Boehner says he's hoping for a vote on a yet-unintroduced energy and infrastructure jobs bill this year. Photo: Associated Press

Instead, House Transportation Committee Chair John Mica gave a preview, saying the bill will:

• consolidate duplicative parts of the federal transportation system
• shift responsibility to states and local governments to move transportation projects forward
• increase the ability to leverage financial resources
• significantly streamline the process for projects, cutting red tape and federal paperwork

House Republicans say a bill to pay for infrastructure with oil exploitation is on its way. Photo: Heat USA

Back in September, the Speaker let slip that the GOP would like to “link the next highway bill to an expansion of American-made energy production.” Turns out, two House Republicans have already put forth proposals to do just that. Both plans pay for infrastructure investment not with user fees like a gas tax, but with revenues from oil drilling.

Yoking transportation funding to fossil fuel extraction presents a horrific feedback loop. Drill for oil to pay for infrastructure to drive more cars to burn more oil — it’s a recipe to entrench oil dependence in transportation policy in a whole new way.

Very few details have emerged so far about Boehner’s plan. For example, it’s unclear whether House leadership plans to use one of those bills as a guide. Most likely, it will combine the House Transportation Committee’s multiyear transportation reauthorization proposal with some hybrid plan to expand domestic energy production.

This new development is disheartening for anyone who genuinely wants to see a reauthorization pass anytime soon. Congress has been unable to pass one because of polarizing disagreements over funding and complete paralysis when it comes to taking the necessary step of increasing the gas tax. A plan to expand oil drilling, with the Deepwater Horizon disaster still fresh in people’s minds, is bound to be even more controversial. With no chance of passing the Senate or being signed by the president, a bill like this will only serve to distract attention from more realistic proposals to reauthorize the surface transportation program. Besides, the logistics will likely be so complex and the revenues will be far enough in the future that even putting politics aside, the proposal is untenable.

AASHTO reacted positively to the news, however, with executive director John Horsley saying, “It’s encouraging to hear Speaker Boehner express his support for transportation infrastructure investment and we appreciate his commitment to move a bill through the House in the near future.”

With Boehner’s announcement, expanded oil drilling – long a GOP goal – has become a condition for Republican support for adequate funding for the transportation bill. The House-proposed bill had included a one-third cut in funding across the board, which was resoundingly rejected by industry groups, transportation advocates, and Democrats. Several months later, House leadership agreed to raise the funding levels but wouldn’t say where the money would come from. Now we know.

Some observers, including Taxpayers for Common Sense, have noted that a change to paying for infrastructure with oil revenues would represent a fundamental shift away from a “user-pays” system. Of course, our current system isn’t a precise “user-pays” protocol either , but it’s a lot closer than drilling for oil in Alaska and using that money (that won’t come in for years or decades anyway) to build a road in South Carolina.

Jeff Davis of Transportation Weekly also notes that “no public analysis of any previous proposals for additional oil and gas exploration has brought in anywhere near” enough money to pay for a six-year transportation bill at current levels without bankrupting the Highway Trust Fund.

I haven’t done a thorough investigation of oil drilling plans, but ExxonMobil has said that “opening up American resources for development that have been kept off-limits could create 130,000 jobs by 2030, in addition to generating more than $1.7 trillion in government revenue over the duration of the projects.” That’s a lot more than the $75 billion hole in the trust fund, but we’d have to take ExxonMobil’s calculations with about a thousand grains of salt. How long is “the duration of the projects?” How much would it cost in overhead to generate that much revenue? What areas would have to be exploited for oil to bring in all that money?

There are countless questions surrounding Boehner’s announcement, and so far, he hasn’t given any details. But if he’s good for his word, we’ll see a concrete plan within a few weeks.

Meanwhile, the Senate EPW Committee is moving forward next week with its two-year bill, which is notably short on oil-drilling. Committee staff have reportedly said the bill text would be available today and reporters have been buzzing around looking for a copy, but none have appeared yet.

Energy intensity of different modes of transport. Source: ESLC

What do the president of FedEx, the former Director of National Intelligence, and 19 other business and military leaders have in common? They’re urging the U.S. to adopt less oil-intensive transportation habits. They say our national security depends on it.

Admiral Dennis Blair, former Director of National Intelligence and Commander in Chief, U.S. Pacific Command, says oil dependence is a threat to national security.

Retired military officers have joined forces with business tycoons to form the Energy Security Leadership Council. They’re looking for ways to reduce U.S. oil dependence and improve energy security. In 2008, the ESLC released a study detailing the need for the U.S. to shift from a petroleum-based to an electricity-based transportation sector.

Realizing that fuel efficiency and alternative fuels are just two legs of a three-legged stool, the ESLC released a report yesterday, “Transportation Policies for America’s Future,” calling for significant changes in transportation infrastructure [PDF].

America’s transportation network exists almost in a vacuum, the report says, with virtually no connection between how it is designed, how it is funded, and how American families and businesses use it every day. The result is an inefficient system in which system needs are out of alignment with investment, cost is out of alignment with usage, and congestion is threatening to undermine the potential gains associated with recent improvements in vehicle technology and fuel diversification.

Fedex CEO Frederick Smith agrees.

The ESLC call for policy shifts including:

• The establishment of national performance metrics, with reduction in oil consumption chief among them, for projects to receive federal funds.
• Create a new federal formula program, totaling 25 percent of annual federal transportation funding, to reduce congestion and encourage “economically justifiable alternatives to single-occupant travel in internal combustion vehicles” in metropolitan areas.
• Create a $5 billion-per-year competitive program with funds available to congested metropolitan areas seeking to implement dynamic tolling, improved traffic signals and payment systems, and public transportation solutions.
• Maintain and improve highway and passenger rail capacity outside of metropolitan areas and along major freight corridors.
• Remove federal restrictions on state tolling of new and existing roads.
• Shift to a VMT fee that “adequately accounts for fuel consumption externalities.”

