USEPA The Fed

USEPA

The Feds anti-transport program, SOVs gored

The US Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA) is spending millions of US taxpayers money to help environmentalist, anti-roads and other left-activist groups campaign to reduce the mobility of Americans. This anti-transport program is called “Transportation Partners” (TP). The recent annual report of TP says most of it: “The mission of the Transp Partners program is to reduce the growth in vehicle miles traveled (VMT) throughout the US. The program has worked with (subsidized - TRnl) hundreds of local organizations (activists - TRnl) to achieve this mission over the past three years... These local organizations are known as project partners (sounds better than paid agents - TRnl.) There are currently 347 project partners (located in 42 states and DC) enrolled in the program, ranging in size and scope from a community bicycle program in Tampa to a transit center in Phoenix. (“Virtually every anti-road auto-hating group in the country gets some of our dough” - TRnl.)

SOVs gored

“This unique program was formed out of Pres Clinton and VP Gore’ s Climate Change Action Plan. The CCAP describes the US response to the Earth Summit, a gathering in Rio de Janeiro...The Transp Partners (TP) program is responsible for 44% of the transp sector VMT reductions called for in the CCAP. To meet this goal, the program aims to reduce (VMT by) 20 billion (b) nationally in the year 2000. Such a reduction constitutes 0.8% of the VMT baseline outlined in the CCAP. EPA headquarters staff who work on the program are referred to as TP Central. (Juss love that name, right out of Orwell - TRnl)

“The program’s mission is to reduce the growth in VMT through the promotion of projects that provide alternatives to single occupancy vehicle (SOV) travel. The Transp Partners program focuses on three types of measures to reduce VMT:

(1) community design or redevelopment strategies that facilitate walking, bicycling, and transit use by incorporating a mix of land-uses, higher densities, pedestrian and bicycling amenities, and small business/commercial development at transit centers (all the stuff UCTC says is ineffectual - TRnl)

(2) market-based measures, including reducing parking subsidies, parking cash-out programs, and peak-period road pricing (they’ve never shown up at the FHWA conferences - TRnl)

(3) technology applications that take advantage of cutting-edge technologies, such as telecommuting and smart cards, and enhance existing transportation choices and services (Baloney! USEPA does nothing for this good stuff - TRnl)

“As part of the Climate Change Action Plan, Transportation Partners is responsible for a reduction of 20b VMT and an emissions reduction of 2.9 million metric tons of carbon equivalent (MMTce) in the year 2000,” TP claims.

USEPA numerology

USEPA/TP Central figures: “From 1990-1995, the annual growth is 2.02%; 1995-2000, it is 2.31%. It is apparent that FHWA’ s VMT estimates are significantly higher than the CCAP Baseline estimates. In other words, VMT has grown at a faster rate than expected since 1992-3. In fact, the 96 numbers show a 1.4% difference (33b) in VMT between the two data lines. The significance of this discrepancy for the Transp Partners program is that if the goal is to reduce VMT to a level of approximately 2,495b by the year 2000, then the size of the gap between the actual baseline and the goal may be much greater than previously thought. For example, if the difference in the CCAP Baseline and the FHWA statistics remains at 33b through 2000, the Transp Partners program would have to reduce national VMT by over 34b (0.44 multiplied by 78b VMT), rather than the 20b designated in the CCAP. Stakeholders should also be aware that even if the program meets its reduction goals (20b VMT) for 2000, the overall level of VMT and greenhouse gases may be higher than the targets outlined in the CCAP. Thus it is possible that even with complete success in achieving the CCAP annual reduction goals, actual VMT will exceed the annual VMT levels set to be achieved under CCAP. Relying on the earlier estimates of VMT reductions, in 1997 Transportation Partners has reduced approximately 1.25b VMT or approximately 0.19 MMTce. While Transportation Partners has thus had noticeable success in reducing VMT, there needs to be a substantial increase in program pace over the next three years if the program is to reach the goals established in the CCAP.”

