The Tyee is running a series authored by UBC professor of Landscape Architecture Patrick Condon drawing from the book A Convenience Truth: A 2050 Plan for a Sustainable Vancouver. The research and future-focused design was done by 17 students in the UBC School of Architecture and Landscape Architecture and the UBC School of Community and Regional Planning.
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So far …
Making Vancouver Work for Everyone
How 17 landscape architecture and planning students at UBC envision a sustainable city by 2050. First in a series.
Vancouver in 2050: Transit City
Team of UBC landscape architecture and planning students envision getting around easily, sustainably. Second in a series.
A City that Runs on Itself
Cut greenhouse gas emissions dramatically? UBC students envision building this into Vancouver’s future.
The results might surprise you. Rather than a city rendered unrecognizable by tower blocks in every part of the city, they saw a future where most new housing was fit into existing neighbourhoods through gentle infill, or along transit streets in low-rise structures. …
They saw a city where the environmental costs of moving from place to place were decreased by over 80 per cent and where the cost of heating homes was similarly slashed. …
But they saw problems too. First and foremost was an aging population. …
They saw a city that might be on a path to becoming two cities, not one. A city of gleaming towers in some places, a pattern already clearly visible in the downtown, and a static and unaffordable city of car-dependent districts — districts with empty schools, fewer and fewer services, fewer and fewer jobs.
They saw a city whose main task would be caring for the old and sick, without a vibrant cadre of the young to help in this crucial task. …
A journey in six parts – three more to come. Read ’em all.
The link will allow you to read sentences like it:
A diesel powered bus produces more GHG per rider (assuming average loads) than does a Toyota Prius… and the like…
Where we have already heard that? In Langley Thursday, February 23rd 2012
Randall O’Toole said the same (they uses same source)…Todd litman explains why that is a fallacy….
the last opus presents a strange diagram, looking like the GHG emssion as function of gas price, but here presented as GHG emission as function of density..but denser LA emits more GHG than less dense New York, why that?
could it be because L.A. density follows the proposed “gentle streetcar urbanization model” where New York embraces the ultra dense high rise cores?
That illustrates the peril of average density” (Jarret has found useful to dedicated a chapter of its book on it, you can find also in my blog, a study of why Zurich – has high transit ridership in despite of low average density ),
Patrick Cordon has some interesting ideas that I like on Urban Planning. That said I have been quite ‘scared’ of his ideas on transportion. However I should point out he seems to be reasonably open to changing his ideas. If you look at his original transportion ideas they really were deeply flawed, but over time he seems to have modified them significantly to the point were even if I disagree at least they don’t look like something from Rail for the Valley.
Voony.
Stats on buses are solid and are based on average bus loads for north american buses as given in credible sources. Buses with full loads are of course more efficient, and this is acknowledged.
Kenworthy figures relating density to car use are from widely influential and credible research. The explanation for the difference between LA and NYC is generally that NYC has a more comprehensive transit system, whereas LA, famously, opted for the freeway in a big way in the 50s and 60s. Outriders exist of course, (Toronto, for example, performs worse than it should – Copenhagen much better) but the trend line is obvious.
RIco,
Thank you for your second look. My contention has always been that transit is part of a linked system where land use, jobs, affordability, and housing options all constituted parts of the organism of the city. I hope this comes through.
Patrick;
I don’t challenge the data itself-which I am sure are taken of verifiable sources- it is the presentation and interpretation of it which make problem
On bus vs Toyota Prius
for the reader having no time to listen the Langley debate record: What Todd Litman point out as a fallacy is the use of data not the data itself:
The NA average bus is asked to serve car oriented-and transit hostile-development: obviously it is deeply inefficient…
…But it is not that the bus is inherently inefficient…
A fairer comparison, could be a subset of bus data for the urban form you want to promote (e.g. Vancouver city, eventually TTC…).
using average load, and average vehicle consumption for all, could lead to a more accurate comparison either (I know soon all the car will be like Prius people told us, but Bus consumption make progress too (development of Hybrid bus…) …also note that for bus you use data (APTA) including fuel used for HVAC, for Prius you use data (EPA) not including this.
Kenworthy figures
again, the data are not the problem, the problem is the presentation, the wiki page below express the problem…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Revised_petrol_use_urban_density.JPG
and see, the trend line is not obvious at all.
Beside it, I think like Rico: the urban planning ideas you have are very interesting and recognize a great openness to engage conversation on your research.