Grand Cooperative Driving Challenge workshop, May 14th, The Netherlands
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“The paradigm shift goes from a car receiving information only to a car communicating bi-directionally with its environment. The car will become an open system and the car industry will see a change in much the same way that mainframe computer vendors and incumbent telecom operators saw their world change within a decade. We invite all the bright minds to create the best solution and to test them in an open challenge. Who will become the Microsoft of the car operating system? It will take decades, five system generations of evolution, but the automobile will become a real auto (auto) mobile.”
Obama administration gets ready to unveil the plans for accelerating high-speed rail deployment
(Source: Reuters)
Image: Seth Anderson via Apture
The Obama administration is expected to unveil its plans on Thursday for accelerating development of high-speed rail, a concept that in the past has had mixed political support and little public funding.
“It will be broad and strategic,” Karen Rae, acting head of the Federal Railroad Administration, told Reuters in an interview on Tuesday about the initiative described by officials as President Barack Obama‘s top transportation priority.
“It’s going to talk about how we begin to create this new vision for high-speed and intercity rail,” Rae said.
White House and transportation officials have spent the past several weeks weighing plans for developing at least six high-speed corridors.
High-speed rail initiatives are in various planning stages in California, Florida, Nevada, the Carolinas and the Northeast. States are already formulating how to use the large appropriation for high-speed rail projects in the economic stimulus act.
“Some of these plans are 20 years old,” said Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood in an interview this week with Reuters Financial Television.
In February, Congress included $8 billion for rail development in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act and Obama has included another $5 billion for the efforts in the White House’s proposed budget.
LaHood said the $8 billion in stimulus money will “jump-start” the process, but rail advocates and transportation officials agree that financing high-speed rail nationally will cost significantly more.
The plan to be released on Thursday is required by the stimulus act, but Rae said it will “reference the broader rail agenda that is out there.”
Click here to read the entire article.
Questions arise about highway-safety nominee’s views on CAFE
(Source: Greenwire – New York Times; AutoBlogGreen)
Chuck Hurley - Image Courtesy: Dickinson College
Hurley has served as CEO of Mothers Against Drunk Driving since 2005 and has spent more than three decades working on a host of driving safety initiatives. He previously held senior leadership posts at both the National Safety Council and the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, a nonprofit research group funded by auto insurers.
The insurance institute has been critical of past CAFE proposals and has backed an auto industry argument that a disproportionate focus on increasing fuel mileage would lead to smaller and less safe cars (See a related article on TransportGooru that discussed the latest IIHS crash test results correlating vehicle safety during crashes to the size and fuel effieicency factors of small cars). The group helped lead a successful industry push for CAFE standards that use an attribute-based system that requires cars and trucks to achieve different standards depending on each vehicle’s footprint.
Hurley’s work with the institute during the 1990s was enough to worry Dan Becker, director of the Safe Climate Campaign, which has advocated for fuel economy increases. “It would be awkward to have an administrator of NHTSA who’s spent much of his career attacking fuel economy standards that NHTSA administers,” he told the Wall Street Journal.
With exception of the fuel economy concern, Hurley’s nomination drew near-universal praise from highway safety advocates. In addition to his extensive work on drunk-driving issues, Hurley has also worked with law enforcement agencies on air bag and seat belt issues, child passenger safety and teen driving initiatives. “Chuck is a passionate safety advocate whose career has been dedicated to reducing motor vehicle deaths and injuries on the highways,” said Vernon Betkey Jr., chairman of the Governors Highway Safety Association.
Goodbye, Gas Guzzlers? – Washington Post editorial analyses the keys to succesful implementation of US’ Cash for Clunkers” initiative
(Source: Washington Post)
Without higher gas taxes, ‘cash for clunkers’ won’t do the job
CAR SALES in Germany jumped an astonishing 40 percent in March, thanks in large part to a “cash for clunkers” program in which the government gave those handing over old-model cars roughly $5,000 toward the purchase of newer, more fuel-efficient vehicles. Lawmakers in the United States have crafted similar proposals, hoping both to provide a boost to the U.S. auto industry and to spur sales of environmentally friendlier cars. But even the best of these proposals is not likely to provide the punch of the German initiative.