These aren’t treehugging hippies advocating for these changes. These retired high-ranking military officers and corporate CEOs are convinced that the U.S. addiction to oil is the nation’s Achilles heel. “Hostile state actors, insurgents, and terrorists have made clear their intention to use oil as a strategic weapon against the United States,” they say. “America’s energy security can be fundamentally improved through major reductions in oil demand.”

It will take more than tech fixes to put an end to catastrophic oil spills and reverse the mounting death toll wrought by motorized traffic on the world's streets.

How else to explain two case studies in modern hubris that now appear to be reaching their denouements: The Deepwater Horizon catastrophe and Toyota’s sudden acceleration debacle.

It is our belief in technology that has for years reassured us, along with oil industry advertising and the promises of the U.S. Minerals Management Service, that drilling offshore -- way offshore -- could be done safely while we kept on refilling our tanks. It has reassured us, along with car company marketing and green lights from the NHTSA, that our cars -- increasingly electronically complex -- would keep our families safe while we put ever more miles on the odometer.

The automobile, not the computer or smart phone, is still the technological icon we venerate with the greatest fervor. The car is the most important, most expensive piece of technology most of us own. It is the technology of the past century, and neither BP nor Toyota would be as large or as powerful without that reverence.

Simply walk into one of our houses of worship, an auto showroom, on any Sunday. Or drop some coins in the basket and enter one of the cathedrals that are the Detroit, New York, or Los Angeles auto shows. Congregants are gathered around the gleaming new vehicles, snapping cell phone pics of spectacular concept cars and passing on the good news.

Of course, the automakers and petroleum companies don’t see this as their first mission, operating as they do on cost containment and profit maximization, not cutting edge technology as an end in itself. But their customer base has been convinced that each time they buy a new car, they are buying the future, secure in the knowledge that the world’s smartest geologists and engineers are helping fuel their experience. Never mind that the new tech they’re spending on is largely media and telecom gadgetry, not the electric or more environmentally sustainable power technologies that headline auto shows or attract tens of thousands of Facebook followers, like the not-yet-for-sale Nissan Leaf. (In fact, less than one percent of all new vehicles bought worldwide over the next five years are estimated to be electric or electric-hybrid).

Our responses to BP and Toyota’s epic failures expose the danger in our faith. Deep anxiety aroused by death and destruction in the Gulf and on the interstates is calmed by the belief that technology will save us -- if not now, soon. After all, the promise of technology is in the better life to come. A failsafe brake override resolves Toyota’s problem, reassuring us that there can be such a thing as a safe car. An engineered capping and better blowout preventers promise to restore confidence in our ability to tap into fossil fuels wherever they may be.

We haven’t quite realized that the faith in technology to save us from the problems that technology has created was sold to us by people with a deep interest in this outcome. Fortunes hinge on our capacity to treat each of these disasters as an isolated “accident,” soon and easily solved. Don’t worry. Go back to driving -- maybe some other vehicle make for a few years, stopping at a gas station under another sign for a while -- but get back to driving into the bright, new and improved car future. Even as we clearly head for the cliff of environmental ruin.

BP and Toyota also share a public perception as “foreign,” to the good fortune of American multinationals like ExxonMobil and Ford. BP may have recently made poorer choices than other oil companies, but serious threats to our way of life are endemic to the practice of drilling (especially in the peak-oil period, as hydrocarbons become increasingly hard to access, and iffy techno-fixes are developed to get us to the dwindling supplies). Toyota may have produced too many cars too fast, but 1.2 million people are killed globally each year in car crashes, a death toll that’s unlikely to be affected by whether vehicles are fueled by gas, electricity, or hydrogen.

Simply put, technological progress alone is not a strategy for a sustainable future. The capping of the Deepwater Horizon and the imminent passage of the Motor Vehicle Safety Act will leave intact the technological faith that led to the initial devastation. America is in dire need of behavioral and political change in areas ranging from public leadership to corporate responsibility to the individual choice to drive less. Only a hard turn can avert the head-on collision between America’s love of technology and our quality of life.

Anne Lutz Fernandez, a former marketer and banker, and Catherine Lutz, an anthropologist at the Watson Institute at Brown University, are the authors of Carjacked: The Culture of the Automobile and its Effect on our Lives (Palgrave Macmillan).

Editor’s note: This is an essay from Jason Henderson, a Geography Professor at San Francisco State
University. He was born and raised in New Orleans and spent many years
exploring Louisiana’s wetlands. He is currently writing a book about
the politics of mobility, and frequently advocates for reduced car
parking and improved bicycle space in San Francisco.

The Moratorium

After almost two months of failed attempts at "topkills," "tophats," "junkshots," "cofferdams," and "caps-on-the-diamond-cut-riser" it is evident that the BP wellhead spewing oil into the Gulf of Mexico has unleashed an unprecedented catastrophe. We made a mistake in wishing away the risks of deepwater drilling. Despite protests from the oil industry, the six-month moratorium proposed by the Obama administration is clearly needed in order for the nation to have a pointed and deliberate reflection about its priorities.

As a Louisiana native I am sensitive to the disruption this moratorium might cause for the 150,000 people employed in offshore drilling and corollary services. Yet take one look at the destruction of a truly renewable and sustainable industry — fisheries — and think it through. The offshore oil industry just killed the commercial and recreational fishing industry, it may destroy tourism, and will kill more if we do not get drilling and environmental protection right. How many jobs will be lost because of this ecological catastrophe? And what future start-up companies or footloose firms want to move to a region that is mired in a toxic cesspool of oil? Who would want to invest in property or raise families in a region that has not carefully protected its environment and regulated polluting industries? In the long run, the moratorium gives us time to work this out, and is better for the Gulf Coast economy. It’s also best for the nation.

