January 2007 - Transpo - list.sfgreens.org

health etc.
by Jerry Path 31 Jan '07

31 Jan '07

Hi all, First, I wanted to let you all know why I haven't been active for some months. I have been diagnosed with a chronic disease - ulcerative colitis - which is a inflammation of the colon. It isn't life threatening and mine is a relatively minor case - but it has absorbed a lot from me both mentally and physically. Then, more recently we have been threatened with eviction due to earthquake renovation - of course we have all of our legal rights, but we have to fight for them and this also is taking a lot of our time and energy. I do have some thoughts on the Rider's Union (among other things) - hopefully I can pull these together before the next meeting. Also, I don't know if people caught it - but there was a program on KPFA this morning on - Cuba and peak oil. Don't know the title - may be "the power of community" It deals with how the Cuban people coped after losing almost all of their oil supply. Has anyone seen this video - know how to get ahold of it. I think it would be useful for us. Best, Jerry Path Jerry Path pjrry(a)igc.org Why Wait? Move to EarthLink.

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Fwd: 10 Years To Save The World
by Eric Brooks 30 Jan '07

30 Jan '07

The Sunday Times January 28, 2007 Last warning: 10 years to save world Jonathan Leake Environment Editor Scientists say rising greenhouses gases will make climate change unstoppable in a decade THE world has just 10 years to reverse surging greenhouse gas emissions or risk runaway climate change that could make many parts of the planet uninhabitable. The stark warning comes from scientists who are working on the final draft of a new report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). The report, due to be published this week, will draw together the work of thousands of scientists from around the world who have been studying changes in the world's climate and predicting how they might accelerate. They conclude that unless mankind rapidly stabilises greenhouse gas emissions and starts reducing them, it will have little chance of keeping global warming within manageable limits. The results could include the destruction of the Amazon rainforest and the Great Barrier Reef, the forced migration of hundreds of millions of people from equatorial regions, and the loss of vast tracts of land under rising seas as the ice caps melt. In Europe the summers could become unbearably hot, especially in southern countries such as Greece, Spain and Italy, while Britain and northern Europe would face summer droughts and wet, stormy winters. "The next 10 years are crucial," said Richard Betts, leader of a research team at the Met Office's Hadley Centre for climate prediction. "In that decade we have to achieve serious reductions in carbon emissions. After that time the task becomes very much harder." Among the scientists' biggest fears is that rising temperatures and levels of greenhouse gases could soon overwhelm the natural systems that normally keep their levels in check. About half the 24 billion tons of carbon dioxide generated by human activities each year are absorbed by forests and oceans -- a process without which the world might already be several degrees warmer. But as CO2 levels rise and soils dry, microbes can start breaking down accumulated organic matter, so forests become net producers of greenhouse gases. The sea's power to absorb CO2 also falls sharply as it warms. The latest research suggests the threshold for such disastrous changes will come when CO2 levels reach 550 parts per million (ppm), roughly double their natural levels. This is predicted to happen around 2040-50. "At the moment the real impact of our emissions is buffered because CO2 is absorbed by natural systems. However, if we reach this threshold they could be magnified instead," said Betts. "It means we must start the action needed to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in the next few years." His warnings were backed up by Dr Malte Meinshausen, a researcher at the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research in Germany. He has used computer modelling to work out what might happen if greenhouse gas emissions were cut immediately, in 10 years' time or later. His results showed that immediate action might allow mankind to hold CO2 levels at 450ppm -- well below the 550ppm danger level. However, Meinshausen and his colleagues recognise that this is unrealistic because the world's governments are in such disarray over global warming. The best hope, they say, is that a global plan will emerge in the next few years, most likely from the renegotiations of the Kyoto treaty on reducing emissions. "We have to make sure carbon emissions peak no later than 2015 and then fall at around 3% a year. If we let them keep rising after that date it becomes much harder to bring them under control," said Meinshausen. His views were echoed by Dr Carol Turley of Plymouth Marine Laboratories who has been studying how rising CO2 levels are acidifying the ocean. When the gas dissolves in water it creates carbonic acid. "Rising acidity makes it much harder for marine organisms to build shells," she said. Turley, like the other scientists, has contributed to the IPCC report but all commented this weekend on the basis of already-published research. "If we do not take action in the next decade, by 2100 swathes of the ocean could have been stripped of creatures from plankton to coral reefs," she said. "Such changes would devastate ecosystems and fisheries."

