Peak Oil and ..Peak Car?

U.S. Car Fleet Shrank by Four Million in 2009 – After a Century of Growth, U.S. Fleet Entering Era of Decline (Plan B Updates- Lester Brown, Jan. 6,2010)

Many see suburban sprawl and the associated car-addiction as the main threat and obstacle to sustainable, pollution-free cities. In the wake of the great 2009 recession, a net decrease in automobiles in the USA has been observed. This article by a world known futurist looks at some of the reasons for this and where the future might go.

Key Quotes:

“Cars scrapped exceeded new car sales in 2009 for the first time since World War II, shrinking the U.S. vehicle fleet from the all-time high of 250 million to 246 million.”

“Among the trends .. are market saturation, ongoing urbanization, economic uncertainty, oil insecurity, rising gasoline prices, frustration with traffic congestion, mounting concerns about climate change, and a declining interest in cars among young people.”

“Japan apparently reached car saturation in 1990. Since then its annual car sales have shrunk by 21 percent”

“Mayors across the country are waging a strong fight to save their cities from cars, trying ..to reduce costly traffic congestion by simultaneously improving public transportation while imposing restrictions on the use of cars.”

“Between 2005 and 2008, transit ridership climbed 9 percent in the United States”

“reconsidering parking requirements for new buildings…Earlier codes that once required four parking spaces for every 1,000 square feet of retail space now require only one.”

“In Washington, D.C., with a well-developed transit system, only 63 percent of households own a car.”

“despite the largest U.S. teenage population ever, the number of teenagers with licenses, which peaked at 12 million in 1978, is now under 10 million.”

“there will be little need to build new roads and highways. Fewer cars on the road reduces highway and street maintenance costs and lessens demand for parking lots and parking garages”

Children Near Traffic

Proximity of Licensed Child Care Facilities to Near-Roadway Vehicle Pollution (7 page pdf, September 2006, Vol 96, No. 9 | American Journal of Public Health)

Key Quotes:

“among girls aged 4 months to 4 years, exposure to nitrogen dioxide (NO2) near their home or day care center may be associated with the development of wheezing bronchitis; higher levels of traffic-related air pollutants are associated with wheezing, physician-diagnosed asthma, flu, serious colds, and ear, nose, and throat infections; and exposure to air pollution (including NO2), particularly in combination with exposure to environmental tobacco smoke, increases the risk of recurrent wheezing in children”

“Outdoor air pollutant concentrations may be heightened in homes in close proximity to major roadways, and children may also experience significant exposures in other micro-environments such as portable classrooms, school buses, and passenger vehicles.“

“Because many working parents rely on child care, the hours a child spends in a care facility often correspond to the morning or afternoon periods of peak traffic volumes when pollution levels near roadways are most elevated. “

“Although the distance and traffic volume thresholds used in available studies vary, they suggest that a proximity of 100 m to 500 m from roadways with a traffic volume of approximately 24000 or more vehicles per day is associated with adverse effects.“

“Programs should carefully consider near-roadway air pollution concerns in evaluations of facility location and expansion criteria to ensure that preschool children residing in the most disadvantaged neighborhoods are not systematically subjected to higher concentrations of vehicle-related pollutants. “

“Evidence of the high concentration of harmful air pollutants near roadways prompted the California legislature to prohibit public schools within 150 m (500 ft) of busy corridors to protect children’s health “

Sustainability Trends for the Next Decade

The Next Decade’s Top Sustainability Trends (World Changing Team, 5 Jan 2010)

World Changing: Top Sustainability Trends of the Next Decade (Sustainable Cities Collective, 4 Feb 2010)

Many of the key trends are a result of the expected cost for carbon fuels along with the imperative to reduce greenhouse gas emissions on the one hand and to build resilience to climate impacts on the other, especially within urban communities. This would likely also result in a trend toward more sustainable cities with less pollution.