But in the short run, a solid and comprehensive moratorium could mean roughly 1.7 million barrels a day eliminated from the US energy portfolio without any stopgap measure in place to check that demand. Far-off energy miracles in hydrogen, wind, solar, or nuclear energy will not meet the immediate demand. Instead, as Louisiana Senator Mary Landrieu points out, the nation might get the 1.7 million barrels it draws from the Gulf from somewhere else.[1]

Defenders of offshore drilling say that demand for oil in the U.S. will still hover around 20 million barrels a day — every day — including during the moratorium, however long it lasts. Since there is nothing online to substitute for the oil drawn from the Gulf of Mexico, the equivalent will instead be shipped in by tanker. Existing and soon-to-be deployed rigs in the Gulf will be moved to Brazil, Mexico, or West Africa. Once they are licensed to operate there, they’ll likely be fixed in place for up to two years. Therefore 1.7 million barrels of oil will still come in every day, but at greater risk to other places with less regulation or oversight. Do Americans feel that these places are more expendable than Louisiana and the Gulf Coast? I hope not. And if we put all our eggs in the Middle East basket again, consider that it costs America between $47 and $90 billion annually to defend Middle Eastern oil supplies.[2]

So what can be done in the immediate future to rectify the whole mess? I propose that we can offset the moratorium on drilling in the Gulf of Mexico by driving 20 percent less. What follows is an outline of how I came to this conclusion, and what government can do to achieve it quickly.

Photo: Jonathan Henderson, Gulf Restoration Network

Offsetting the Moratorium

According to the US Department of Energy’s 2009 Transportation Energy Fact Book, regular passenger cars used 4.8 million barrels a day in 2008.[3] That same year light trucks (SUVs, mini-vans, and personal household pickup trucks) burned another 4 million barrels a day. In total, personal household passenger vehicles burned 8.8 million barrels per day in 2008. The 1.7 million barrels per day produced in the Gulf of Mexico, mainly for gasoline, amounts to roughly 19 percent of US gasoline consumed daily for cars and light trucks. For comparison, trucks for freight used 2.5 million barrels per day in 2008, and 1.2 million barrels per day were used for flying.

So if we err on the side of caution and round up, America needs to reduce daily gasoline consumption by 20 percent every day for the next six months, and, I argue, for the next two-to-five years as this deepwater drilling conundrum is resolved. We do not want to hit trucking because that carries our food and goods. We do not want to hit industry, which uses 4.5 million barrels a day, because we want to remain competitive globally (although we could stand to decrease consumption of disposable plastics made from oil). And we do not want to hit agriculture because petroleum, like it or not, grows food. There are various other important things, like pharmaceuticals, eye glasses, and laptops that are part of the 20 million barrels consumed daily in the U.S. We pretty much will want to keep using those things, albeit in cleaner ways. So we are left with reducing everyday driving, and there is nothing wrong with that. It is what the nation needs to do anyway. We owe it to ourselves, to the Gulf of Mexico, and to the rest of the world. And we need to do it now — not wait for miracle green cars decades from now. So how do we do it?

We should learn from World War Two

During World War Two the United States supplied 6 billion barrels of oil for the Allies’ war effort. [4] It was used to propel bombers and transport the wounded, to build battleships and provide fuel for growing food for the Allied armies. U.S. oil amounted to roughly 85 percent of all the oil burned by the Allies, and it was oil that largely determined who won the war. As rapid expansion of wartime industry occurred, the government recognized the need to conserve oil. It established the Office of Defense Transportation (ODT) within days of the Pearl Harbor attack in December 1941. ODT was mandated to "assure maximum utilization of domestic transport to ensure successful prosecution of the war" and lasted until August 1945, just after the Japanese surrender.

Through gasoline rationing, coordination of public transit, and aggressive marketing of the moral imperative to conserve, the U.S. reduced gasoline consumption by 32 percent between 1941 and 1945.[5] In 1941, 23.6 billion gallons of gasoline were used for civilian cars and trucks, but by 1944 it was reduced to 16 billion gallons. More significantly, by 1944 personal driving was reduced to 63 percent of what it was in 1941. Annual vehicle miles traveled per private personal vehicle dropped from roughly 9,500 miles to 5,250 miles per car. The "We Can Do It!" spirit of war on the home front translated into a concerted effort to reduce driving.

Lest you conclude that rationing is some sort of communistic plot, recall that after Hurricanes Katrina and Rita shut down Gulf of Mexico drilling and crippled 50 percent of U.S. refining capacity, President George Bush urged Americans to be "better conservers" and asked us to avoid non-essential driving. He also asked federal workers to carpool or take public transit.[6] While this was purely voluntary and amounted to nothing, the point is, an oil man said it. He did not have to, but Bush’s people understood the relationship between oil and driving and saw the panicked long lines at gas stations in Houston suburbs. Now, 52 days after the Deepwater Horizon blew up and sank, there has not been a peep about the relationship between oil and driving from the current administration. But I am certain that they understand that relationship, and so I will offer the following suggestions for how we as a nation can reduce driving by 20 percent in order to offset the 1.7 million barrels of oil pumped daily from the Gulf of Mexico.

Flickr photo: Atwater Village Newbie

How to reduce driving by 20 percent (or more):

Federal funding for transit operations

During World War Two, public transit reached its peak ridership in the U.S., and this was largely through coordination by the federal government as part of the national gasoline rationing strategy. Public transit policy was energy policy. While I am not advocating a federal takeover of transit, the federal government can provide something more targeted to transit today — operating revenue.

Consider this. As part of a voter mandate to study how transit can reduce greenhouse gas emissions, transit planners in San Francisco have thought about what would be needed if a substantial portion of motorists in that city switched to transit.[7] Currently the transit system, Muni, is at capacity carrying roughly 700,000 passengers a day. Planners estimate that in order to reduce the city’s greenhouse gas footprint by 20 percent, transit would need to expand by 25 percent, and carry 920,000 daily passengers. This actually approaches the city’s peak ridership of 970,000 at the end of World War Two, as the federal government coordinated transit for the war machine. But Muni’s expansion needs several hundred million dollars of annual operating funds. These are funds that the city does not have. The federal government should make it a core part of energy policy to provide that operations support and to support public transit operations throughout the nation. Public transit is energy policy.

