reason to ditch the car in favour of more active, healthy and sustainable travel options.

"King George Square Cycle Centre demonstrates our commitment to encouraging people to live a more active, healthy and sustainable lifestyle," said Cr Prentice.

"The more people we get travelling on two wheels or two legs, the more cars we take off the road enabling us to live healthier and greener lifestyles that will contribute to ensuring Brisbane's long-term sustainability."

Transport Minister John Mickel said that, by using the King George Square Cycle Centre, the average commuter could save more than $25 dollars per day.

"The average car commuter can spend up to $33 per day on off-street parking alone when travelling into the CBD," Mr Mickel said.

Think a paid bike commuter facility like this one could fly here in New York, say in Midtown or the Financial District?

"Bicycle racks are available outside for the convenience of bike riders," said Maya Israel, a spokeswoman for Tishman Speyer. “Bicycles are not permitted inside, for the safety of all our tenants and visitors."

While the supposed hazards posed by bikes inside a building remain unspecified, the scarcity of protected space is a known deterrent to would-be cyclists. The lack of secure parking is one of the main obstacles New Yorkers cite when asked why they don't commute by bike, according to a 2007 Department of City Planning survey [PDF, p. 19]. Not to mention, as Times reporter Colin Moynihan implies, that it's hardly "convenient" (or secure) to park your bike outside when only about 5,000 racks are available for 131,000 daily riders.

The piece, which omits the New York Times Building's own anti-bike history, culminates with a quote from bike commuter Robert Kotch that skewers the policies of commercial property owners:

“They work inside these fancy buildings where there’s this inexplicable hostile attitude towards bicycles,” he said. “It’s an arcane policy that says bikes are like the bubonic plague.”

Bike-friendly zoning regs can't come soon enough.

Photo: ynotbike/Flickr

Big news out of Georgia. Governor Sonny Perdue, who in the past would have been about as likely to advocate for transit as to take his iced tea without sugar, is suddenly interested in commuter rail links between Atlanta and the 'burbs. Very interested, it seems. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports:

Until now, no amount of begging or pleading seemed to get Gov. Perdue’s attention, much less his leadership.

Yet, last Thursday, there was the governor holding a news conference with all the transportation players in his office, speaking words that regional and state leaders have wanted to hear throughout his administration.

“Let’s move out aggressively,” Perdue said. “Once I’ve made up my mind, I’m usually impatient.”

How out of it was Perdue? This is the same man who, when Hurricane Katrina briefly interrupted fuel supplies in 2005, leading panicked drivers to line up at convenience store pumps all over the state, shut down the public schools for two days in order to save gas.

Until now, the solution to congestion in Georgia has been pavement, pavement and -- yes, more pavement please. But $4.00-per-gallon gas appears to have finally changed that. In January, according to the AJC, Georgia Department of Transportation officials checked out (for the first time?) rail facilities in New York, Chicago and Boston, leading one board member to remark to another: "We are 100 years behind." And they visited cities more akin to Atlanta, like Charlotte, NC, and Denver, CO, where rail has taken off. Perdue was also reportedly convinced by a friend, Congressman David Scott, that passing up a $90 million rail funding pledge from the feds would be bad form and could jeopardize future grants.

“When he left my office, he told me, ‘David, I’m going to see what we can do as a result of our conversation,’ ” Scott said. “He left with a very good understanding of the issue.”

Maybe that was the moment Perdue decided he would finally take action to support commuter rail and more transit.

Maybe Perdue finally understood the true benefits.

He said at his news conference he was particularly impressed when he saw a graphic showing that one bus could remove 57 cars from our roads (those numbers are much higher for rail).

Maybe, as DOT board member Robert Brown said, it was a just confluence of events that came together “at the right time.”

The proof will be in the peach pudding, but as a former Georgia resident I can't begin to convey what a shock it is just to see this conversation happening. With Perdue on board, the time may have finally arrived for one of the most auto-addicted populations in the country to take to the rails. That would be big news for all of us.

Photo: Brad Aaron

Every day, T.A. gets calls from reporters in search of commuters who are changing their habits because of high gas prices/financial pressures. These include drivers who have switched some/all of their trips to transit or biking.

We've managed pretty well the last few months, but there are only so many former drivers a livable streets advocate can know! If you're interested in being in our bank of interviewees for reporters, please email Wiley at wiley@transalt.org with your name, contact info and a quick description of your commute.

Tired of hearing about gas tax holidays, bridge toll suspensions, and rebates for drivers? Here's a policy proposal that will actually improve commutes, not just encourage trips by car: subsidizing fuel for transit systems.

As the Wall Street Journal reported earlier this week, rising diesel prices are hitting transit agencies hard (preview only), leading to fare hikes and service cuts even as ridership balloons. Now, the Amalgamated Transit Union, which represents transit workers in the U.S. and Canada, is calling on Congress to help agencies purchase fuel. The ATU made their case in a statement released this Wednesday: 

Americans took 2.6 billion trips on public transportation in the first three months of 2008, nearly 85 million more trips than last year for the same time period.

Yet, ironically, while high gas prices are encouraging more people to ride transit, rising diesel prices are also causing mass transit systems nationwide to raise fares, cut service, lay off staff, and delay capital spending. Like other consumers, the agencies are also paying more for fuel -- 44% more this year than last. "So, at a time when demand for buses and trains is at one of its highest points in history, we have transit agencies cutting back. This makes no sense," said ATU International President Warren S. George. "Transit needs to be part of the solution -- not the victim -- of high gas prices."

This is one fuel subsidy that makes sense from an emissions perspective. According to the American Public Transit Association, the average transit user consumes half as much oil as the average car commuter.

Photo of NJTransit's Southern New Jersey Light Rail: DMJM Harris

You've read about it. You've analyzed it. Now see what the fuss is about. 

It's the 7th Annual Great NYC Commuter Race, brought to you by Streetfilms.

To the surprise of no one -- with the possible exception of Bike Snob NYC -- bike commuter and social worker Jamie Favaro won Transportation Alternatives' 7th Annual Great NYC Commuter Race this morning, completing the 4.5-mile route between Fort Greene and Union Square in 16.5 minutes. Driver Emmanuel Fuentebella came in second at 22 minutes, and transit rider April Greene made the trip in 29 minutes. Writes T.A.:

According to 2000 Census figures, New Yorkers have the longest average commute in the country, about 45 minutes. However, the average bicycle commute in New York City only takes 30 minutes. And with 75% of driving commutes in NYC under 5 miles (the distance of today's challenge), there is great potential to shift driving trips to bicycling.

Congratulations to Jamie. Stay tuned for full coverage of the race from Streetfilms.

Photo: Transportation Alternatives