A bill co-sponsored by Sens. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) and Susan Collins (R-Maine) offers the most sensible approach. Buyers are eligible for vouchers worth $2,500 to $4,500 toward the purchase of a new car if they turn in older vehicles that get less than 18 miles to the gallon. The older vehicles would be junked and turned into scrap. The new car must have a sticker price of less than $45,000 and surpass fuel economy standards by 25 percent. Buyers may also apply the vouchers to fuel-efficient used cars manufactured after 2003. Vouchers could also be used for participating in public transportation programs. A similar proposal in the House provides credits only for vehicles made or assembled in North America; such a provision is problematic because it could violate free-trade agreements.
Click here to read the entire article (free regn. required).
Note: Below is a list of articles on this issue, previously published on TransportGooru. This compilation of articles offer an insight into state of various “Cash for Clunkers” style programs implemented (or currently being debated) across the globe (Germany, UK, etc,). Stay plugged in to TransportGooru for more on this topic in the days to come.
Consumer Assistance to Recycle and Save (CARS) Act revives “Cash for Clunkers” scrapping plan in U.S
Germany plans to extend Abwrackprämie aka “Environmental Bonus”
The bickering starts over the implementation of the Cash for Clunkers legislation
Obama Favors “Cash for Clunkers”
Britain mulls implementation of “Cash for Clunkers” scheme to boost ailing auto sales
Where the US stands in pushing “Cash for Clunkers”- Four bills in Congress; Details Needed
Pentagon Prioritizes Pursuit Of Alternative Fuel Sources
(Source: Washington Post)
For the Defense Department, the largest consumer of energy in the United States, addiction to fuel has greater costs than the roughly $18 billion the agency spent on it last year.
By some estimates, about half of the U.S. military casualties in Iraq and Afghanistan are related to attacks with improvised explosive devices on convoys, many of which are carrying fuel. As of March 20, 3,426 service members had been killed by hostile fire in Iraq, 1,823 of them victims of IEDs.
“Every time you bring a gallon of fuel forward, you have to send a convoy,” said Alan R. Shaffer, director of defense research and engineering at the Pentagon. “That puts people’s lives at risk.”
Spurred by this grim reality, the Pentagon, which traditionally has not made saving energy much of a priority, has launched initiatives to find alternative fuel sources. The goals include saving money, preserving dwindling natural resources and lessening U.S. dependence on foreign sources.
“The honest-to-God truth, the most compelling reason to do it is it saves lives,” said Brig. Gen. Steven Anderson, director of operations and logistics for the Army. “It takes drivers off the road.”
Other than fueling jet engines, the largest drain on U.S. military fuel supplies comes from running generators at forward operating bases. The Pentagon says that the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq have required more fuel on a daily basis than any other war in history. Since the conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq began in 2001 and 2003, respectively, the amount of oil consumption at forward bases has increased from 50 million gallons to 500 million gallons a year.
To help reduce consumption, the Pentagon is using $300 million of the $7.4 billion it received from the economic stimulus package to accelerate existing programs for developing alternative fuels and saving energy.
The Pentagon is also testing the use of solar and geothermal energy to provide power at installations. The Army, for example, is partnering with a private firm to build an enormous, 500-megawatt solar farm at Fort Irwin, Calif. The farm would supply the 30 to 35 megawatts needed to operate the installation, with the remaining available for sale to the California electrical grid.
About $6 million is aimed at improving a program run by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency to convert algae into jet propulsion fuel 8, or JP-8, that could power Navy and Air Force aircraft.
Other initiatives include $27 million to develop a hybrid engine the Army could use in tactical vehicles and $2 million to develop highly efficient portable fuel cells that could reduce the battery load carried by infantry soldiers.
Click here to read the entire article (Free Registration required).