Key Trends:

“Bike usage will continue to rise across cities worldwide”

“Copenhagen UNFCCC meeting will eventually result in a set of targets for cutting GHG emissions”

“Cellulosic fuels will no longer cause higher food prices, and will instead become a key part of the energy mix”

“Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) will drive advances in sustainable urban development”

“Carbon taxes will help integrate the real environmental costs of using fossil fuels into the actual price”

“Drought will be the first major effect of climate change to cause significant investments in climate change adaptation measures”

“The end of “cheap oil” will make sprawl more expensive”

“Rising fuel costs will make urban agriculture increasingly viable”

“Localities will undertake resiliency planning”

“A new sustainability cultural event will help make the issues more prominent”

Health Impacts from Residential Traffic Exposure

Residential Traffic Exposure, Pulse Pressure and C-reactive Protein: Consistency and Contrast Among Exposure Characterization Methods (45 page pdf, Environ Health Perspect, 02 February 2010)

Key Quotes:

“Traffic exposure has been shown to increase cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk via systemic inflammation and elevated blood pressure“

“association between traffic exposure indicators as predictors of C-reactive protein (CRP) and pulse pressure in an adult U.S. Puerto Rican population“

“Pulse pressure was positively associated with residence ≤ 100 m of a roadway with a difference of 2.2mmHg (95% CI, 0.13 – 4.3 mmHg) for the total population and 3.8 (95% CI, 0.88 – 6.8) for those with BMI ≥30.“

“Differential personal exposure to particles, gaseous pollutants and traffic pollution have been associated with lower socioeconomic position with respect to education, minority status and income and major roadways have been routed through lower-income areas with less political and economic power“

“Traffic density has been identified as a significant predictor of NOx, NO2, PM2.5, the soot content of PM2.5 and volatile organic chemicals “

“Roadway proximity ≤100 m was significant for pulse pressure, whereas proximity ≤200 m was significant for CRP.“

“This study found adverse health effects were associated with residence near roadways with traffic volumes between 20,000 – 40,000 vehicles per day, suggesting risks from residential exposure at lesser roadway volumes than previously reported.“

Traffic and Onset of Asthma for Children

Traffic Marker? Early Exposure to Air Pollution Associated with Childhood Asthma (Environ Health Perspect, 1 Feb 2010)

Key Quotes:

“Asthma is now the most common chronic disease for children and a major cause of emergency room visits, hospitalizations, and school absences”

“The highest risk of asthma was associated with exposure to the traffic-related pollutants carbon monoxide, nitric oxide, nitrogen dioxide, and black carbon; lesser associations were seen with exposure to PM10 and sulfur dioxide, as well as with proximity to industrial point sources”

Vehicle Emissions and Heart Disease

Cardiovascular health and particulate vehicular emissions: a critical evaluation of the evidence (25 page pdf, Air Qual Atmos Health 30 Jun 2009)

Key Quotes:

“integrative evaluation of the database examining effects of vehicular emissions, such as black carbon (BC), carbonaceous gasses, and ultrafine PM, on cardiovascular (CV) morbidity and mortality”

“NO2 is also seen as a marker of vehicular emissions, particularly in European studies. Although NO2 is emitted from sources other than vehicles, such as power plants and industry, vehicular NO2 emissions usually dominate in busy urban centers lacking major industry”

“highway proximity studies found significantly elevated risks for cardiovascular death or morbidity outcomes and for all-cause mortality, for people living in close proximity (usually 100 m to major roadways or 50 m to a major urban road), compared to those living farther away.”

Health Impacts of Pollution in Moscow

The effects of particulate and ozone pollution on mortality in Moscow, Russia (7 page pdf, Air Qual Atmos Health, 29 Dec 2009)

Key Quotes

“(1) to evaluate how acute mortality responds to changes in particulate and ozone (O3) pollution levels,

(2) to identify vulnerable population groups by age and cause of death, and

(3) to address the problem of interaction between the effects of O3 and particulate pollution.”

“aim of the study reported here was to access relationships between air pollution and mortality, unconstrained by temperature, seasonal factors, and secular trends.

