Dan Walters had it partly right in his piece “State losing its war on carbon” in explaining why the transportation sector’s greenhouse gas emissions are going up instead of going down as planned. Yes, it’s true that “So far, Californians aren’t buying what their politicians are selling” when it comes to buying electric vehicles and increasing their use of transit. Those numbers are disappointing…
But the problem is much bigger than that: The public keeps driving more (as measured in Vehicle Miles Traveled, or VMT) because suburban development makes its residents dependent on the automobile. With a large percentage of Californians living in suburbs, this is a subject no one wants to talk about. Politically, it’s pretty scary…
TRANSDEF did its part to place the subject on the public’s radar. It should be obvious that every new suburban home will add to congestion on the highways and increase emissions as well. But California’s political establishment has not been willing to address this. Governor Jerry Brown wouldn’t touch it… TRANSDEF believes the California Air Resources Board’s failure to reduce the overall amount of driving in the state, and therefore its emissions, was the result of direction from Brown to not rock the boat.
If the State is going to actually meet its targets for greenhouse gas emissions reductions and provide leadership for the efforts of the rest of the world, it will require very significant change in terms of how we think about new development. Continuing the status quo clearly won’t do the job.