Yet public transit service throughout the nation has been cut because of local and state revenue shortfalls due to the financial meltdown in 2008. That, coupled with increased health care and pension costs for transit drivers, meant rapidly increased operating costs but rapidly shrinking revenue. For example, in San Francisco a draconian 10 percent service cut went into effect in May even as people demand better transit service — and even as the city’s system is at capacity. If thousands of people suddenly stopped driving and took transit, the existing system could not absorb the new riders.

All transit systems in the U.S. need an emergency cash infusion to sustain current operating levels and to expand capacity in order to absorb new riders. In Congress, $2 billion is being proffered as a Band-Aid for this national transit crisis. That $2 billion is not enough for all of the transit systems throughout the nation, and needs to be substantially increased to meet existing demands. The government bailed out banks and automobile companies that it deemed "too big to fail." Given the ecological disaster in the Gulf and the much-needed moratorium on drilling, public transit is now too big to fail if we are going to get out of this.

Photo: Bryan Goebel

Bicycle Systems

Obviously it will be hard to get transit capacity expansion ratcheted up immediately, but Congress can act fast and at least make operating funds available now. But to be clear, in the early phase of the drilling moratorium, transit will not be adequate to absorb a 20 percent reduction in driving. This will take months to bring online. Therefore, in the short-term, there is a quick, cheap, and nimble solution to help get us to 20 percent reductions in driving — bicycles. Bicycles do not require expensive, long-term capital investment. A bicycle system can be developed rapidly. Unlike transit systems, a bicycle system does not require large operating costs. In San Francisco the modest, off-the-shelf bicycle plan would cost $24.5 million to implement.[8] Though modest in scope it is expected to take five years to implement, mainly due to funding issues, and because of resistance by local motorists for removal of car space in order to create space for bicycles. With political will, San Francisco’s modest bike plan could take just six months to deploy and would have minimal operating costs when compared to transit and automobile systems. Repeat this throughout the nation in all urban areas, and this can be synchronized with a longer moratorium on offshore drilling.

Bicycles are practical and can meet many needs. Throughout the U.S., 40 percent of all car trips are less than five miles, the ideal spatial range of bicycling, and some argue that 20 percent of all trips could be made by bicycle if the U.S. built proper infrastructure.[9] In cities like San Francisco, up to 75 percent of voters support new bike lanes.[10] But many people are hesitant to start cycling now. Large majorities of people say cycling with automobiles is uncomfortable, that there are not enough bike lanes, and that it is difficult to cross major streets.[11] Cities can address this promptly by producing truly wide, safe, interconnected bicycle lanes. In most cases the physical space is there to do it. It just requires political will and good paint. Like public transit, a bicycle system is a critical part of energy policy, and at the local level, cities and towns can do their part during this crisis by prioritizing bicycles as a cheap, quick, and effective tool for reducing driving.

Entrepreneurial jitney services

Whenever public transit and bicycles are proposed as solutions, a small but vocal group of naysayers argue that they cannot bicycle to the grocery store and carry groceries, or schlep their children to day care on buses. Some of these concerns are valid for some people, but most people are physically able and resourceful enough to manage. However, one way of rethinking grocery shopping and automobiles is to consider implementing flexible jitney services. This might be an opportunity for entrepreneurs to do their part in reducing driving by helping to promote and establish flexible, on-demand, door-to-door jitney service from grocery stores and other activities currently centered on driving. In many countries around the world, particularly where transit service is inadequate, inexpensive mini-van and shared taxi services are widespread.

While a system of jitneys would take time to implement and no doubt have political opposition from transit agencies and taxi-cab companies, an immediate short-term path to flexible jitney service could be deployed by the grocery store industry. Each grocery store could own and operate a service to provide costumers deliveries when they cannot carry groceries. This is already done in some cities and could be greatly expanded. In New York City several Whole Foods in Manhattan have no parking for costumers and instead offer delivery service for those who cannot carry their groceries home. In San Francisco both Mollie Stones and Safeway deliver groceries. This is not the panacea for everyone, but with creativity and innovation, grocery stores could be an anchor in creating licensed jitney services that contribute to reducing driving overall. More importantly, as more and more people move to urban areas and seek alternatives to driving, more urban space can be used for housing, and less for expensive and gluttonous parking space.

Personal responsibility

Photo: Thinkquest.org

During World War Two, one of the key approaches to reducing driving was to promote moral arguments. Many people have seen the iconic 1942 propaganda poster "When you ride alone, you ride with Hitler." The poster showed a typical businessman in a convertible driving alone, but with the transparent, shady figure of Hitler in the passenger seat. The poster impressed on motorists that excess personal driving wasted fuel that was needed to win the war. Appealing to a sense of morals helped get people to decrease driving, and helped win World War Two. In a similar vein, if we as a nation accept the urgency of the oil spill, and of the interrelated crisis of global climate change that is connected to oil and driving, then there is a moral imperative to reduce driving today. President Obama stated that BP has a moral obligation to the Gulf of Mexico. He is right. But American motorists also have a moral obligation to reduce demand for offshore oil by reducing driving.

In many coastal states, Republicans like governors Arnold Schwarzenegger of California and Bill Christ of Florida have joined Democrats like senators Barbara Boxer and Bill Nelson in opposing new offshore drilling. Reacting to the spill, Schwarzenegger said, "I see on TV the birds drenched in oil, the fishermen out of work, the massive oil spill and oil slick destroying our precious ecosystem. That will not happen here in California…" Senator Barbara Boxer used images of oiled birds in an impassioned and morally driven speech on the floor of the US Senate on June 10. She also praised California’s unspoiled coastline and linked its preservation to the ban on offshore drilling in California. Environmental groups such as the Center for Biological Diversity have filed lawsuits to halt offshore drilling plans in the Gulf of Mexico that were approved without full environmental review. Moratorium or not, offshore drilling is going to be tied up in prolonged political and legal debates for years. People in these coastal states and supporters of these environmental organizations have a moral obligation to reduce their driving if they want to stop offshore drilling. And even if they insist that they must keep driving, they can at the very least show support for those who do actually chose to reduce driving.