“Just 15 of the world’s biggest ships may now emit as much pollution as all the world’s 760m cars”
One giant container ship can emit almost the same amount of cancer and asthma-causing chemicals as 50m cars, study finds
(Source: Guardian via Tree Hugger)
The Guardian has a pretty shocking piece about giant cargo ships and the pollution they emit. The title of this post is a line from “confidential data from maritime industry insiders”, and according to them, the low-grade ship bunker fuel that powers cargo ships has up to 2,000 times the sulphur content of diesel fuel used in US, and European automobiles and emission control is practically non-existent. Here we can see that the primary concern with shipping is air-pollution (“US academic research which showed that pollution from the world’s 90,000 cargo ships leads to 60,000 deaths a year in the US alone and costs up to $330bn per year in health costs from lung and heart diseases”). It does contribute significantly to global warming, but about 5-6 times less than land-based transportation.
Shipping by numbers (From Guardian)The world’s biggest container ships have 109,000 horsepower engines which weigh 2,300 tons.
Each ship expects to operate 24hrs a day for about 280 days a year
There are 90,000 ocean-going cargo ships
Shipping is responsible for 18-30% of all the world’s nitrogen oxide (NOx) pollution and 9% of the global sulphur oxide (SOx) pollution.
One large ship can generate about 5,000 tonnes of sulphur oxide (SOx) pollution in a year
70% of all ship emissions are within 400km of land.
85% of all ship pollution is in the northern hemisphere.
Shipping is responsible for 3.5% to 4% of all climate change emissions
The calculations of ship and car pollution are based on the world’s largest 85,790KW ships’ diesel engines which operate about 280 days a year generating roughly 5,200 tonnes of SOx a year, compared with diesel and petrol cars which drive 15,000km a year and emit approximately 101gm of SO2/SoX a year.
Attention American carmakers & dealers (especially those trying to sell GM, Ford & Chrysler): Please consider adopting Alfa Romeo’s marketing strategies to boost your sales
(Source: Jalopnik)
It’s not often that you quickly look past blonde and presumably Italian (or maybe Swiss) “booth professionals,” but the Alfa Romeo 8C Spider has that affect on a man. Yes, friends, the highly anticipated Geneva debut of the Spider is finally here. This car has the same 450 HP 4.7-liter V8 as its brother, the 8C Competizione, which earned its own Very Special Jalopnik Day. If you haven’t already noticed, the Spider features a fully automatic electro-hydraulic convertible top that has been engineered with the same aerodynamic and performance precision as the rest of the ride.
The car’s sexy enough on it’s own. But adding a couple of super good looking, electric red wearing, smoking hot babes, strutting their wares around that dream machine to some fine rhythms – makes it absolutely irresistible (i.e., if you are ready to do some explaining to your wife/girlfriend why you decided to spend $200K). Watch the video below and tell me if you disagree:
Scoopful of GM News – Bankruptcy, Churning Board Members, Sales Dreams, Volt Reality, Vehicle Recall, etc..
(Source: Jalopnik, Wired, Autoblog, Detroit News)
GM chair fears deal can’t be reached: Kent Kresa, interim chairman of General Motors Corp., is not optimistic money-saving concessions can be reached with bondholders and the United Auto Workers to avoid bankruptcy before a June 1 deadline. “I’m hopeful we can get there,” Kresa told The Detroit News today. “Everybody understands we would be in a much better situation if we can resolve this among all the players without going through bankruptcy.” GM is trying to restructure about $28 billion in unsecured debt held by GM’s bondholders and $20 billion in obligations to the United Auto Workers. The federal government also may agree to swap some of its $13.4 billion in General Motors Corp. debt for new equity in the company in a move to help boost GM’s balance sheet.
GM chairman looking to turn over half of board of trustees by June? According to the Detroit Free Press, General Motors interim chairman, Kent Kresa, has been asked by president Obama’s administration to replenish the automaker’s board with fresh blood. Kresa said that while the board did achieve “historic things” recently, like renegotiating the UAW pay scale, he also said that the board didn’t fully comprehend the magnitude of the downturn.
GM Says Volt Won’t ‘Pay the Rent’ : General Motors won’t make money on its electric car for quite awhile. That’s to be expected, and it should be supported. The Obama administration doesn’t understand that.
