Planning, Zoning, and Development changes we need to make NOW.
I think it is time for us to realize that one way or another, the issues of peak oil and climate change are going to rise up and bite us in the our exalted posteriors. To take a middle of the road estimate, we only have about 20 years to re-configure planning and development as we know it, both for already developed areas and for those now being developed, and most certainly for all future developments. I would like to therefore throw out a list of things that we need to adopt immediately, whether we like it or not, to try and combat the effects that peak oil and climate change will have on our society.
I don’t have any illusions about anyone actually liking or adopting these proposals. I’m a realist, not an optimist. But after having considered the situation carefully, I have come to the conclusion that these things could be done, if anyone was willing. So in 20 years, if nothing else, I’ll at least be able to say “I told you so,” when everyone looks back and says, “Why didn’t we…”
1. Electric trolley/streetcar systems need to be installed to service every last neighborhood in our urban area. These neighborhood electric systems need to be served in turn by an electric collector system of express streetcars, subways, or light rail. If that means taking up road lanes, so be it. Gasoline powered buses must be replaced with electric ones, starting immediately.
2. A moratorium needs to be placed on “big box” and “mega-shopping” centers. We have enough of these already. The existing ones need to be tied into the electric mass transit system. If that means taking up road lanes, so be it.
3. Every new neighborhood must be absolutely required to have three things:
a) grocery, pharmacy, and hardware retail shopping centers within ¼-½ mile of every home built – in other words, within a reasonable walking distance.
b) A children’s playground, adjacent to at least two acres of open field space. This open space can be used for air-dropping emergency rations, medicine, or supplies, and can be a staging area for a “tent city” of government, medical or military operations during a natural or man-made disaster. These should be no greater than 1-¾ mile walking distance from every home in the development.
c) A “community center” building, with classroom space and assembly space, hopefully adjacent to the open field, must be provided for each neighborhood.
4. All existing neighborhoods need to be retrofitted to meet the above requirements. (“Retrofitted” is a nice, polite way of saying that the division of planning needs to select a block or two in each existing neighborhood that more or less meets the walkability requirements and raze it to the ground in order to put in a-c above.)
5. All new development (both residential and commercial) must, starting immediately, be required to have solar panels or solar shingles to supplement the building’s electrical needs. In order to put the electric mass transit in place in an already near capacity electric grid, we are going to have to get serious about this now.
6. Existing development must be retrofitted with solar panels or solar shingles, and the government is going to have to systematically do this in each neighborhood and provide substantial subsidies for owners of buildings to do so. This is not optional. It is not enough to reduce the electric usage of just the new developments. Old neighborhoods MUST be brought “up-to-speed” with solar power. We have a 20 year timeframe to do this. There is no reason that it cannot be done in that amount of time.
7. The driving age needs to raised immediately to at least 18.
8. The government now offers tax help for those who buy hybrid or electric cars, but this is not enough. Starting immediately, a tax must be placed on all households or businesses starting at the 3rd registered standard gasoline vehicle. No exceptions. In five years, that needs to fall back to starting with the 2nd standard gasoline vehicle. No exceptions. In ten years, every standard gasoline vehicle must be subject to the tax. No exceptions. In addition, a substantial sales tax in addition to the regular state sales tax must be placed on the sale of standard gasoline powered vehicles. No exceptions.
9. Toll roads must charge higher tolls for standard gasoline powered vehicles. Ditto for parking permits, etc. You get the idea.
10. Rail freight must be encouraged and provided for both with land for standard rail yards and tie-ins to the local electric mass transit system for special electric “freight trolleys” which can deliver rail freight to local businesses. Alleys behind and between existing and new businesses can have spur rails for these trolleys to unload so they don’t block passenger service. Underground or basement unloading is also an option.
11. Free or heavily subsidized wireless internet must be made available throughout the urban area. Government must also encourage full or partial telecommuting with tax breaks for businesses – for each employee who telecommutes at least half-time.
12. All government employees should be given free passes for mass transit. Government should encourage businesses to do the same, using incentives of some sort. All students should receive a free mass transit pass from their schools, both k-12 and college (with expiration dates clearly marked).
13. Unlucky 13 I’ll add as my personal wish: All new development must be required by law to be at least 10% “affordable housing” – “affordable” being defined by something like affordable to someone with about 50% of the area’s median income. There are several ways of calculating “affordable,” and most of you already have some way of doing this, so I won’t belabor the point.
14. “Zoning” needs to be changed to allow non-industrial home businesses in all areas, and “homeowner association” rules against home-based non-industrial type businesses needs to be made illegal effective immediately.
