141. WASTEFUL VS. EFFICIENT TRANSPORT

Oil's greatest effect has been on transportation. Without doubt this sector has been changed the most by cheap, readily available oil. Around 70% of oil goes directly to the transportation sector and nearly 50% is used by cars. So, apart from looking at alternatives fuels, it's worth just taking off those car-based rose coloured spectacles, and look at what's been happening around the world.

As it turns out cars are a hopeless machine for moving around cities (or even going to them) – by virtue of flow, parking and accidents and not all that good at energy efficiency. (See 58. EXTERNALITIES OF CAR USE.)

Imagine the race between the hair and the tortoise, while that 1.5 ton 11mpg personal monster appears to be an example of sexy consumerism, in the real world those that can get to work quicker, more easily and using less energy are ultimately going to win the race.

Traffic congestion, already costing Americans $63.1 billion a year, is only getting worse, according to a new report from the Texas Transportation Institute (TTI). Factoring in today's rising fuel prices adds another $1.7 billion per year.

[...]

• Annual delay per peak period (rush hour) traveler, which has grown from 16 hours to 47 hours since 1982,

• Number of urban areas with more than 20 hours of annual delay per peak traveler, which has grown from only 5 in 1982 to 51 in 2003,

• Total amount of delay, reaching 3.7 billion hours in 2003, and

• Wasted fuel, totaling 2.3 billion gallons lost to engines idling in traffic jams.Source

No wonder politicians have tried to solve this, and there are two schools of thought: Build more highways or encourage people onto mass transit. The first option sounds tempting (assuming you have the space) and sits well with oil companies, car makers and all the pimps of the highway lobby. And there is a great deal of political opposition to alternatives.

The absolute maximum highway capacity is 2,000 vehicles per hour (VPH) on grade separated freeways per lane, with various diseconomies of scale using on ramps as they fight for space down to less than 2,000 VPH for the whole highway (source). If those 2,000 vehicles have one person in them, they are extremely inefficient at getting people around in urban areas.

This compares to new rail lines in China moving 100,000 people per hour (source), with a 99% punctuality record (source).
Then you start feeding in the stats of an impending oil crisis and moving away from car based traffic in cities looks even more tempting. Some cities were built before cars or in topographically restricted areas - So mass transit has had to be the way.

The city of Hong Kong (China) has a population of 6.7 million and spreads out over Hong Kong Island and Kowloon. There is just no other way to get about. Fast, efficient mass transit means that less than 10% of households own a car(source).

Hong Kong has a metro system, owned and managed by the Mass Transit Railway. Kowloon-Canton Railway Corporation (KCRC) operates the extensive train network. Hong Kong Tramways run a tram system with double-decker vehicles. Peak Tram (a cable car on rails) operates between Central and Victoria Peak. There is a light railway system, The Light Rail Transit (LRT), within the northwest New Territories (comprising the northern part of the Kowloon peninsula and Hong Kong's outlying islands). Four companies operate bus transportation in Hong Kong; Citybus, New World First Bus Ltd, Kowloon Motor Bus (KMB) and New Lantao Bus. Also, because of the nature of the region, there are many ferries connecting the islands to each other and to the mainland.Source

And funding?

The Jubilee line extension in London was a missed opportunity. The £3.5 billion cost was a fraction of the £13bn Land value increases that come about as a result of its construction.Source(pdf)

Land Value Transfer (LVT) and property development to pay for mass transit already is happening in Hong Kong.

-- by Wildwell