GM, Task Force preparing for “surgical” bankruptcy: According to a lengthy report by the New York Times, the Treasury Department is directing General Motors to begin work on a bankruptcy filing by June 1. Based on sources close to the talks who were unable to officially discuss the process, the report outlines the “fast ‘surgical’ bankruptcy” of the automaker if GM is unable to reach an agreeme…
GM‘s new offer for bondholders may contain no cash, just equity: …GM, Earnings/FinancialsGM’s most recent offer to its bondholders offered a little bit of cash and a little bit of equity. GM CEO Fritz Henderson’s example was that a holder of $1,000 in bonds would end up with $333 and a some equity. After conferring with the Auto Task Force, however, that offer was deemed excessive in light of GM‘s situation so…
IIHS: New crash tests demonstrate the influence of vehicle size and weight on safety in crashes – Smart forTwo & Toyota Yaris score poorly
Smart USA quickly responds to IIHS crash test results
(Source: Autoblog, Jalopnik & IIHS)
This morning’s IIHS report on the shocking finding that little cars don’t take well to colliding, at speed, with bigger cars. Three front-to-front crash tests, each involving a microcar or minicar into a midsize model from the same manufacturer, show how extra vehicle size and weight enhance occupant protection in collisions. These Insurance Institute for Highway Safety tests are about the physics of car crashes, which dictate that very small cars generally can’t protect people in crashes as well as bigger, heavier models.
“There are good reasons people buy minicars,” says Institute president Adrian Lund. “They’re more affordable, and they use less gas. But the safety trade-offs are clear from our new tests. Equally clear are the implications when it comes to fuel economy. If automakers downsize cars so their fleets use less fuel, occupant safety will be compromised. However, there are ways to serve fuel economy and safety at the same time.”
The three tests we have are between the Honda Accord and the Honda Fit, the Toyota Camry and Toyota Yaris, and finally the Mercedes C300 and the Smart ForTwo. With each we get a full speed offset frontal crash with both cars traveling at 40 MPH, destruction and carnage ensue and rightly so, there’s a lot of energy involved here. These are hardly scientific tests, and they represent the absolute most extreme crash scenario for these speeds, especially for the smaller cars. Ratings got from “Good” at the top of the scale through “Acceptable” and “Poor.” Considering this is one car bashing into another, the evaluation is somewhat subjective, but it gives an idea of relative performance. Let’s take a closer look at each.
Click here to read the entire article and to watch two other awesome videos. Seen below is the IIHS report in PDF format. To download the report, please visit the IIHS website.
P.S: According to AutoBlog, folks over at Smart USA were not pleased to see the results of the latest batch of crash testing from the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety. The IIHS did a series of frontal offset crash tests between small and mid-size cars, one of which included a smart ForTwo versus a Mercedes C300. While the results may have been what most people expected, they don’t correlate with the ForTwo’s results in standardized tests where the IIHS rates the smart as good in front and side impacts. The feds at the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration give the smart 4 stars on frontal impact and 5 on side impact.
The problem, as Smart USA sees it, is that the IIHS devised a test that no automaker has designed to and that they claim only represents about one percent of real world accidents. Smart has even set up a site for customer testimonials about the crash safety performance of their ForTwo. Typically, in the past, Smarts have actually done quite well in similar vehicle-on-vehicle tests, such as the ones conducted by Mercedes and Auto Motor und Sport after the jump.
Bernie’s Transportation Communications Newsletter – April 14, 2009
Tuesday, April 14, 2009 – ISSN 1529-1057
Join U.S. Department of Transportation Secretary LaHood at ITS America’s 2009 Annual Meeting & Exposition – June 1
U.S. Department of Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood will be the featured speaker at the opening plenary of the Intelligent Transportation Society of America’s (ITS America) 2009 Annual Meeting & Exposition, which will take place June 1-3 at the Gaylord Convention Center on the Potomac in National Harbor, Maryland. The Secretary’s remarks are scheduled for 10 a.m. in the convention center’s Potomac A-B rooms on the Ballroom level. With ITS America 2009 in the Metro Washington Area, this is a wonderful opportunity to interact with legislators on the federal, state, and local level to showcase ITS products and services. In addition to policy and technical sessions, the event will feature “city streets” vehicle and infrastructure technology demonstrations, a 150,000 square foot exhibit hall, tours of area transportation projects and facilities, and many other activities. Registration information is available at www.itsa.org/amregistration.html.
