Re: Making ALL Roads Into TOLL Roads

From: Christopher L. Estep (pghammer21_at_comcast.net)
Date: 12/01/04 

Date: Wed, 1 Dec 2004 18:40:52 -0500

<kashe@sonic.net> wrote in message
news:bhjoq0pquviubg27n30ua9trtgohe6n6j3@4ax.com...
> On Sun, 28 Nov 2004 16:59:28 -0500, Alan Browne
> <alan.browne@FreeLunchVideotron.ca> wrote:
>
>>Dave Head wrote:
>>
>>> Come here and drive the DC / N. Va. area for a few months and then see
>>> if you
>>> say that, moron.
>>
>>Poor regional planning is a poor excuse for building more roads. The
>>region
>>cited has a very high pollution growth rate due to excessive development,
>>sprawl
>>and the attendant popularity of fuel-hog-SUV's. As local development of
>>roads
>>is connected to pollution going down, it's kinda hard to get new roads
>>when
>>habits drive pollution up:
>>
>> "The Washington region set its own limit on car and truck
>> emissions as
>> part of its plan to meet a federal deadline for cutting ozone
>> pollution
>> by 2005. Transportation planners project road emissions based on
>> the
>> types of vehicles and number of miles driven.
>>
>> Once the exhaust projections exceed the region's self-imposed
>> limit,
>> transportation planners may not launch road projects until the
>> projections fall to acceptable levels. " -- Washington Post
>>
>
>
> Fat chance in hell. Look what happened to the CAFE standards.
> The auto outfits complied for a decent period of mourning for their
> old ways, then started thumbing their noses. Now, with a
> corporate-rabid administration firmly entrenched, no one will have the
> balls to stand up to the free-marketeering auto companies who have
> only to bleat, SUVs are obviously the choice of the marketplace."

They thumbed their noses due to declining sales numbers for automobiles.
Instead, the public was buying trucks and SUVs, as well as performance
vehicles (all of which tend to be CAFE-busters). An automobile
manufacturing company that fails to follow the marketplace *dies* (example:
Chrysler was the ONLY Big Three automaker AHEAD of CAFE, and darn near went
under BECAUSE of it).

Would you rather have had GM and Ford follow Chrysler (and Ford was also in
serious trouble; in fact, the year following Chrysler's bailout, Ford broke
Chrysler's then record for largest annual loss by any corporation in the
US)?

Fuel economy is *not* the most important issue for a typical vehicle buyer
in the US: it's usually pretty far down on the scale, in fact. The biggest
issue is usually SAFETY (which explains high sales numbers for SUVs, trucks,
and Volvos, and Ford buying Volvo).

And even with all the oil we import, it is *still* less than that of the EU
or Japan (as a percentage of all oil usage). (Of course, it could drop even
further if non-oil-fired generating plants were to replace oil-fired plants,
but that's another issue entirely.)

Also, both the EU and Japan allow sales of micro-mini vehicles (which are
banned from the US for safety reasons) which throws EU CAFE numbers (vs. US
CAFE numbers) so far out of whack that country vs. country comparisons are
impossible (same for Japan; in fact, look at the Mitsubishi Lancer Evo,
which is finally available in the US, vs. the Home Islands-spec vehicle).

Christopher L. Estep

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