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(Source: Treehugger; Photo viaSakarya54.net)
Excerpts from Tree Hugger report:
Americans aren’t the only ones newly enamored of high-speed rail. Turkey’s first fast train makes its official debut this week, but railway officials are already envisioning anetwork spanning the country, which has been woefully under-served by train routes of any kind. (Though Turkey’s long-haul bus system puts Greyhound to shame.)
That first fast line, between the capital city, Ankara, and Eskişehir, about 210 kilometers away, will have its coming-out party on Friday. Test runs show it should cut the travel time between the two cities from 180 minutes to 70 or 80 minutes. The train will make eight round-trips a day, carrying up to 419 passengers and will include a business section with power outlets to charge laptops, eight cafeterias, and LCD screens for watching TV at each seat.
(Source: New York Times, Greenwire via Autobloggreen)
Schwarzenegger’s “Vision 2010” plan promised that every California motorist would have access to hydrogen fuel by the end of the decade. He has since repeatedly mentioned the highway in a standard stump speech on his environmental accomplishments.
But the program has fallen short of expectations. With less than 10 months until the end of the decade, 24 hydrogen fueling stations are operating in California, most of them near Los Angeles.
The vision of a hydrogen infrastructure, with fueling stations dotting the interstates, has not materialized, partly because the eager governor may have set unrealistic targets.
Gerhard Achtelik, manager of the hydrogen highway program at the Air Resources Board, admitted in an interview that the state would not hit its 150-station goal by 2010.
(Source: Bureau of Transportation Statistics, U.S. Dept. of Transportation)
Wednesday, March 11, 2009 – The nation’s largest airlines had a higher rate of on-time flights this past January than in either January of last year or in December 2008, according to the Air Travel Consumer Report released today by the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT).
According to information filed with the Bureau of Transportation Statistics (BTS), a part of DOT’s Research and Innovative Technology Administration (RITA), the 19 carriers reporting on-time performance recorded an overall on-time arrival rate of 77.0 percent in January, an improvement over both January 2008’s 72.4 percent and December 2008’s 65.3 percent.
The monthly report also includes data on lengthy tarmac delays, flight cancellations and the causes of flight delays by the reporting carriers, as well as information on reports of mishandled baggage filed with the carriers and consumer service, disability and discrimination complaints received by DOT’s Aviation Consumer Protection Division. This report also includes reports of incidents involving pets traveling by air, as required to be filed by U.S. carriers.
(Source: PBS’ Blue Print America)
This afternoon I received a couple of alerts from PBS’s Blue Print America. There first report is about the Budgetary Issues facing transit agencies:
As the economy has slumped, Americans have increasingly turned to mass transit, putting new pressure on transit agencies. In a new report for the “Blueprint America” series, correspondent Rick Karr examines the budgetary issues facing public transit.
Click here to view the video report.
The second report focused on the subject of how the financial meldown has added to the woes of the transit agencies. The excerpt reads:
Amid the country’s economic crisis, some public transit agencies have found themselves linked to complex financial deals that have since soured. Rick Karr reports in the latest installment for the “Blueprint America” series on infrastructure on The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer.
Click here to watch the video report.
(Source: Smart Growth America)
A detailed report titled, “Spending the Stimulus: How Your State Can Put Thousands Back to Work by Jumpstarting a 21st Century Transportation System” published by Smart Growth America (you can find the full report here) illustrates the breadth of investments that a state can make with the STP funds it receives through ARRA, by outlining 20 project types in 5 main categories, and providing an example for each.
The website says “Smart Growth America is launching an immediate, six-month campaign to support our state partners in shaping stimulus spending and state DOT budget decisions. The need and opportunity are clear. States and DOTs, asked to develop lists of “ready to go” projects, have developed lists that consist almost entirely of road and other conventional projects. Without this campaign, the stimulus money will likely fund destructive road expansion projects rather than providing a down payment on a clean, green transportation infrastructure for the 21st Century.This campaign aims to:
- Influence how state DOTs and governors spend the substantial amounts of money they receive from the federal government,
- Hold the state DOTs and governors accountable on the stimulus spending; and
- Increase the capacity of state advocacy groups for subsequent state, local, and federal campaign work.”
Click here to read the entire article. Also click here to read a related write-up by our Sarah Goodyear, at Streetsblog.
Transportgooru encourages readers to Donate to Smart Growth America today and help in furthering its mission and to ensure that the future for America is a bright one. Click the Donate button to proceed.
Attached is the detailed report called Spending the Stimulus published by Smart Growth America:
[ipaper id=13172497]
(Source: Streetsblog)
For our readers living in the greater Washington, DC metro area or planning to move there, the Urban Land Insititute has developed a slick tool that let’s you calcuclate the cost of housing and transportation for a given address/location in the metro region. The ULI website says ” The Terwilliger Housing + Transportation Calculator is a new tool designed to calculate combined housing and transportation costs in the greater Washington, D.C. region.”
Click here to read a related article on Streetsblog. Or click here to explore the tool.
(Source: Autobloggreen)
(Source: Autobloggreen)
Today, Ford celebrates a new milestone in the life of its hybrid SUV platform as the 100,000th vehicle rolls down the assembly line at the Blue Oval’s Assembly Plant in Kansas City. This production total includes all Ford Escape Hybrids, Mercury Mariner Hybrids and Mazda Tribute Hybrids produced since 2004, the year that Ford launched its first ever fuel-saving gas/electric model.
Perhaps now would be a good time to remind our readers that Ford hit the 60,000 hybrid mark in the 4th quarter of 2008, meaning that the automaker’s federal hybrid tax credit will be cut in half beginning in April of this year. Buyers wanting to capitalize on the full rebate will need to make their purchase before the end of this month.
Click here to read more and to view the awesome picture gallery of the Ford Escape Hybrid.
(Source: Autobloggreen)
Automakers, fuel suppliers and engine builders would be among the organizations that would have to submit annual reports on their CO2 (and other greenhouse gas) emissions to the EPA, should a new proposed rule go through. In all, the 13,000 facilities that account for 85-90 percent of the GHGs emitted in the U.S. would be affected. To understand the baseline issue, here’s how the EPA explains the proposed rule:
In general, EPA proposes that suppliers of fossil fuels or industrial greenhouse gases, manufacturers of vehicles and engines, and facilities that emit 25,000 metric tons or more per year of GHG emissions submit annual reports to EPA. The gases covered by the proposed rule are carbon dioxide (CO2), methane (CH4), nitrous oxide (N2O), hydrofluorocarbons (HFC), perfluorocarbons (PFC), sulfur hexafluoride (SF6), and other fluorinated gases including nitrogen trifluoride (NF3) and hydrofluorinated ethers (HFE).
Click here to read the entire article..
