Transcript No Slide Title

Efficient Cities: Easy on the CO2 and H2O
• Less CO2  less sea level rise, more wetlands
• Less driving  less breakpad dust, oil runoff
• Less asphalt  more pervious  better H2O
quality.
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3 Stage Path to Sustainability
• Can’t go straight there
• 1) Populist: (convenient) Consciousness raising, light
bulbs, Prius, green building
– Low flow toilets, gray water recycling
• 2) Fundamental: 2020. (inconvenient) Efficient cities.
Sustainable-savvy voters, government restructuring.
– Fewer lawns
– Less human land expansion  less watershed trashing
• 3) Profound: 2050. 80% reduction, less people,
accurate pricing, renewable NRG, vegetarian, local
food, anti-materialism, lower GNP, social
cooperation/enlightenment, etc
– Less livestock waste runoff, less fertilizer (fewer ocean
dead zones/phytoplantkton).
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Bay Area: 2MM more lousy humans
• Well, jobs are coming. Homes may sprawl.
– Ag  residential, habitat  ag
• 2,000 square feet asphalt for each car
• Oakland downtown is booming, but Sunday
Chron & Merc new homes section? 
disaster.
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Family Energy Consumption – driving matters most
Oakland vs. Palo Alto vs. Tracy (work in Palo Alto)
250
Transportation Use
Household Use
200
125
150
Million BTU
per Year
83
28
100
20
50
115
115
81
20
69
42
0
Suburban
Avg
(240
MBTU)
Suburban Urban Avg
Urban Green
Green
(143 MBTU) (89 MBTU)
(164 MBTU)
Single Family Household Type
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© Jonathan Rose Companies, LLC
Urban
Multifamily
Green (62
MBTU)
Efficient Human Settlement Patterns
• Reducing driving is BIG, BIG, BIG
– Prius is good, but not sufficient
• For each person, minimize the distances in the
triangle below (units: miles  feet)
• Benefits: more happiness, less carbon, lower cost of
living, better health, etc
• Solution: fix Palo Alto at a profit, spread like virus
– Must innovate, need better tools.
Job
Home
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Activities
Culture: Low Miles Community
•
•
•
•
Exploit behavior research
Non auto-centric culture
Good Deeds (make it easy)
EBay’s online community phenomenon
– Make friends, achieve social status
– Self polices bad behavior
• “Communities of Practice” – expertise around
a problem domain (green commutes).
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Low Miles Community (2)
• Big new residential complex
• Everyone signs low mileage pledge
– Entry condition to obtain housing
– People are “self-consistent”
• Manufacture a tipping point
– Currently, it’s often dumb to be green
– Positive peer pressure
• Problem-solving think tank. Online & in person
– Carpool to grocery store
– Ex: Biking learning curve: route, gear, defensive
• People love to share such self-discovered expertise
– Delivery services, etc.
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New PRT: last mile solution
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Comprehensive, Integrated Mobility
Door to Door
Train
first mile
Walk
Centralized Cars:
first mile
Bus
share, rent, ride home
Delivery services,
Personal activities,
Business services
•Web/wireless coordination
•Supportive policy context
•Scale!
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Bike, scooter, Segway
Flexpool
Short carpool pick up
•Improved match-making
•Shared parking, nuride
Long carpool
PRT shuttle system
LAST MILE
mid-day trips
first mile
Move closer to your job:
Traffic Reducing Housing
• Priority access to new housing for green
commuters
– Waiting list
• The most cost-effective traffic reduction policy
(ever). SF  San Jose (swap)
– Or, “Proximate Commute” for Starbucks workers.
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Traffic Reducing Hsng Examples
• Santa Barbara: 42 affordable apts
– 40 block walkable, mixed-use downtown
– Priorities: no cars, work downtown
– Result: TWENTY cars
• Stanford West Apts: 515 apts
–
–
–
–
Shuttle bus, biking, hostile to cars
396 Stanford, 96 hospital, 14 Palo Alto, 9 long commutes
10% short-commute rent discount
2.6 MM less VMT/CO2 lbs./yr
• Redwood City: 800 mkt rate condos
– 1 mi from dwntn, bike path
– Cities21 victory
– 4 months: green commutes
• 1MM units: 3MM tons/yr.
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TU
r
Efficient Cities: Easy on the CO2 and H2O
• 2MM new Bay Area residents
250
Transportation Use
Household Use
200
125
150
83
28
100
20
50
115
115
81
20
69
42
0
Suburban
Avg
(240
MBTU)
Suburban Urban Avg
Urban Green
Green
(143 MBTU) (89 MBTU)
(164 MBTU)
Single Family Household Type
[email protected]
Urban
Multifamily
Green (62
MBTU)