The 2010 National Transit Database has been available for a few weeks. As usual, it comes in two formats: either some 34 data tables that are easy to read but difficult to manipulate in Excel or some 20 data files that are easy to manipulate in Excel but difficult to read.
The Antiplanner has summarized the database in a single Excel file that includes annual transit trips, passenger miles, vehicle revenue miles, fares, operating costs, capital costs (which the database calls “expanded service” capital costs), maintenance costs (which the database calls “existing service” capital costs), number of vehicles, total seats, total standing room, BTUs of energy consumption, and carbon dioxide emissions for each transit agency and mode of transit. The BTUs were calculated from the energy table using energy factors from the Energy Information Agency. Carbon dioxide outputs were calculated using state electrical generation data from the same source.
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Rows 2 through 1392 include the data by transit agency and mode. Rows 1396 through 1412 are sums by transit mode. Rows 1416 through 1431 are sums by transit mode including only those modes for which energy data were published. Rows 1434 through 1798 are sums by urbanized area. Eventually, I’ll add more columns that include calculations of various factors, but with these raw data you can do the same on your own.
The Antiplanner wrote:
BTUs of energy consumption, and carbon dioxide emissions for each transit agency and mode of transit. The BTUs were calculated from the energy table using energy factors from the Energy Information Agency. Carbon dioxide outputs were calculated using state electrical generation data from the same source.
It would be informative and useful if the Federal Transit Administration were to mandate that all providers of transit services (mostly electric-powered rail lines of various kinds; and also cable cars, trolleybuses and funiculars) that consume electric power for propulsion or traction also disclose the generation attributes of their electricity provider(s).
Then it would be possible to easily (and unambiguously) compute CO2 emissions of transit and other modes of transportation.
Thank you Randal. Good gift. The BTU and carbon emissions are important, because soon we will be taxing carbon and the efficiencies will be important – not just for transit, but for buildings, infrastructure, trade, food, and manufacturing as well. Everyone should get used to the metric, as our kids will be talking about it when they are adults.
DS
because soon we will be taxing carbon and the efficiencies will be important
Perhaps the All Knowing Planner could point out the Senate or House bills to this effect, thanks.
Everyone should get used to the metric, as our kids will be talking about it when they are adults.
Ah, the old, condescending “get used to it, Mundane!” that planners are sooooo good at!
Metro since your about as anti-planner as one gets and your a regular here, I was hoping you’d offer a counter model to the current planning model so we can understand the “basics” of why planners and anti-planners disagree:
The community educates citizens to professionally plan their cities. These citizens trained in urban studies then offer advice, and the community as a whole leverages this advice towards a solution. The community, not the planner, holds the power to make change.
If possible please try to keep this to basic theory for now! Just a few sentences and we can add to it.
Sustainer said: metrosucks since your about as anti-planner as one gets and your a regular here
THWM; Though O’Toole & metrosucks aren’t actually against planning.
They’re just against planning that also takes into consideration railroads, cyclists & pedestrians.
I was hoping you’d offer a counter model to the current planning model so we can understand the “basics†of why planners and anti-planners disagree:
Pretending that the choice is government planning, or pure anarchy, is a false dichotomy. It’s not planning I have a problem with; it’s government planning, which distorts the market, invites cronyism, and substitutes political decisions for reason and analysis. That’s why we have gold-plated light rail and streetcar systems in Portland (and other cities), while traffic stews in hours of bumper to bumper gridlock. To name just one example of government ineptitude or just pure evil.
Government planners can’t believe that people could possibly, actually prefer cars to slow, inconvenient transit, so they make up lies about how the car receives huge subsidies and is unhealthy and anti-community, as well as making up “problems” like “sprawl”.
Private planners would do their best to deliver market-demanded solutions. You would never catch a private planner trying to increase congestion on a road to “get people out of their cars”. Only the unbelievable hubris of government planners allows them to dream up this stuff.
Mr. O’Toole,
Thank you for the xls. summary file. This will be vary useful for me over the next few months. I’ll use it to the best of my abilities to give you a Christmas present… More financially sustainable transit (FYI, I’ll be working almost exclusively on bus systems and not trains).
Hopefully someone in bennett’s office will be working on the social side of bus riding, to take away the stigma!
DS
It pains me to say this Dan, but not really. I basically look for “transit dependent” populations and make sure the bus is getting them to where they need to go. This should be simple, but mix in politics and it consumes a lot of my time. This also ensures that low income people, families without cars, the elderly, teens (under 16) and people with disabilities will be using the bus systems heavily. This is fodder to those that hold the stigma.
