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The California Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment last week released its latest report on the impact of climate change on the Golden State. As the above chart shows, the state is convinced that temperatures are rising and evidence now exists of their impacts.
This is a topic I try to harp on. Why? There has been several noteworthy reports that have found that one way to reduce your greenhouse gas footprint is to take transit. The gist of it: buses or trains carrying a lot of people at one time are more efficient than most cars carrying one or two passengers (hybrids and electric cars are only four percent of the vehicles on the road in the U.S.).
Here are two reports worth reading:
Public transportation’s role in responding to climate change (FTA)
While polls indicate a majority of Americans believe the Earth is warming, the same polls also show that far fewer Americans believe it’s a serious problem. Perhaps that’s one reason that transit agencies in the U.S. have failed to use climate change as an argument for taking buses and trains — although many agencies, such as Metro, are actively seeking to reduce their own greenhouse gases.
What do you think? Is that a missed opportunity or is it best for transit agencies to steer clear of the climate change issue at least in their marketing efforts? Comment please.
Categories: Policy & Funding
^CV Gal> Climate change thinking is too big>>> the health of old and young much more accessable.
Give up on tying transportation to global warming. It’s a made up crisis. Focus on reducing emissions because real research has demonstrated that increases in pollution cause serious health effects to mankind, especially children and seniors. That’s a cause I can get behind and that I keep in mind when I make transportation decisions.
Thank you, Ron, for stating the ‘inconvenient truth’ that the global warming alarmists do not want to face as they take more and more of our money to support their nonsense.
[…] New State Website Outlines Climate Change Impacts in CA (The Source) […]
China’s coal production alone negates ‘anything’ we in this country can do for your supposed climate change. Throw in India and it becomes downright laughable.
It would be irresponsible for any service provider to “steer clear” of something so crucial as the impact of climate change. It is a risk management issue for all types of planning. The north pole is a lake and that means change is speeding up.
Gloom and doom won’t sell transit. The powerless feeling to change something this big is too overwhelming. This is where the denial “not a serious problem” comes from. It is a defensive reaction to the glaring reality and what it means to the entire human race. We look at our children and shudder.
Steer us toward acceptance of reality with an accent on what we can do, each if us. We are fearful and need comfort but many a campaign use this fear. That’s a mistake for the long term. Creating any more fear will have an equal denial reaction. Comfortable ways to travel that remind us we are doing the best we can. The offering of safety, reliability, comfort, consistency has never been more important.
Start to think what supplies comfort and calm, not just the physical but the emotional too. One often overlooks nostalgia but that is key comfort… protection of the past. A desire to turn the clock back or stop time. Quality of life improvement now that meets the emotional dream of the past… before the automobile rearranged our lives and polluted it. Before plastic trash had piled up in the oceans and beaches, killing the pure and innocent.
I know I’m not telling you anything you don’t already know.