Individual motorists can start by accepting that the space of cars in cities must be reconfigured to accommodate public transit, cycling, and walking. Motorists who continue to drive have a moral responsibility to discontinue their local political resistance to changing our streets. They’ll still be able to drive, just more slowly, with less convenience than they have now.

Throughout cities in the U.S., vocal motorists oppose proposals to re-allocate street space to favor buses or bicycles. Each time a stretch of street is considered for change, angry motorists line up at city hall to protest the change. Our cities are in a spatial stalemate, traffic is miserable, the buses move slow due to traffic, and bicyclists find haphazard, fragmented bike lanes. Often cars double-park in bike lanes, making cycling very unsafe. Meanwhile, car-oriented neighborhood organizations demand that new infill, transit-oriented housing must contain excessive amounts of parking, which then make it difficult to configure space for sustainable transport. Attempts at traffic calming or pedestrian enhancements are diluted by anger over lost parking space or because many motorists simply do not want to slow down.

All of this resistance to change by motorists needs to stop. Motorists who insist on continuing to drive need to step aside in local political debates and cede space to other modes. At the local level this sort of intransigence has been a major barrier to change, and has kept America addicted to oil. Every single skirmish over a parking space or traffic lane sets back progress in sustainable transportation. Individual motorists need to discontinue opposing change, and better yet, vocally endorse the removal of travel lanes and reductions in parking as a necessary step towards reducing oil dependency and addressing climate change. It is a matter of national security and global justice.

Conclusion

Today there is an ecological disaster in the Gulf of Mexico that stems from the insatiable demand for oil and for using that oil for driving. Almost half of the oil used in the US is used for personal driving, and upwards of 68 percent of the oil we use is for all transportation. We can make a substantial dent in our oil dependency, while also giving the moratorium in the Gulf of Mexico time to work, by reducing personal driving by 20 percent. We do not have the time to wait for a magical "clean" car decades away — we must act now.

Instead of seeking to substitute 1.7 million barrels of oil by shipping more oil in by tanker, we can offset an offshore drilling moratorium by driving 20 percent less. Instead of drilling for the sake of preserving 150,000 offshore jobs, the nation needs to immediately order thousands of new, off-the-shelf transit vehicles in the short-term — stimulating the transit industry. Jobs in public transit can offset lost jobs in drilling. The nation must also help finance cheap and quick implementation of bicycle systems in cities and towns. Local governments can do their part by re-allocating street space to make cycling safer, and to help transit run more smoothly by avoiding traffic. Business — particularly grocery stores — can do their part by creating innovative new jitney services for their local communities. And individual motorists can take personal responsibility by not opposing efforts to re-allocate street space for transit and bicycling.

During World War Two the federal government coordinated a massive wartime transportation effort in a very short amount of time. Individuals, influenced by moral arguments, also did their part for the greater good. Today we need to lay out a similar vision in the service of a moral imperative. It was done during World War Two, we can do it again.

Sometimes it takes an outsider's perspective to see things clearly. So what would an extra-terrestrial think of humankind's dependence on fossil fuels? In light of the devastation being unleashed off the shores of the Gulf states, cartoonist and recent Pulitzer recipient Mark Fiore files this brilliant summation of the absurdly self-destructive lengths we earthlings go to for our "lizard squeezins."

BP's Deepwater Horizon. Photo: U.S. Coast Guard.

Editor's note: Jason Henderson is a geography professor at San Francisco State University who is writing a book on the politics of mobility in cities. He grew up in New Orleans, where he spent much time in the coastal wetlands of Louisiana while also observing the activity of the oil and gas industry. He has never owned a car.

For almost a century my native Louisiana has been expendable when it comes to America's voracious appetite for oil. Now after over a week of national media attention, the BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill is suddenly big enough to bring President Obama down for a disaster tour this past Sunday.  

No one can say when the gushing river of oil will stop. But as we watch and ponder this sorry state of affairs, environmentalists will demand loudly that Obama retract his earlier proposal to loosen offshore drilling policy. Perhaps they are right, but like other Americans, most of those same people will likely keep on driving. So I take this moment to urge environmentalists to reflect upon their relationship between oil and driving. We need oil and are lucky as a civilization to be endowed with oil, but most people are squandering this precious resource by driving.  We need to use oil more wisely.

I see incredible value in oil.  It is one of the most utilitarian natural resources known to humans. Oil stores tremendous amounts of energy, it is very easy to transport long distances by pipeline, rail, ship, and by truck, and it can sit for a long time without degrading. It can be refined and distilled easily and its petroleum by-products are used in plastics and pharmaceuticals, and are part of the food system.

Wind turbines and solar panels are made from polymers that come from oil. The new alternative energy future promoted by environmentalists will be made from oil. Growing plants to drive cars also requires oil. Oil will be needed to build new high speed rail lines, bicycle networks, light rail systems, electric buses, and new ways of organizing work and shopping through compact urban development. In sum, we'll need to keep drilling for oil so that we can shift to a more sustainable energy path that significantly reduces our overall dependence on oil.   

As many environmentalists point out, we do not need to keep drilling everywhere. We do not need to keep searching further offshore, or push into remote, wild areas, or burn toxic tar sands. We need to conserve. We need to reduce per-capita consumption. But most importantly, we need to stop driving everywhere for everything so that oil can be used more intelligently and judiciously.

Roughly 70 percent of the oil America consumes is for transport, and much of this is for using cars to travel relatively short distances on a routine, daily basis.  This adds up to over 21,000 miles driven a year per car.  92 percent of American households own one car, and 62 percent own two cars.  Currently there are 250 million automobiles in the US, amounting to 33 percent of the global fleet of cars, and 325 million vehicles are forecast for 2050.  