How is all this being achieved? Lots of conferences, such as

• Campaign to Make America Walkable: National Pedestrian Conference

• Cities for Climate Protection Campaign: Reducing Greenhouse Gas Emissions from the Transp Sector

• Building Livable Communities with Transit

•“Rail-volution” (Free rides for life for the guy who coined that beauty - TRnl)

• STPP’ s Transp Advocacy and the Internet workshops in 16 cities (We need one of those - TRnl)

“TP’s second annual conference included “the Sustainable Transportation Initiative, a review of ISTEA reauthorization activities, and a summary of outreach and recruitment efforts currently underway.”

Bike giveaway and other free rides

Examples of TP programs

• City of Milwaukee WI has a transit subsidy program in which 2060 employees get free or subsidized rides. An estimated 100k Milwaukeeans use bicycle paths annually cutting 300k VMT, resulting in a 43 MTce reduction.

• San Francisco-San Mateo Videoconferencing/Trip Reduction Project’s videoconferencing allows Public Defender Office attorneys in San Francisco to conduct interviews with inmates at San Francisco’ s two county jails in San Bruno CA,.eliminating the need for making the 40mi round-trip between facilities reducing annual VMT by 600k and carbon emissions by 87 MTce.

• a Free Community Bike Program Tampa FL with100 bicycles, which were used about 4 times/day. The average trip was around 1.5mi for a total of 600 mi/day of bicycle travel. 80% of the trips replace single-occupancy vehicle trips. This results in a VMT reduction of 112.8k VMT annually and a reduction of 16MTce.

Guys getting it

USEPA/TP is supporting among others: Surface Transp Policy Project, the intractably anti-roads enviro organizations’ chief Washington DC lobby group, Environmental Defense Fund, Bicycle Federation of America, Association for Commuter Transp, Center for Clean Air Policy, International Council for Local Environmental Initiatives etc etc.

Global warming

USEPA/TP Central explains: “The program grew out of the Climate Change Action Plan (CCAP), a strategy for meeting the United States commitment to reducing greenhouse gas emissions.” We note that the General Accounting Office (GAO) energy specialist Victor Resendes said in Congressional testimony Jun 4 that there is no coherent Climate Change Action Plan. He said it “lacks a quantitative goal for reducing greenhouse gas emissions, does not have a specific performance plan and contains incomplete information on expected outcomes and links to the Kyoto protocol’s targets.” Further he said there is no “time frame for preparing a more detailed plan.” The GAO analyst said the USEPA is overstating the results of its measures. Those USEPA numbers are bogus?

Neither the Rio nor the Kyoto protocols have been ratified by the US Senate as constitutionally required to make them a US treaty so the US “commitment to reducing greenhouse gases” mentioned by USEPA/TP Central does not exist. These supposed international commitments are being falsely invoked by USEPA/TPC to give legitimacy to an environmentalist agenda without legal standing or scientific basis. (See “Climate of Fear” by Thomas Gale Moore, Cato Inst — review in TRnl#28 Jun 98)

Opinion:

No government agency has any legitimate business trying to influence VMT. Citizens of a free society have the right to determine what miles they travel out of their own resources, free of government interference. No US government agency should be working for or against personal car travel. To the extent travel is subsidized or mis-priced because of government policies then those subsidies and mispricings should be ended, but beyond that government should butt out.

Government funds are being grossly misused in supporting the political activity of anti-roads/anti-motorist activist groups. That is a misuse of federal power. Imagine the outrage if USDOT was funding Highway Users or ARTBA to promote roads. This is the equivalent on the left. The USEPA’s TP program is funding, rallying and giving US Govt sanction to the anti-road side in state and local battles over roads. USEPA’s “TP Central” is diminishing local efforts to improve American mobility and undercutting the programs of USDOT. (Contact Catherine Preston, TP Central USEPA 202 260 5447 www.epa.gov/tp)