2005.01.26
Population Density Needed
I recently had the privilege of accompanying my lovely girlfriend to a Berkeley Design Review Committee meeting where Solomon ETC was presenting its plans for the new David Brower Center. During the public statements a gentleman named Jan Lundberg from Culture Change, a sustainable energy research institute, got up and spoke. Here is an article he wrote (which includes the speech he made to the DRC). Please read it if you want the rest of this to make sense, but in essence he is saying cars in downtown Berkeley are bad and presents a case for this view.
Some comments were made to me about the article and I agree (I’m not going to publish them here unless given permission) that unless population density is allowed to grow, then getting rid of cars make no real sense. The following is an email I sent regarding those comments.
I agree with you… I think he does miss the point of population density. The reason some (not all) European cities can scale back on vehicles is two fold. First, they have a population density that allows for constant usage of public transportation (except during rush hour you rarely see that in America except, perhaps NYC). Second, the costs of oil/gas/automobiles is such that it is often more affordable in time and real cost to use public transportation; this is partly a simple supply and demand issue.
His “good intentions” fail to address these issues. Until population density reaches a critical point public transportation is not very economically feasible. Until that point is reached demand for automobiles, and all that entails, will continue unabated. You can gripe and groan about it but aside from small changes like adding room for a bike lane or adding a bus route it will not change.
In the meantime his ideas will stunt growth into Berkeley because, hell, who wants to move or shop in Berkeley if I can’t get there in the first place? Yeah, I could take BART but I still need a car to get to work, I still need a car to get anywhere that isn’t on a bus or BART line. I could adjust my living but at this time I don’t see the point. It is short term thinking on my part, but this is the world we live in and beating people over the head with how they probably should live will only cause them to react negatively.
Of course the reality of this argument shows he can only think in the short term himself. The difference is you and I have an idea of how to achieve the goal he is advocating in a manner that is realistic and likely to produce results and he does not.
Not the best written thing, but hopefully the ideas are clear. Hopefully the quip at the end isn’t too much, too, since I’m trying for discourse and not nastiness.
Categorized: thoughts
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