15. Conservation of electricity and resources needs to be given a top priority. For example, the government must make it illegal for homeowner’s associations to prohibit clotheslines (and other electricity-use-reducing old fashioned items), home vegetable gardens, home greenhouses, and other eco-friendly practices.
So here they are – 15 things you can do or start doing right now that will greatly help the city deal with climate change and peak oil. There are surely other things, such as bike routes and the new “walkable schools” initiative, but they are just a drop in the bucket. The two biggest problems we will face are lack of gasoline and hence lack of transportation, and addressing those will need to go hand-in -hand with electric conservation and alternative electric generation, and eventually the acknowledgment that it is morally wrong – a crime against humanity, even – to let electricity (and water, and local phone service) be for-profit privately owned ventures that can deny people basic necessary-for-life services due to inability to pay. – but that’s another post.
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Here's an interesting commentary...
...about another city that had a chance to do it right a few years back, and blew it.
Raise the Hammer
Hammerblog
Yes, It's a Crisis
(Category: Energy)
Posted 2008/04/28 | By: Ryan McGreal
Original at: http://www.raisethehammer.org/blog.asp?id=989
...Even when such esteemed economic analysts as CIBC World Markets and Goldman Sachs started warning about peak oil in 2005, hardly anyone paid attention to them. So far, it seems they have actually underestimated the impact on prices.
...The city of Hamilton went so far as to hire a consultant to prepare a report on peak oil [PDF]. Aside from some window dressing [PDF], the city mostly ignored its conclusions, neglected even to study its recommendations, and flat-out refused to reconsider its enonomic development plans in the face of growing evidence that oil-dependent industries have poor long-term prospects...
...Here are some "serious new realities about the cost of living" we can no longer afford the luxury to ignore:
* Oil prices are going to double in the next four years, and quite possibly even sooner.
* Oil prices are likely to quadruple within a decade.
...In the face of this reality, planning long-term economic development around air transport is sheer lunacy. To the extent that airlines will survive the next decade or two, they will do so through ruthless consolidating: a few very large planes owned by a few very large companies flying between major centres, and mostly transcontinental at that. Hamilton will not have a prosperous future as an air transport hub. It's that simple...
...Similarly, Hamilton will not grow its economy by building more highways. The highway we just built is doing effectively nothing to grow our economy, as evidenced by the zero percent tax assessment growth the city has projected for 2008...It has not spurred new commercial and industrial development - in fact, the city is fighting to preserve its highway accessible employment lands from residential development - and losing...It has not taken transport trucks off downtown streets - and John Dolbec, CEO of the Hamilton Chamber of Commerce rushes to explain of why they won't any time soon...
...The bottom line is that highways and airports are no longer viable economic development engines. They will not produce jobs or growth once oil prices double and double again. The sooner the city wakes up to this, the sooner we can start developing our economy in real growth sectors: rebuilding our rail and shipping infrastructure, producing energy renewably, conserving energy and retrofitting existing buildings, and creating a centre of innovation around these areas...
...The question is whether the entrenched people in power are willing to admit reality and change course.
*****************************
Apparently, the answer is "no."
homeownership vs. rental
Good ideas, though you'll get a better reception if you back your ideas with incentives than any concept in which you propose forcing private property owners to make changes. The number of times the term "must" or "need" was used in this list is a bit hilarious
Add to the list - the overwhelming emphasis on homeownership in lieu of urban in-fill rental housing in our Federal budgets should be reevaluated to create a more balanced housing ecosystem.
Here is why: http://www.southfloridaceo.com/article700.html
"market incentives..."
...only make sense when you're dealing with people who care and understand the problem. We MUST and NEED to tackle these problems while we still have the resources to do so.
As for housing, what needs to be re-evaluated is single family detached housing, not ownership. We need a return to European style towns where a family business is run on the first floor and the living quarters are above. I have actually been toying with some designs to this effect in my spare time - you can get very nice 3-4 bedroom 2 story flats with bonus finished attic space as a 40-ft storefront ground floor. Re-localization means a return to encouraging sustainable economies as well as sustainable agriculture. Ownership is an important economic boost.
Implementing the Plan
These suggestions appear to be unfunded mandates. We need to concentrate on revisioning our economic system to implement many of his suggestions. Such activity would require somewhat of a concensus of the people.
Why not limited equity co-ops giving poor folks a place that they can afford AND ownership opportunities?
When you say "co-op" people think "commune."