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Re: [Transpo] cost of fare collection
by susan_e_vaughan＠juno.com 26 Jan '07

26 Jan '07

No, that didn't come up. We were talking about the feasibility of creating a Riders Union -- and the conclusion was that it will be a taunting task that requires hiring someone to be the Dave Snyder/Leah Shahum of the Transit-Users Community. Sue -- Dave Snyder <dave(a)livablecity.org> wrote: Hi all, I know that you all discussed free Muni at the working group meeting on Tuesday. Did the actual amount that Muni spends collecting fares come up in the conversation? And if so, how much is it? Dave _______________________________________________ Transpo mailing list Transpo(a)sfgreens.org https://list.sfgreens.org/mailman/listinfo/transpo

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cost of fare collection
by Dave Snyder 26 Jan '07

26 Jan '07

Hi all, I know that you all discussed free Muni at the working group meeting on Tuesday. Did the actual amount that Muni spends collecting fares come up in the conversation? And if so, how much is it? Dave

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Some Stark Reality On Biofuels
by Eric Brooks 23 Jan '07

23 Jan '07

forwarded from http://www.counterpunch.org/tokar11012006.html November 1, 2006 Running on Hype The Real Scoop on Biofuels By BRIAN TOKAR You can hardly open up a major newspaper or national magazine these days without encountering the latest hype about biofuels, and how they're going to save oil, reduce pollution and prevent climate change. Bill Gates, Sun Microsystems' Vinod Khosla, and other major venture capitalists are investing millions in new biofuel production, whether in the form of ethanol, mainly derived from corn in the US today, or biodiesel, mainly from soybeans and canola seed. It's literally a "modern day gold rush," as described by the New York Times, paraphrasing the chief executive of Cargill, one of the main benefactors of increased subsidies to agribusiness and tax credits to refiners for the purpose of encouraging biofuel production. The Times reported earlier this year that some 40 new ethanol plants are currently under construction in the US, aiming toward a 30 percent increase in domestic production. Archer Daniels Midland, the company that first sold the idea of corn-derived ethanol as an auto fuel to Congress in the late 1970s, has doubled its stock price and profits over the last two years. ADM currently controls a quarter of US ethanol fuel production, and recently hired a former Chevron executive as its CEO. Several well-respected analysts have raised serious concerns about this rapid diversion of food crops toward the production of fuel for automobiles. WorldWatch Institute founder Lester Brown, long concerned about the sustainability of world food supplies, says that fuel producers are already competing with food processors in the world's grain markets. "Cars, not people, will claim most of the increase in grain production this year," reports Brown, a serious concern in a world where the grain required to make enough ethanol to fill an SUV tank is enough to feed a person for a whole year. Others have dismissed the ethanol gold rush as nothing more than the subsidized burning of food to run automobiles. The biofuel rush is having a significant impact worldwide as well. Brazil, often touted as the the most impressive biofuel success story, is using half its annual sugarcane crop to provide 40 percent of its auto fuel, while increasing deforestation to grow more sugarcane and soybeans. Malaysian and Indonesian rainforests are being bulldozed for oil palm plantations-threatening endangered orangutans, rhinos, tigers and countless other species-in order to serve at the booming European market for biodiesel. Are these reasonable tradeoffs for a troubled planet, or merely another corporate push for profits? Two new studies, both released this past summer, aim to document the full consequences of the new biofuel economy and realistically assess its impact on fuel use, greenhouse gases and agricultural lands. One study, originating from the University of Minnesota, is moderately hopeful in the first two areas, but offers a strong caution about land use. The other, from Cornell University and UC Berkeley, concludes that every domestic biofuel source the ones currently in use as well as those under development produces less energy than is consumed in growing and processing the crops. The Minnesota researchers attempted a full lifecycle analysis of the production of ethanol from corn and biodiesel from soy. They documented the energy costs of fuel production, pesticide use, transportation, and other key factors, and also accounted for the energy equivalent of soy and corn byproducts that remain for other uses after the fuel is extracted. Their paper, published in the July 25th edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, concluded that ethanol production offers a modest net energy gain of 25%, resulting in 12% less greenhouse gases than an equivalent amount of gasoline. The numbers for biodiesel are more promising, with a 93% net energy gain and a 41% reduction in greenhouse gases. The researchers cautioned, however, that these figures do not account for the significant environmental damage from increased acreages of these crops, including the impacts of pesticides, nitrate runoff into water supplies, nor the increased demand on water, as "energy crops" like corn and soy begin to displace more drought tolerant crops such as wheat in several Midwestern states. The most serious impact, though, is on land use. The Minnesota paper reports that in 2005, 14% of the US corn harvest was used to produce some 6 million gallons of ethanol, equivalent to 1.7% of current gasoline usage. About 1 1/2 percent of the soy harvest produced 120 million gallons of biodiesel, equivalent to less than one tenth of one percent of gas usage. This means that if all of the country's corn harvest was used to make ethanol, it would displace 12% of our gas; all of our soybeans would displace about 6% of the gas. But if the energy used in producing these biofuels is taken into account the fact that 80% of the