As an avid cyclist studying transportation, I find Bryan D. Taylor's Rethinking Traffic Congestion a stark reminder that it will take a veritable revolution to wrestle the monopoly of streets from cars to people. While I am generally optimistic about the future of transportation based on new designs and policies that embrace people walking, biking, and taking transit, I am often let down in their implementation. Key features that would be truly transformative sometimes end up in the cutting floor. Shortened crosswalks, protected bike lanes, and light rail are often diluted to longer walk signal cycles, buffered bike lanes (nestled between parked cars and through lanes) and BRT lines that share lanes with cars. While there are valid budgetary and logistical constrains that may dilute a project, I feel that the main reasons we take these half-measures are political.
As Taylor says:
Automobiles are central to metropolitan life, and efforts to manage congestion must accept this fact.
The so-called American love affair with automobiles is not an irrational addiction, as some assert. Instead it is a rational response both to the utility of private vehicles and to public policies supporting their use. Widespread auto use unquestionably imposes significant costs on society, but it also brings enormous private benefit. It’s so easy to see the many costs of auto use—like chronic traffic congestion—that we can forget how fast and flexible automobiles benefit travelers.
It is important to recognize that driving is the most convenient form of personal transportation in most cases because our policies and designs of the late 20th century dictated it. Today, with the private automobile as the de facto monarch of the streets, any policy or design that may be perceived as having a negative impact on the convenience of driving will have to prove its worth and face incredible scrutiny. And thus, active transportation and transit projects need to be framed as being able to solve multiple societal problems that are created (or at the very least exacerbated) by driving. We claim that these projects will result in less people driving because they present an alternative to driving. But being an alternative to driving is not enough if it is not more convenient than driving. It is difficult for these projects to provide a more convenient alternative to driving on their own, and near-impossible when their most promising features are diluted.
I believe that, in our current scenario, the only way that we will have the funds to produce world-class active transportation and transit projects, and the only way that we can make them more convenient to driving is by pricing congestion. It may seem like political suicide to suggest it now, but we can't wait until the gas tax fails (even more so than today) to fund transportation projects. It is time for driving to pay for all the societal costs it has accrued over the last century. And while climate change begins to affect our lives, and the public slowly begins to see the need for urgent action, we can't wait to have universal consensus on this matter. Yes, driving will be less convenient because it will be more expensive. Yes, it will be an uncomfortable transition. But we'll have a chance to make it through that transition. To continue on our current path is to accept that there is no future worth saving, and that we may as well do as we have been while we wait to die. To price congestion and fund safe and convenient alternatives to driving will give us a fighting chance for a healthy future.
Taylor, Brian D. "Rethinking Traffic Congestion," Access, 21: 8-16, Fall 2002.
I appreciate the quote you included from Taylor. The "love affair" we have with automobiles "is not an irrational addiction... it is a rational response to the utility of private vehicles and to public policies supporting their use" is an import distinction. Taylor does not make the driver the enemy, rather he acknowledges that for most, it is the only option. We have built a system that both subsidizes and encourages driving. While I believe in congestion pricing, I do think think it punishes the driver, the same driver Taylor is forgiving for their dependency on cars.
ReplyDeleteAny implementation of congestion pricing would have to include an equity component in the form of exemptions or rebates. This would prevent low-income drivers from being unfairly burdened. Congestion pricing would not affect higher-income drivers although the funds raised could contribute to new infrastructure projects. Those that fall in the middle would suffer the most, and yes that may decrease their total vehicle miles travelled.
Before we discourage private vehicle use, we must have a viable, efficient alternative for community members to turn to. A public transportation system would have to be accessible, affordable, and prepared to accept increased ridership. That may be the case in Portland, I'm uncertain. Either way, getting cars off the road is not easy, as you mentioned, politically or otherwise.
Thanks for your post! It seems like most of us in this class and in PSU urban studies department are very in favor of and excited about alternative modes of transportation to cars and it can be easy to lose sight of how much cars dominate transportation in our country. Being honest about how much of an uphill battle we face when it comes to making our transportation system more sustainable is crucial. Here in Portland I feel like we get a lot of praise for our alternatives to driving but in almost no circumstances do they actually feel more convenient. Overall I appreciate your post as a perspective check that responds well to the reading.
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