I'm very much in favor of co-ops - but it's pretty much a non-starter. People are too "into" the every-person-for-themselves, independence at all costs paradigm. Places like the Netherlands have a very interesting co-op type of housing, basically sharing a large common kitchen and a common great room, with suites of bedrooms, baths and private living rooms for the individual families of the co-op. Here you'd have to have all sorts of "commercial" grade appliances and equipment and permits and what-not that makes sense for a dorm of dozens of singles but not much sense for a bare handful of co-oping families. I don't think the legal system here is set up for that sort of thing, either (insurance, for example, zoning, taxes - there's no way to "own" part of a building without setting up a separate legal entity to "own" the common areas - not exactly stuff "the poor" can whip up for themselves, etc.). Perhaps you can work up a proposal for such a co-op and post it as a new forum? I'd enjoy seeing people's input on it.
Great list!
I like the idea of streetcars taking over city center roads. If only they hadn't pulled them out in the 50's!
One thing though... "There are surely other things, such as bike routes and the new “walkable schools” initiative, but they are just a drop in the bucket."
I disagree. Cars can be banned from dense city centers. They're way too inefficient, smelly, and alienating anyway. For those who think it will hurt commercial activities: cars don't buy things, people buy things. Simply turn the roads into bicycle roads. For those who can't ride a bike, there's always public transit.
I wish!
My municipality is actually considering making the downtown area even more pedestrian un-friendly by taking out the one way roads and returning to two-way traffic. A friend in the division of long range planning actually told me she "would never" give up her SUV. People just can't seem to understand that things going on outside of their favorite basketball team or video game has relevance to their lives - and this is a person with years of experience in the division of planning.
In fact, our 5-year comp plan was just sent to the publishers, and it's a joke. I'm actually ashamed of it. It's 300 pages of nothing, complete fluff - literally nothing. No realistic assessment of anything, not even lip service.
This is a metropolitan area with around 300,000 people, I might add, second largest in our state. Not impressive to some of you, I'm sure, but how are all these people going to get to work? Get to school? Get groceries?
Or worse: gather and receive emergency instructions and supplies? The emergency shelter and emergency response portions of the plan were removed in the early 1980s and never put back in, much less updated - and not even the slightest hint that peak oil or climate change will be on their radar anytime within the next 20 years (which is supposedly the comp plan's timeframe).
The planning commission has no clue. They have no plan. If I could get my husband to move, we'd be out of here. Seriously. (His family is here - this is his hometown.)
Great Work Ahavah!!!
I agree with your assessment and sense of urgency regarding the twin problems of peak oil and climate change. It is so good to see a Planner who is visionary, sees the larger picture, and not stuck in a niche accepting or trying to tweak the status quo. We need more people like you suggesting policy changes and strategic action.
I too, have my realist, and optimistic sides. Don't give up. Never give up.
It is my considered opinion that we need to do more than mandate change. We must change the way that we allocate resources to and within communities.
Although it would be extremely unpopular, we need to substantially increase local, state, and Federal gasoline taxes and dedicate the revenues to rebuilding neighborhoods, and expanding mass transit.
Furthermore, it is essential that we reorganize the economy to one that is consistent with the mission of adapting to decreased availability of finite resources, such as oil, and its concurrent sister climate change.
The two pillars of such would be sustainability and equity. We need to move towards relocalization wherever possible.
The biggest task is to educate people on the need for unity regarding the predicament that the human population faces.
I have identified the following principles as an effort to reach such consensus:
-ecology
-sustainability
-cooperation (economic democracy)
-equity
-community stewardship
-neighborhood improvement
-quality of life
-conservation
-peace and tranquility
-sufficiency
-production and access to essential goods and services (moving toward relocalization)
-primacy of the pedestrian/walkability/new urbanism
-economy and humanity of scale
-risk diversification
-life long education.
Enough for now. You can get more inight into my work by going to:
www.culturechage.org/Morin.html
Workin' for peace and cooperation,
Mike Morin
katerimarie@netzero.net
You know...
...I must say that I'm pretty astonished that no one even blinked an eye at the tax scheme for gas powered cars - yet the majority of commenters were horribly offended at the idea that minors shouldn't be allowed to drive for leisure. I'm not sure what that says about our society. I just think it's interesting.