energy goes into production in the case of corn ethanol, and almost 50% in the case of soy biodiesel, the entire soy and corn crops combined would only satisfy 5.3% of current fuel needs. This is where the serious strain on food supplies and prices originates. The Cornell study is even more skeptical. Released in July, it was the product of an ongoing collaboration between Cornell agriculturalist David Pimentel, environmental engineer Ted Patzek, and their colleagues at the University of California at Berkeley, and was published in the journal Natural Resources Research. This study found that, in balance, making ethanol from corn requires 29% more fossil fuel than the net energy produced and biodisel from soy results in a net energy loss of 27%. Other crops, touted as solutions to the apparent diseconomy of current methods, offer even worse results. Switchgrass, for example, can grow on marginal land and presumably won't compete with food production (you may recall George Bush's mumbling about switchgrass in his 2006 State of the Union speech), but it requires 45% more energy to harvest and process than the energy value of the fuel that is produced. Wood biomass requires 57% more energy than it produces, and sunflowers require more than twice as much energy than is available in the fuel that is produced. "There is just no energy benefit to using plant biomass for liquid fuel," said David Pimentel in a Cornell press statement this past July. "These strategies are not sustainable." In a recent article, Harvard environmental scientist Michael McElroy concurred: "[U]nfortunately the promised benefits [of ethanol] prove upon analysis to be largely ephemeral." Even Brazilian sugarcane, touted as the world's model for conversion from fossil fuels to sustainable "green energy," has its downside. The energy yield appears beyond question: it is claimed that ethanol from sugarcane may produce as much as 8 times as much energy as it takes to grow and process. But a recent World Wildlife Fund report for the International Energy Agency raises serious questions about this approach to future energy independence. It turns out that 80% of Brazil's greenhouse gas emissions come not from cars, but from deforestation-the loss of embedded carbon dioxide when forests are cut down and burned. A hectare of land may save 13 tons of carbon dioxide if it is used to grow sugarcane, but the same hectare can absorb 20 tons of CO2 if it remains forested. If sugarcane and soy plantations continue to encourage deforestation, both in the Amazon and in Brazil's Atlantic coastal forests, any climate advantage is more than outweighed by the loss of the forest. Genetic engineering, which has utterly failed to produce healthier or more sustainable food-and also failed to create a reliable source of biopharmaceuticals without threatening the safety of our food supply-is now being touted as the answer to sustainable biofuel production. Biofuels were all the buzz at the biotech industry's most recent biotech mega-convention (April 2006), and biotech companies are all competing to cash in on the biofuel bonanza. Syngenta (the world's largest herbicide manufacturer and number three, after Monsanto and DuPont, in seeds) is developing a GE corn variety that contains one of the enzymes needed to convert corn starch into sugar before it can be fermented into ethanol. Companies are vying to increase total starch content, reduce lignin (necessary for the structural integrity of plants but a nuisance for chemical processors), and increase crop yields. Others are proposing huge plantations of fast-growing genetically engineered low-lignin trees to temporarily sequester carbon and ultimately be harvested for ethanol. However, the utility of incorporating the amylase enzyme into crops is questionable (it's also a potential allergen), gains in starch production are marginal, and the use of genetic engineering to increase crop yields has never proved reliable. Other, more complex traits, such as drought and salt tolerance (to grow energy crops on land unsuited to food production), have been aggressively pursued by geneticists for more than twenty years with scarcely a glimmer of success. Genetically engineered trees, with their long life-cycle, as well as seeds and pollen capable of spreading hundreds of miles in the wild, are potentially a far greater environmental threat than engineered varieties of annual crops. Even Monsanto, always the most aggressive promoter of genetic engineering, has opted to rely on conventional plant breeding for its biofuel research, according to the New York Times. Like "feeding the world" and biopharmaceutical production before it, genetic engineering for biofuels mainly benefits the biotech industry's public relations image. Biofuels may still prove advantageous in some local applications, such as farmers using crop wastes to fuel their farms, and running cars from waste oil that is otherwise thrown away by restaurants. But as a solution to long-term energy needs on a national or international scale, the costs appear to far outweigh the benefits. The solution lies in technologies and lifestyle changes that can significantly reduce energy use and consumption, something energy analysts like Amory Lovins have been advocating for some thirty years. From the 1970s through the '90s, the US economy significantly decreased its energy intensity, steadily lowering the amount of energy required to produce a typical dollar of GDP. Other industrial countries have gone far beyond us in this respect. But no one has figured out how to make a fortune on conservation and efficiency. The latest biofuel hype once again affirms that the needs of the planet, and of a genuinely sustainable society, are in fundamental conflict with the demands of wealth and profit. Brian Tokar directs the Biotechnology Project at Vermont's Institute for Social Ecology (social-ecology.org) and has edited two books on the science and politics of genetic engineering, Redesigning Life? (Zed Books, 2001) and Gene Traders: Biotechnology, World Trade and the Globalization of Hunger <http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0974693510/counterpunchmaga> (Toward Freedom, 2004).