As a social scientist, I wish I had more resources to deal with the stigma. My profession as a transit planner doesn’t allow me enough time. Plus, most of the quasi-racist ideals that the individuals that hold the “bus stigma” have will die alongside the baby boomers. The younger generations are too pragmatic for that bs. All in good time.
Awesome Metro thanks for the response. What I’m hearing is that you agree with the current model … with the exception that private planners should replace government planners (that’s fair to say, right?). There are a couple things that don’t make sense though, and I’m assuming that your a professional willing to answer a citizens questions regarding your own proposal. So, as a professional, can you just jot down a sentence or two, by number, explaining how the following works in your private planner model? Remember this isn’t a trap, I’m sincerely just trying to understand your model, if your not sure I’m not gonna slam you or anything. Lets learn!
1.) UNDER-REPRESENTED PARTIES: Who will finance private planners to envision the future of low income neighborhoods, natural/historical/architectural sites, or the removal of brown sites if there is no profit incentive to hire a private planner to do so?
2.) AUTHORITY TO PLAN: A.)How does a private planner assume the authority, especially under the constitution and relevant case law, to plan how all the different road projects, for example, relate to each other without violating the rights of citizens and without getting sued?
3.) PUBLIC RIGHTS: Does the public community still get a say in what private planners do to their city? If the private plan is altered by the rights of the city, how would a private plan differ from a public planners plan which undergoes an identical process?
4.) FINANCING PLANS: Who pays for comprehensive planning if taxes cannot be used (as taxes would imply public planning has occurred).
5.) PUBLIC PROTECTION: If gov’t will no longer enforce zoning laws (correct?), what replaces it so quiet neighborhoods are protected? 5b.) If zoning remains, how do we distinguish between private planners doing the job and public planners doing the same job? Public planners are being referred to as evil (among other unkind things), so a distinction would be appropriate.
6.) PUBLIC SERVICES: Who conducts public oriented research in order to determine sidewalk locations, street light timing, speed limits, building setbacks, easements, etc etc etc (it seems like if a private planner performs public activities, then suddenly the private planner just turned into a public planner, even if not financed by public dollars … see the confusion?).
Thanks in advance for the insights Metrosucks.
And thank YOU, Sustainer, for outlining the first week’s lecture in freshman Public Policy or Government or Civic Studies.
BTW, I’d like to invite you to play a game of chess, I can’t find your contact info on your site…
DS
Yea well it seems so much easier for harshly opposing ideologies to communicate when we just stick to the basics of the basics. Of course then the opposing side accuses me of implying that they are stupid so I guess I still have to refine my engagement process.
Yea I’ll put up contact info one of these days, I’ve been hesitant cause there’s some Iraqi’s looking over our soldier’s Facebook pages and I’m a bit of a worry wart about things like that, but how hard would that really be to find any of our information these days? Anyway you can contact me at falconpilot05@aol.com, I usually play at chess.com, makes sense huh?
bennett-
The difference between “looking for ‘transit dependent’ populations” and “opposing improvements to roads to make the population more dependent on transit” is the difference between planners who are helpful and planners who are evil.
My advice to planners is to really really really emphasize that you know the difference.
That may sound easy, but college planning faculty are against that, as the trend is for social science faculty to demand that student demonstrate support for very left wing views of the world. If planners can’t fix their own profession, then I don’t see why anybody should trust them professionally.
Just some free advice. Not even two cents worth, unless you want engineers to take you seriously.
I usually play at chess.com, makes sense huh?
Good, me too.
If planners can’t fix their own profession, then I don’t see why anybody should trust them professionally.
The conclusion still doesn’t follow from the false premises.