Although I more or less
Although I more or less agree with your list items, in spirit at least, the first and most difficult challenge will be in convincing people that there is even a problem. In the world outside of Planetizen and a few Peak Oil websites, you will have difficulty finding any reference to any kind of oil shortage at all. There have been a few murmurs here and there in the mainstream media, but people still don't fundamentally understand how "Peak" can be a bad thing. ("That means most, right???") It will be a major challenge to convince people that Peak Oil is real and that it's not oil company price gouging, a liberal/socialist/totalitarian conspiracy, etc. (I'm looking at you, greginboise)
There is a vast agglomeration of major difficulties, arguably crises, headed our way and most of the news is what did Hillary, Obama, Romney do today. Who won in the NFL playoffs the other day? What did Britney do this time? People are just on a totally different frequency to all of this. What they are going to notice is a variety of problems increasing in frequency, but they will not be able to tie it all together and understand why it's happening. They will be confused, angry, scared and in search of someone or something to blame. That is likely to be the liberals, the government, the neocons, whatever. In any case it isn't the right kind of environment to support massive gov't "New Deal" capital projects, especially given the state of our financial system and government finances in full meltdown mode. The free market is going to take care of all this, and it's going to be very ugly. The U.S. will never be the same, and I'm afraid it's too late for planners to be able to do much about it.
I share your pessimism...
...but I'm not going down without giving it my best. No one I know is going to be able to say they didn't see it coming, because I will call them to the carpet on it if they do. I'm going to be the most obnoxious "I told you so" fiend on the planet, no doubt.
But seriously, there's no chance of getting anything fixed. I went to a talk given by Mattew Simmons, an energy analyst and financier with the CFR, who told me personally last year that the reality was more like 7 years, not 20. And now we're seeing articles saying the same thing from big oil executives. Shell Oil recently suggested publicaly a 7 year timeframe before rationing and shortages will be widespread. You'd think people would be fainting in the floor. Ninety-nine-point-nine percent of people don't read the news enough to even know about it.
I don't know if you read the Falls Church News-Press (Virginia), but there is a series of articles going on there now, I think three in the series have been published, by Tom Whipple. His research also suggests a 5-10 year frame left.
And I have read some reports from various government agencies that have kept me up at night. Government has to have gas/diesel, you know - for ambulances, police cars, firetrucks, border patrol, military, food transportation, etc. But their budget isn't unlimited. The feds will bring down the price of gas/diesel to something they can afford by the very simple expedient of banning the biggest competitor - private automobiles - whether we're ready or not. Unless you're excruciatingly rich and/or well-connected politically, you're not going to have a car permit, period. People are going to have to use mass transit whether they like it or not - whether it's even THERE or not.
PS - they're also planning/simulating their responses for the riots that will follow. Don't even think about trying to use a gun to secure your "right" to drive - you don't have a right to drive.
Oil futures contracts are trading at $200 a barrel right now - that means the traders are expecting to be able to sell that oil for MORE than that and make a profit by the end of December. They don't buy those things to lose money, you know. People have no idea how close they are - and they don't even care, as you said. Are you ready for $8 a gallon gasoline? Nobody is.
Changes to Make NOW
Ahavah:
Sorry for the late posting but I just came upon this recently. You make many good points and those critics who seem mired in dominant social paradigmatic quicksand are amusing but sadly lacking in awareness.
I would be interested to learn if you've come upon any good resources on peak oil and relocalization other than Post Carbon or Relocalize.net. Your suggestions are good starting points for a broader discussion and I hope you continue on this course.
I'm glad you liked it.
By "good" I presume you mean "useful," and not alarmist? There are several good pessimistic ones that I actually enjoy reading - not that I believe everything, but there are good ideas to glean out of them. One is:
www.lifeaftertheoilcrash.net/breakingnews.html
The Home page is a very informative and well-written article, but doesn't really offer much in the way of suggestions.
The Oil Drum just did a couple of articles on whether or not agriculture can and should be relocalized - there are other interesting articles there, too.
www.theoildrum.com
If you're interested in the philosophy of attempting the paradigm change that is necessary for our culture to adapt, there is a series of very excellent posts:
www.thearchdruidreport.blogspot.com
For a wide range of articles on agriculture, saving energy, adapting, alternative energy, etc. try:
www.energybulletin.net
There's a very good article by urban planner and critic James Howard Kunstler called "making other arrangements" published at Orion:
http://www.orionmagazine.org/index.php/articles/article/7/
That's all I can think of off the top of my head. The way I usually find interesting articles is to just follow links on the sites I already know, or on magazine webpages I already know, like Mother Earth News (yes, it is still around!).
Hope this helps some. I don't actually have any hope any of this can be done in time. Our own planning commission just looked at me like I was nuts after I gave this presentation. Our new mayor made a remark in passing about needing more mass transit, including streetcars and light rail, but the community is not taking it seriously. I don't imagine most are.
changing the driving age to 18
Why does the driving age need to be changed to 18? I was a very responsible driver at 16. I am quite aware that many teenage drivers make terrible decisions, but what makes us think that they won't make the same mistakes at 18? I think that drivers education needs to be much more intensive and diving tests should be more difficult rather than assuming that young people will be bad drivers and making them wait to get a license. Also, how about just putting 16-17 year olds on mopeds?