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reminder - Transpo WG meeting Tues
by John-Marc Chandonia 23 Jan '07

23 Jan '07

Tuesday from 7-9 pm, we'll be discussing the possibility of a MUNI rider's union, free MUNI, and more (see the SFGP website for details). JMC -- John-Marc Chandonia (jmc(a)sfgreens.org) http://sfgreens.org/

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Active membership lists from working groups requested
by Susan King 13 Jan '07

13 Jan '07

Hi all, It's that time of year again- the SFGP County Council will be compiling our active membership list for 2007 at our Feb CC meeting (Tuesday, 2/13). We need every working group to provide a list of active members of the group so we can compile as complete a list as possible. Here's the working groups, forgive me if I overlook one (and please add to the list and send back to me): Feminist Issues Group: Chair, Vicki Leidner Campaigns and Issues: Chair, Susan King, Marc Salomon Housing and Land Use: Chair, Dave Wilbur Animal Advocacy: Rosalind, Chin, Eric??? not sure... Transportation: John Marc Chandonia Westside Greens: Barry, Nancy, Rita??? GROW: Sue Vaughan, Micheas Herman Sustainability: Don Eichelberger, Eric Brooks People of Color Caucus: Jazzie Collins and Christina Olague Finance Committee?? Media: Erika McDonald There are potentially several new working groups forming (Compassionate Use and Expansion), these groups may submit membership lists once they have presented the General Meeting with their platform, mission statement and bylaws for approval by the group. Again, please get back to me if I've overlooked any group, so the CC can contact them to get their list. It usually falls to the chair of each group to compile an annual list, please get this list to us (typed in an email is fine) by Feb 13 before our CC meeting. peace, susan