There is no source of energy that will replicate this level of hyper-automobility. Electric or hydrogen cars will need the oil-equivalent of hundreds of coal or nuclear power plants which will also take lots of oil to build.  Where are we going to build all of those power plants? What other places are expendable? How much greenhouse gases would come from building all of those power plants and is it worth it simply to keep up routine driving?  Retrofitting entire cities with new plug-in outlets will require enormous resources at a time when we can’t even "afford" to provide basic upkeep to bridges and highways much less sustain a working public transit system.

The emphasis by many environmentalists on "green cars" has been an awful distraction. Replacing 250 million vehicles with hybrid or electric cars will not cut it. These are oil consuming machines made from polymers derived from oil and designed to travel under 30 miles a day in an urban configuration. That oil needs to be conserved and used to make the "big switch" that we need to survive as a civilization. Any able-bodied environmentalist that regularly exclaims "but I need to drive!" should really reflect on what they’re saying.  

Consider the modest lifestyle changes that can be made towards routine daily walking, bicycling, and transit. Even in many low-density suburbs in America, 40 percent of car trips are less than five miles, within a comfortable spatial range of bicycling. Grocery shopping does not require a car. One can simply walk, bike, or take transit, and either come up with creative ways to carry it, or have a jitney service take care of the delivery.

Consider the co-benefits of physical activity, health, reduced greenhouse gases, less noise and less sprawl. In anticipation of rural environmentalists' need to continue using cars, consider that 80 percent of Americans live in metropolitan areas, and that many small towns are highly bikeable and walkable. Most people can do the switch if they think it through.  Car sharing can provide the mobility needed in the rare instance when a car is truly required.

Those environmentalists who are still unwilling to give up driving should at least give up obstructing change. In supposedly progressive cities like San Francisco, many self-identified environmentalists balk at removing parking to create bicycle lanes. Still other self-proclaimed environmentalists oppose removing car lanes in order to create bus lanes that improve transit service. In suburban areas many environmentalists spearhead opposition to compact, modestly dense housing because they view it as a threat to their convenient driving.  
Environmentalists and political progressives who insist on driving need to accept that we need to make it more difficult to drive everywhere, for everything, all of the time. We charge the poor to ride transit, and keep allowing fares to rise while gutting service, but many environmentalists have come to expect cheap and easy driving. The sense of entitlement to drive across the city at high speed and easily park needs to be rethought. And motorists need to slow down on our streets so those of us willing to make the change can do so safely.

Instead of the same-old approach of "stop drilling," environmentalists need to lead by example, and stop driving so that we can keep drilling in a thoughtful and reasonable way that minimizes expansion but enables the shifts needed. Otherwise environmental outcries about the spill in the Gulf are difficult to take seriously. There is a car-free and car-lite movement in America seeking to create spaces to live and work without automobile dependency. Please join in helping to create those spaces.

And remember, we still need oil to get us there, so we need to use it wisely.  

NRDC's depiction of how hard states are hit by gas costs, ranked by percentage of income spent.

An attempt to answer that question was released Tuesday [PDF] by the National Resources Defense Council (NRDC), which has ranked the "oil vulnerability" of the 50 states for three years running.

On its face, the list is unsurprising: Mississippi remains in first place, with the average driver spending more than 9 percent of annual income on gas, while Massachusetts, New York, and Connecticut were rated the least oil-dependent states. Yet NRDC's analysis also offers some instructive tidbits:

• New York is the overwhelming leader in transit -- but not much else. The state dedicated 41 percent of its federal transportation money to transit as opposed to roads in 2007, making it the benchmark by which NRDC measured all others. Yet that was only enough to hit No. 6 on the overall scale of sustainable energy use, thanks to the state's lack of a low-carbon or renewable fuel standard, action on smart growth, and incentives for hybrid vehicles.

• New Jersey's transit spending may not be getting through to some of its drivers. The state ranked second behind New York with 30 percent of transport cash used on transit, but the state's average driver spent $2,286 on gas last year compared with $1,654 in New York. It's not due to a high state gas tax; New Jersey's is one of the lowest in the nation. 

• Capitol Hill can set the pace for reducing vehicle miles traveled (VMT). Only six states have set targets for shrinking their VMT, a goal that Transportation Secretary LaHood has called essential to fighting climate change. Without congressional passage of legislation making VMT reduction a national priority, it's difficult to see a majority of states taking action individually in the near term.

• Reputations may be deceiving. Georgia, where all but 23 of 5,400 DOT employees focus on roads, saw its federal transit grants frozen this month due to financial mismanagement and spends less than 7 percent of its transport budget on transit. But the state ranked 17th on NRDC's list, just ahead of Minnesota -- the progressive-leaning home of House infrastructure committee chairman Jim Oberstar.
  

“We will harness the sun and the winds and the soil to fuel our cars…”
-- Barack Obama's inaugural address.

“The last thing this nation needs now is a stimulus plan aimed at the development of non-gasoline-powered automobiles married with extensive rehabilitation of the highway system.”
-- James Howard Kunstler

With the president-elect, Congress and the current White House divided on how or if American taxpayers should save the domestic auto industry, General Motors is taking its case directly to the public with this video and accompanying web site. More threat than appeal, the message, in a nutshell, is "Do it, or else."

On gmfactsandfiction.com, the reeling giant "Tells It Like It Is":

From plants to parks. From dealerships to driveways. From gas stations to grocery stores. What happens in the automotive industry affects each and every one of us. In fact, the collapse of the U.S.-based auto industry wouldn't just impact the more than 239,000 Americans directly employed by the Big Three. One out of every 10 people in America is employed in a service that is related to the U.S. auto industry. If a plant closes, so does its suppliers, the local stores, the hot dog vendors, and the local restaurants. The effect would be devastating in ways of which you never have thought.