Jean Mosher
Sorry it took so long to reply...
...things have been hectic the last six months (my father died of cancer, among other things).
The reason the driving age should be raised to at least 18 (and I'm actually in favor of 21), except possibly for special licenses for those who work and are in company logo vehicles driving - as one youth pointed out to me above - the reason is not because of safety, though that is a major concern. You might have been responsible, but the vast majority simply aren't. The leading cause of death for teens is automobile accidents, if I recall correctly - and most involving alcohol, I believe. That one change alone would save tens of thousands of lives every year - not to mention lower everyone's insurance rates.
But the real issue here is getting people off the roads, and even some teens are relatively "safe" drivers that doesn't change the fact that the places they need and want to go shouldn't require personal automobiles. They shouldn't be driving out of town or on long road trips alone. The reality is that gas is going to be allocated only for certain uses by the government - none of which a teen would be involved with: public service, emergency response, border guard, military, food distribution (trucking, not pizza delivery), etc. So why should they have a license?
Congestion and scarcity aren't going away. They may as well get used to living in that world, because it's here.
That's quite the nice little
That's quite the nice little totalitarian state you've designed, B. My guess is that most of us don't want to live there. Did your history classes ever teach you about a place called the U.S.S.R? Sounds like you might have liked it...
Really?
With the exception of the solar energy, the above was what every town in America looked like - locally owned and operated shops, trolleys and electric streetcars, etc. I guess you're too young to remember. Therefore, I humbly suggest that it is you who needs to brush up on your history.
Aren't these simply proposals?
I can envision these proposals being adopted in a manner quite consistent with American republican democracy. I picture a New England town hall. A citizen (note I didn't refer to "consumer", or "voter", or "homeowner", or "Republican" or "Democrat" or any other useless label) stands and draws attention to issues in the community. The citizen then proposes his or her "fixes" and then it goes to a vote or is tabled for discussion. It may be adopted in toto or piecemeal, but the commissar's you mention are nowhere in sight.
Just a thought.
Teens and cars
I was thinking primarily of cruising, that and driving to and from school, which most kids do because they think they're too "cool" to ride the bus in most non-inner city areas of the country. Perhaps some sort of "commercial" license could be issued for kids who drive as part of their job - a license which would not be valid when out driving on their own time. They would have to be in a specially marked vehicle (company logo, etc.) and have the employer's number handy so an officer could call and verify they were actually on duty if they were pulled over for anything.
I understand, and agree
I understand, and agree with, almost all of your changes except for one: how would raising the driving age change the effect the city? I am biased because I am quite young, but I would like your opinion expressed with more depth on this topic.
I understand that raising the driving age would bring about these changes: less drivers contributing to traffic, less accidents (since new drivers are the most likely to drive recklessly), and more people paying for and using public transportation. But dear Ahavah B., by raising the driving age, wouldn't the city lose all of its good pizza delivers, flower delivers,and dramatically decrease the amount of fast-food drive-thru customers?
I think that the youngest drivers, ages 16-17, are the most likely to drive recklessly, but by putting the driving age at 16, the government is giving adult freedoms gradually. First comes the privilege to drive, then soon the privilege to purchase tobacco and acquire a pilot's license, and finally the ability to register a fire-arm, buy alcohol and pornographic material.
Thanks for bringing up the topic and I hope that we can continue this conversation.
Legalize Accessory Dwelling Units in all zones
This is an important one that slipped by your radar.
There are at least 30 tangible advantages with no disadvantages.
Check:
http://groups.google.com/group/friends-of-granny-flats/web/adu-benefits-...
You're right.
I did see an article on that lately, but it slipped my mind when I was writing this (you know, late at night, after the kids have gone to bed and all that.) Along with striking down non eco friendly homeowner's association rules, we do need to find reasonable ways to to increase dwelling density in established neighborhoods, and this is one good idea that, as you said, has little in the way of drawbacks. I would say, though, that it should not be a license to put up cheap, tacky, duct-tape-and-vinyl-siding junk in nice neighborhoods. I am in favor of reasonable architectural review. That being said, if the residents are willing to build architecturally acceptable units then the government should not prevent them unless there is a compelling reason to - such as urban streams and waterways, for example. These need to be kept clear, and developers often "put" them along back property lines, where granny-flats are most likely to be put also. But yes, I agree with the principle that density must be raised quite a bit in existing sub-urban and near-urban neighborhoods. That is the only way to stop sprawl.