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Re: [Transpo] [SFGP-A] Notes Of November Transpo Meeting
by susan_e_vaughan＠juno.com 13 Jan '07

13 Jan '07

Notes (I am also going to post these to the official SFGP web page): I. We agreed that Richard Marquez and/or others should be contacted about participating in our January meeting to discuss forming a Riders Union. II. We discussed getting Jake McGoldrick to call for an academic study of fare evasion. Among the questions that should be answered are, "What percentage of fare evasion is due to poverty?" III. We agreed that we should formulate a piece of legislation to take to Mark Leno to change the law such that municipalities have the power to raise the cost of parking permits above the amount needed to administer the program. John-Marc had a more specific suggestion that I can't remember. IV. Micheas suggested that we go to Jerry McNerny, with whom he has a personal relationship, and request the introduction of federal legislation that eliminates the requirement that a certain amount of money for transportation projects comes from fares -- if we want federal matching funds. Sue also added that we should eliminate the requirement that matching funds go to primarily capitol projects as they do now. Federal money should be allowed to go to operating costs as well. V. Sue will rewrite the letter re. the schoolyard at Newcomer High School to focus on the needs of the students: a) the fact that they are immigrant students of color (for the most part) b) the fact that permitting overnight and weekend parking poses health risks to students from the toxics left by motor vehicles c) the fact that permitting overnight and weekend parking sets a terrible precedent for the rest of the school district d) and that fact that permitting overnight and weekend parking on the lot will preclude ever changing parts of the lot into dirt or grass lots for particular kinds of sports. The compromise that we suggest is that the Seventh Avenue lot is retained for parking for the time being, and that overnight and weekend parking will be permitted on Sixth Avenue lot until the lot is resurfaced and striped for sports during the summer. This will give time for neighbors and merchants to adjust -- and for Muni to get ready to add service if necessary. The letter will also acknowledge issues of proper neighborhood/merchant notification. (I will also add here that a neighbor who lives across the street from the Sixth Avenue lot who is active in the Sierra Club, Pinky Kushner, has suggested that the Sixth Avenue lot be made available to the neighborhood after hours for recreational purposes. I guess the responsible authority in that case would be Rec and Park -- or the school district if it contracted out to insured after school programs. Pinky says that the closest basketball courts are 14 blocks away in the Panhandle. That does sound far to me -- as I know that in my neighborhood there are three playgrounds with basketball courts within five blocks of where I live at most, besides the elementary schoolyard that my apartment overlooks and that stays open late when the weather is nice.) Sue

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transpo letter about Newcomer
by susan_e_vaughan＠juno.com 12 Jan '07