DS
Anti-planners: If the questions in #10 are somehow unfair please explain why so they can be rephrased by myself or another government planning supporter. I think Mr. O’Toole would appreciate productive responses to civil and productive questions on his site. The point of #10 is to help all planners understand that all planning activities can occur without government (in this case I’m supporting the anti-planner cause, young planners at least in my area are being trained to be as non-partisan as possible, even if at the expense of the profession, but someone from the anti-planner side has to at least answer or have the guts to say “we don’t know, but we’re working on it”). Deflecting, name calling, and unresponsiveness to good questions slide on this site all the time, I mean we do have free speech, but at some point it needs to at the very least be acknowledged that government planning supporters are asking fair and simple questions and not receiving rational or good natured answers. Every system has flaws, but the current system seems pretty good [insert random failure of a planner here], this is simply a call to understand why citizens disagree and perhaps discover actual problems. Without further input the conclusion will have to be drawn that there is no basic theory in existence that rationalizes the ideology that government planning needs to be completely replaced, and also that anti-planners therefore support government planning so long as it does not have malicious intent (which is exactly what government planners would agree with … is there even a concrete difference between anti-planners and “government” planners or is this site simply encouraging mindless debate?). If this is the case, anti-planners should not be targeting government planners directly but the factors within the government planning systems that make planners malicious (strike the roots … sounds like I’m scolding children again but am I wrong?). If anti-planners recognize the causes which breed “evil,” “communist,” “condescending,” “all knowing” government planners then what are those factors? We shouldn’t poke fun at an ignorant child because they attend a bad school, we should reform the school. Again #10 has questions that seem fair, if Metrosucks doesn’t have the answers I’m sure someone else from the anti-planner community does … these aren’t even difficult project based questions these basic theory inquiries should take only moments for a legitimately passionate anti-planner to answer. I just like to think we’re all on the same team working towards the same goal of a better society.
Sustainer – You sound like you asking a sincere question, so let me provide a sincere answer to just the first of the many questions you reference.
1.) UNDER-REPRESENTED PARTIES: Who will finance private planners to envision the future of low income neighborhoods, natural/historical/architectural sites, or the removal of brown sites if there is no profit incentive to hire a private planner to do so?
The question posits that a group of people have “low” income. These people are not stupid. They have their own goals and dreams and families and desires. They make/get some money, and they think very very very very hard about how they spend it.
So why why why why does somebody have to hire a “government planner” to force them to live one way or another? Why can’t they pursue their own future, as individuals, and not be forced by government planners to pursue a collective future that it is taught this year (next year it will change) in college planning classes?
What is wrong with people who “envision” their own future without planning school dogma?
Again. More false conclusions from faulty premises. Lather, rinse, repeat.
DS
Sandy. Thanks for the input. However notice that the question asks how a “private†planner is going to be financed. As nicely as I can say this: you didn’t answer the question. Rephrased the question would ask how does “private†planning* get financed? Planning costs money because research, manpower, and planning knowledge must be acquired? Also, absolutely nothing was stated about the poor being stupid, I really don’t know why that was brought up. If we are going to talk about low income specifically, then we can productively focus on the point that low income areas cannot afford what the rich areas can afford (this has nothing to do with low income education, but access to resources). It then follows that the poor will live in lesser planned areas than the rich if government planners are not available. Public planning serves the poor even when the poor sectors do not pull their weight in taxes … another way to look at this question is to ask: how will this equality be accomplished since the antiplanner model is to be based on market demand, when the poor cannot afford to provide demand?
“Why can’t they pursue their own future, as individuals, and not be forced by government planners to pursue a collective future that it is taught this year (next year it will change) in college.â€
Good question. These are important points for people to understand who are unfamiliar with planning. FIRST: The reason planning techniques change is not due to college professor teachings, but because planning must evolve to fit new scenarios in a rapidly changing society, and also consider lessons learned from past failures. This way every day is designed to be better than the day before. For example planning techniques 1000 years ago focused heavily on military defense, while today most well developed cities are completely unprepared for warfare. The situation and available methods simply change. SECOND: Your talking about government forcing the future on citizens. The system of total freedom for developers has been tried, and basically what happens is a very efficient, but highly unlivable situation where developers who are not restricted by public planners build for profit (extremely high density) and are not held to building code which leads to unsafe and unsanitary conditions. Citizens should not think of planning as being forced on them, but planning should be thought of as the reason why they can live spaciously and in a relatively clean atmosphere: Lastly, and brought up before, the citizens create the change, not the planner. Planners are information providers, they do not run the show. Let me know if this answers the question, it’s tough to be explanatory in only a couple paragraphs.
“What is wrong with people who “envision†their own future without planning school dogma?â€
The first problem with this is that its disrespectful, is there a more professional way this can be rephrased? To the point, and again, planners and citizens work together. Citizens are never dictated by planners, planners are hired by the community. If a citizen does not like the city, its not the planners fault so much as it is the city councils fault or the Mayor’s fault or the business communities fault or any one of the thousands of citizens in the community who could have spoken up at a public workshop or meeting.
Government planners need to realize that citizens are uninformed about how the system works. Although anti-planners cannot fly on a bike, planners should still try to talk to anti-planners. Sure there is no threat, but anti-planners should not be viewed as opposition and certainly not as irritating static, as it is the responsibility of planners to engage every sector of the public even if the conversations are likely to have little value.