AVIATION
1) Funding Debate Stalls Air Traffic Control Upgrade
Link to story and audio report on NPR’s Morning Edition:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=102914658
2) Social Media Sites Take Off at Hartsfield-Jackson Airport
Link to story in Hartsfield-Jackson News:
http://www.atlanta-airport.com/HJN/2009/04/tech.htm
Link to Hartsfield-Jackson Facebook fan page:
BUSES
3) Bus Tickets in Bangladesh Getting Digitalized
Link to story in The Daily Star:
http://www.thedailystar.net/newDesign/news-details.php?nid=83831
CAMERAS
4) Louisiana Looking to Get Hands on New Orleans’ Traffic Camera Cash
Link to story and video on WWL-TV:
http://www.wwltv.com/local/stories/wwl041309cbtraffic.d1a51afd.html
ELECTRONIC TOLLING
5) Plans for Electronic Toll System Welcomed in South Africa
Link to story from The Mercury:
http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=1&click_id=594&art_id=vn20090414052311427C492452
GPS / NAVIGATION
6) Egypt Lifts Ban on GPS
Link to story in GPS Business News:
http://www.gpsbusinessnews.com/Egypt-lifts-ban-on-GPS_a1463.html
PUBLIC INFORMATION / EDUCATION
7) Alabama Launches Public Safety Campaign to Raise Awareness of Slow Moving Vehicle Emblem
Link to story in the Montgomery Advertiser:
http://www.montgomeryadvertiser.com/article/20090414/OPINION0101/904130319
Link to news release from the Alabama Farmers Federation:
http://www.alfafarmers.org/programs/safety.phtml
SAFETY / SECURITY
8) Canadian Airport Workers to Face Beefed-Up Security Checks
Link to story in The Globe and Mail:
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/LAC.20090414.BAIRD14ART21393/TPStory/National
9) US Government Accountability Office: Dead People Can Still Get Passports
Link to story in Federal Computer Week:
http://fcw.com/articles/2009/04/14/state-still-issuing-passports-to-deceased-people.aspx
Link to GAO report:
http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d09583r.pdf
TELEMATICS
10) Taiwan, China Looking to Cooperate in Global Telematics Industry
Link to Central News Agency story:
http://www.etaiwannews.com/etn/news_content.php?id=920220&lang=eng_news
TRANSIT
11) Toronto Transit CIO Takes IT to the Streets
Link to IDG News story:
http://www.thestandard.com/news/2009/04/13/toronto-transit-cio-takes-it-streets
TRAVELER INFORMATION / TRANSPORTATION MANAGEMENT
12) Inland Counties Consider Breaking with Los Angeles-Based Commuter Information Network
Link to story in The Press-Enterprise:
http://www.pe.com/localnews/rivcounty/stories/PE_News_Local_S_511ie14.3cfece7.html
13) Italian Motorway Traffic on Your iPhone
Link to blog in L’espresso:
http://nelki.blogautore.espresso.repubblica.it/2009/04/14/motorway-traffic-on-your-iphone/
News Releases
1) Expansion of Chicago Transit Authority Bus Tracker Nears Completion with the Activation of 19 Routes
Upcoming Events
National Rural Summit on Traffic Safety Culture 2009 – June 22 – Big Sky, Montana
http://www.meetingsnorthwest.com/TSCsummit.html
Today in Transportation History
1944 **65th anniversary** – An explosion takes place in Bombay Harbor when the SS Fort Stikine caught fire. About 800 people died.
http://www.merchantnavyofficers.com/bomEx.html
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© 2009 Bernie Wagenblast