Writing your congressperson yet? Well what are you gonna do now that your "suppliers and dealers" can't get credit? Who's gonna keep you supplied, man?

In all seriousness, while its fate is on the minds of many, New Yorkers included, GM may not be helping its case here. Rather than inspiring confidence that the company would put taxpayer dollars to good use, the "Facts and Fiction" campaign reeks of desperation and even paranoia. (See the web site's "Submit a Myth" widget: "If you’ve read or heard something about GM we’d love to know about it so that we can have an opportunity to address it.") Again revealing itself to be two steps behind, GM doesn't seem to have caught on to the fact that Americans are currently more receptive to change than fear mongering.

So that's the problem, huh? Think GM can't change? GM can change, baby. Just give GM another chance.

Union Station, Denver, CO

T4A has set up a page for members of the public to send their own version to Obama via e-mail.

While you're at it, you can also outline your vision for the country, complete with photos and video, for the incoming White House team at change.gov. The T4A vision summary and Obama urban policy platform might be good jumping-off points.

The T4A letter appears in full after the jump.

What will you say to President-elect Obama? 

Dear President-elect Obama:

First of all...Congratulations! Your election, and results from down-ballot votes around the country, represents a resounding call for a new direction.

The Transportation for America campaign, representing more than 100 organizations and thousands of energized citizens around the country, salutes you. And we join you in seeking infrastructure investment that will stimulate the economy now and lay the groundwork for a clean-energy future that is less dependent on oil.

Americans are ready for this bold vision. Even in this tattered economy, citizens in California, Washington, Hawaii, Colorado and at least 10 other states voted themselves a tax increase so they could jumpstart construction of light rail, commuter train service, high-speed rail and other clean transportation options. Now they, and dozens of other communities, need a federal partner that can step up and do its part.

We call on you to follow through on the vision you offered in the campaign by acting rapidly, starting with the transition and during the first 100 days, to urge Congress to pass a smart package of stimulus investments as well as a new national transportation program. Appoint a Secretary of Transportation with a proven record of understanding both urban and rural needs, as well as how transportation, growth and development, the economy and the environment interact.

You have expressed support for building complete streets that “make it easier for us to walk, bicycle and access transportation alternatives,” and for repairing and restoring our troubled highways and bridges - we call on you today to fulfill that promise in your first 100 days.

By fixing our highways, bridges and transit systems, and pushing ahead with ready-to-go rail projects, we can create millions of jobs that can't be outsourced, launch a clean, green economic recovery, and get started on building a 21st century transportation system.

To quote our next president: "Yes, we can!"

Photo: Sandy Leidholdt/Flickr

Mr. Obama is coordinating with Congressional Democrats behind the scenes on the stimulus plans, which would include more jobless benefits, food stamps, aid to financially strapped states and cities, and spending for infrastructure projects that keep people at work. His chief liaison has been Mr. Emanuel.

"You don't ever want a crisis to go to waste; it's an opportunity to do important things that you would otherwise avoid," Mr. Emanuel said in an interview. "In 1974 and 1978 we never dealt with it, and our dependence on foreign oil never changed."

Good stuff, except for that "foreign" part.

Congresswoman-elect Kathy Dahlkemper overcame ridicule for her "wacky" notion that Pennsylvanians should try walking and cycling. But down in western North Carolina, voters returned Rep. Patrick McHenry -- shown here mocking, and misrepresenting, the federal bike commuter tax benefit -- to Washington.

Though his state also went for Barack Obama, the outspoken conservative Republican defeated Democratic challenger Daniel Johnson handily. The Hickory Record reports:

"The morals and values I took with me to Washington — I still have them," he said. "I'm not going to stop fighting for conservative ideals now."

McHenry's values and ideals have earned him a lot of views on YouTube, where his anti-cycling speech has been given special treatment.

Video: GreenMaterialism/YouTube

The National Republican Congressional Committee ran this ad against Democratic challenger Kathy Dahlkemper in the race for Pennsylvania's third congressional district. It hits a few Gingrichian notes on how to address the country's energy problems before the announcer tells us incredulously:

Dahlkemper's wacky solution? She said we should make personal sacrifices, such as walking places and riding bikes. Hmm... Why don't we use dog-sleds, too?

That passage heaps on the fear and loathing with scare quotes, shots of an impossibly crowded sidewalk, and a bike bell sound effect. But guess what? Seven-term incumbent Phil English is heading back to Erie, and Kathy Dahlkemper is going to Washington. The AP breaks down her victory:

Mrs. Dahlkemper's advantage was viewed as being in the more urban areas of the district -- the cities of Erie, Sharon, Meadville and Butler -- where she was expected to benefit from longtime union support and Sen. Barack Obama's presence at the top of the ticket. Her challenge was to sway voters in the suburban and rural regions.

Think Dahlkemper's competition will bank on the same anti-urban message in 2010?

Workplaces have decentralized. Commuting patterns are no longer radial, from suburban residences to central cities. Now they are complex weaves across broad megaregions. Yet the infrastructure system hasn't adapted.

The Times published five letters in response, including this one from Transportation for America's David Goldberg:

David Brooks is spot-on with his call for major investment in transportation infrastructure, both for near-term economic stimulus and for a sustainable recovery. His recommendations of what to build are outdated, however.

As he notes, a way to put people to work would be to repair and maintain our existing highways, bridges and transit systems. But building new highways was the project for an earlier era, the 1950s, when gas was cheap and President Dwight D. Eisenhower created the Interstate System.

Today we urgently need to build the infrastructure for a clean-energy economy and reduced dependency on oil. Soaring gas prices made our vulnerability clear: Americans flocked to public transportation or took to their bicycles only to find the transit systems underfinanced and the roads dangerous and inhospitable. Half of our urban-dwelling citizens found they had no transit at all.

If we're going to go into debt to build for the future, we must do so to complete our transportation network with high-speed rail, modern public transit, streets that support safe biking and walking, and, yes, well-maintained highways.