12 Jan '07

Here's the letter I have written about Newcomer High School. I don't know what the energy working group email is so I'm not sending it to that (it would take 15 minutes for me to sift through my juno adress book to find it). It's also attached. Sue The Transportation Working and the Sustainability Working groups of the San Francisco Green Party support the efforts of the staff at Newcomer High School to eventually turn the Sixth Avenue lot between Irving and Judah into a schoolyard 24 hours a day, seven days a week. We do not support overnight or weekend parking on this lot. Background: Newcomer High School, which had been at a site in Pacific Heights for about 25 years until August 2006 when it was moved to the Laguna Honda site in the Inner Sunset, has not offered physical education until this year, when Proposition H funds became available to hire a P.E. teacher. The principal would like to use the Sixth Avenue lot for P.E., as there is no indoor gym, and as a place for students to exercise and relax before and after school and during lunch. However, the Department of Parking and Traffic has leased this lot from the school district for many years for neighborhood parking, and neighborhood outrage over the loss of parking has delayed the start of P.E. classes and even prevented the students free time use of the lot. At this time, DPT and the school district have implemented a pilot program to permit overnight and weekend parking for one month. Our position: While the San Francisco Green Party believes that community members should have adequate notification of policy changes at a minimum, and should be invited to participate in the decision-making process at best, the San Francisco Green Party in this case supports a prohibition on overnight and weekend parking on the Sixth Avenue lot because: a) The students at Newcomer are all immigrant students, and most of them are students of color whose families are economically challenged. The families of most of these students have made the decision to send their children to San Francisco at great personal and family sacrifice but with an eye toward improving their futures. They deserve a safe, clean lot for exercise; b) A pilot program permitting overnight parking has already distracted the principal from many of her responsibilities, as she has been required to be on site to sign towing forms for many illegally-parked vehicles. Also, the fact that it is currently available for overnight and weekend parking has meant that the gate has been unlocked after hours, and people come onto the school grounds and dump their trash there, among other illegal activities, on a regular basis; c) The P.E. teacher, in consultation with others, has already drawn up plans for the Sixth Avenue lot, once it has been resurfaced in the summer of 2007. Those plans include striping for basketball, pickleball, volleyball, wiffleball and softball, among other sports. The principal would also like to put benches around a center tree for use of students before and after school, but especially during lunch on nice days. Toxic residue and oil slicks from parked vehicles present health hazards to students, and will accelerate the deterioration of the lot. Also, maintaining the lot as a parking lot after hours would preclude the part of the lot to be dedicated to a wiffleball/softball diamond from ever being transformed into a dirt or grass diamond; d) Permitting overnight and weekend parking on the schoolyard sets a terrible precedent for the rest of the school district; and, e) Vehicles going into and out of the lot cross the 6th Avenue bike lane, endanger bicyclists. We suggest that overnight and weekend parking be eliminated after the schoolyard is resurfaced and striped during the summer. This delay will give adequate time for people who currently use the parking lot to adjust and for Muni to add service to the Inner Sunset, if need be. We also encourage the principal of Newcomer High School, school district officials, and the Recreation and Park Department to work on a system of sharing the Sixth Avenue lot such that the lot can remain available to the neighborhood for recreational purposes, as the closest basketball court is 14 blocks away in the Panhandle. Send to: ross.mirkarimi(a)sfgov.org sean.elsbernd(a)sfgov.org Esther V. Casco, ecasco(a)muse.sfusd.edu (Clerk of the Board) Eric Mar <emar(a)sfusd.edu> Mark Sanchez <msanchez(a)sfusd.edu> Eddie Chin <echin(a)sfusd.edu> Norman Yee <yeen(a)sfusd.edu> Jane Kim -- I don't know her email yet KimShree Maufas -- " " Hydra Mendoza -- " " David Campos: camposd(a)sfusd.edu Baje Thiara (Newcomer principal), bthiara(a)muse.sfusd.edu Organizations to enlist: Chinese Progressive Association La Raza Central Legal ???? SPUR Livable Cities SFBicycle Coalition PTA Sierra Club -- Pinky and I are taking care of this SF Tomorrow (not likely to support this proposal) SF Beautiful others

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SPUR Forum on Transportation *Thursday*
by Dave Snyder 10 Jan '07

10 Jan '07

Date clarification included: Green Transport People, I think you may be interested in this upcoming forum on transportation policy and reform at SPUR. SPUR's transportation agenda Wed Jan 11, 12:30 p.m., 312 Sutter (at Grant), fifth floor SPUR's new Transportation Policy Director Dave Snyder will present his plans to strengthen SPUR's research and advocacy for improved transportation in San Francisco. Snyder, the founding executive director of the modern San Francisco Bicycle Coalition, will lead a discussion of SPUR's transportation priorities: faster and more reliable Muni, including the Caltrain extension to a new Transbay Terminal and the Central Subway.

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