Dave Alpert at Greater Greater Washington picked up the exchange, noting how cities such as Charleston, South Carolina are already moving beyond the default presumption that transportation investment equals road-building.

And BikePortland's Jonathan Maus, recalling an earlier Brooks column that dismissed cycling as transportation, offered this take on transportation spending priorities:

Should we invest billions into highway projects that cater to "mobility" of single-occupancy vehicles (like we did in the 1950s) and throw scraps to everything else (like we do now)? Or, will we look to create world-class biking cities where possible (because bikes offer the best return on transportation investment of any mode) and then invest in things like passenger rail, streetcars and bus-rapid transit?

It is, after all, a simple sounding solution that appeals to politicians in love with the quick fix, oil companies desperate for access to new sources, and auto-dependent Americans, many of whom now find themselves stranded in far-off suburbs, trapped in expensive car commutes and completely lacking freedom of choice when it comes to transportation. No matter that drilling here and drilling now isn't going to do much of anything to reduce gasoline prices or wean Americans from their crushing oil dependence. 

If you're curious about the masterminds behind the message, head over to Newt Gingrich's "tri-partisan" American Solutions web site. There, you can download "The New Language of Smart Energy," a 42-page talking points memo from Republican pollster Frank Luntz. Luntz handily sums up his findings as "The 10 Communications Commandments for 2008." Not surprising, given the buckets of fossil fuel money behind Gingrich's American Solutions, the Commandments can pretty much be summed up as "Thou Shalt Drill. Thou Shalt Drill Here. Thou Shalt Drill Now."

Here, courtesy of Frank and Newt, is some of the messaging that oil companies are using to maintain their grip on U.S. energy policy and get to those environmentally-sensitive leases. Mock and ignore them at your own peril.

• First off, before even getting into the Ten Commandments, make sure you present yourself as having risen above partisan politics.
• Then frame the issue in terms of national security. Our dependence on oil isn't the problem. It's our dependence on "foreign oil" that's the problem. All that stuff about oil being a globally traded commodity? Too complicated. Skip that. 
  
• Shortages "are unacceptable in our 21st century economy." All that stuff about geology and peak oil? Too wonky. Skip that.
• "It is about American oil and American gas." (Bold and underline formatting courtesy of Frank Luntz.)
• The more you can talk about futuristic "breakthrough technology," the more you'll be embraced by the American public.
  
• "Diversity of supply leads to security of supply." But focus, mainly, on diversity of oil and gas supply not diversity of energy sources.
  
• Do: Talk about new technology and the Chevy Tahoe Hybrid. Don't: Talk about conservation or sacrifice.

Newt, Frank, and the rest of their ilk seem to be in retreat for now. But with some drivers returning to their gas-guzzling ways, how long until the next "crisis" hits -- and the oil-suckers emerge from their crypt?

Happy Halloween.

Graphic: Carly Clark

NOW host David Brancaccio does an interview on the LA Metro. Click through for the full video.

The latest episode of NOW is surely the most effective takedown of car-dependent planning ever broadcast in news magazine format. Adhering to the familiar contours of pocketbook journalism, "Driven to Despair" starts with a sympathetic portrayal of the Schleighs, a family who moved to a southern California exurb seven years ago. With their adjustable rate mortgage about to reset and gas prices already busting the family budget, they need a way out.

What follows can be fairly described as a 25-minute ode to the time- and money-saving benefits of transit, complete with a brief history of the Los Angeles streetcar system and a rueful suggestion that the Presidential candidates should address transportation more forcefully.

Watching the Schleighs and their neighbors react to the idea of riding a train to work -- sneering, in one case -- it's all too apparent why someone running for national office would skirt the issue. But you also realize that if a national pol were to finally go out on that limb, he or she may find voters more receptive to the idea of better trains and buses than feared.

"Driven to Despair" will be broadcast on PBS affiliates tonight (check local listings). It's the first part in a NOW series on infrastructure called "Blueprint America."

Enjoy the weekend, Streetsbloggers. We'll be back on Tuesday.

Here's a disturbing story from the Associated Press on gas shortages in Asheville, North Carolina, where hot-tempered drivers are waiting in long lines to fill up, only to find in some cases that the pumps are tapped. Asks one flustered motorist:

"What's wrong with our government? Why are they letting this happen to us?"

Maybe the saddest thing about that comment is that, months into the current gas price spike and years after Hurricane Katrina caused similar supply interruptions, Washington still isn't talking about how to wean Americans off the stuff. As Atlantans Twitter to find the nearest line and Tennesseans take to the Internet with profanity-laced rants, Senate Republicans this week blocked a spending package that would have boosted funding for overburdened transit systems, while the best US Transportation Secretary Mary Peters can do is a paltry $30 million federal allocation to be split among 15 commuter rail projects.

Video: WorldWide News Today/YouTube

From cartoonist Mark Fiore comes this animation of a hyperactive Ziploc baggy. Before clicking through to see why it's so amped up, here's some suggested reading from the New York Times:

Sex, Drug Use and Graft Cited in Interior Department

Frustration in the South as a Gasoline Shortage Drags On

Enjoy the afternoon and Shana Tovah to everyone ringing in the new year.

What the mainstream is truly missing here en masse is that another tsunami is building right behind the finance fiasco, and that it will render moot the whole reeking cargo of schemes and wishes that comprises the Great Bail-out. I am speaking of the global oil problem. In fact, the problems in banking and money currently roaring in the center ring of the world circus, can be described categorically as a product of the oil problem -- since oil is the primary resource of industrial economies and therefore the motive force behind our ability to generate "wealth." Without reliable and ever-growing supplies of oil, there is no industrial growth, and without industrial growth things like capital investment instruments lose their legitimacy. That is why the Frankenstein family of Ponzi securities was invented in the first place -- to compensate for the demise of industrial growth by creating wealth out of... nothing!