“All effects of pollution on mortality seemed to be immediate, rather than postponed “

“we conclude that PM10 and O3 concentration–response coefficients in Moscow largely agree with the results of previous research in other countries. We arrived at an estimate of PM10 rate of 0.33%, which is very close to the value obtained in meta-analyses of 26 European studies (0.40%) and 20 of the largest U.S. cities (0.28%),“

“our analysis of short-term associations between particulate matter and mortality proved that larger effects were consistently observed for the elderly.“

“We found no evidence of PM10 being a modifier of theO3 effect on mortality.”

Orienting Development to Transit

Transit-oriented development requires more than transit and development (from blog by Kaid Benfield, Director, Smart Growth Program, NDRC)

Given that efficient public transit is part of the solution to reduce private vehicle commuting and emissions and make a city pollution free, this article looks at transit oriented development and ways to make the development part of the equation more suited to transit rather than the other way around.

Key Quotes:

““transit-oriented development,” ..“TOD.” ..designed to make it more convenient for more people to use public transportation.”

“defined in the latest draft by the proximity of the location to transit service”

“we have really defined only transit-served development locations. The design process of orienting the development to transit requires more.”

“In order to create a station area that encourages transit use and TOD, the public space around stations must be inviting and usable. A successful public space is easy to walk through, is comfortable to sit and visit, and has attractive features such as water fountains and public art. Great public spaces often include retail . . .”

“Attractive pedestrian environment, with street-facing buildings and a network of pedestrian-scaled streets connecting the transit stop or station with the TOD’s commercial, civic and residential areas.”

“TOD planning principles: greater density than community average; a mix of uses; quality pedestrian environment; a defined centre”

Forecasting Air Pollution with Artificial Neural Networks

3-Day-Ahead Forecasting of Regional Pollution Index for the Pollutants NO2, CO, SO2, and O3 Using Artificial Neural Networks in Athens, Greece (15 page pdf, Water Air Soil Pollut, 29 Aug 2009)

Key Quotes:

“The goal of this study is the construction of models, using ANNs, which give the possibility of forecasting the maximum daily value of an ambient air pollution index for NO2, CO, SO2, and O3, for seven different measuring sites of Greater Athens Area (GAA) and for the next three consecutive days, as well as the daily number of consecutive hours with the pollutants above a threshold concentration.“

“ANNs are a branch of artificial intelligence developed in the 1950s aiming at imitating the biological brain architecture. They are parallel-distributed systems made of many interconnected nonlinear processing elements (PEs), called neurons “

“we created two different ANNs. The first one (ANN#1) was trained in order to forecast the daily maximum value of the ERPI (for the pollutants CO, NO2, SO2, and O3) for seven different measuring sites in GAA, at the same time, 3 days ahead. The second one (ANN#2) was trained in order to forecast the number of the hours, during the day, with at least one of the pollutants concentrations (CO, NO2, SO2, and O3) above a threshold according to directives of European Union, “

“The model’s ability to predict reliably 3 days ahead, the excesses or non-excesses days (days with the limit value of ERPI≥50), for the year 2005, according to the values of the success index ranges between 84.6% (Liossia 3-day-ahead prediction) and 92.2% (Patission 1-day-ahead prediction).“

NO2 Pollution from Traffic and Prenatal Growth

Prenatal Exposure to Traffic-Related Air Pollution and Ultrasound Measures of Fetal Growth in the INMA-Sabadell Cohort

(34 page pdf, Environ Health Perspect, 26 Jan 2010)

Key Quotes:

“We examined the relationship between exposure to nitrogen dioxide and

aromatic hydrocarbons (BTEX) on fetal growth assessed by 1,692 ultrasound

measurements among 562 pregnant women”

<BTEX – benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene, m/p-xylene, and o-xylene>

“We found an effect of prenatal exposure to urban air pollution on growth in BPD between from weeks 20 to 32 of gestation.“ <BPD – biparietal diameter>

“This is the first study to use exposure assessment based on LUR models to investigate the effect of prenatal exposure to traffic-related air pollution on ultrasound based fetal growth. “ <LUR – land-use regression>

“Our results lend some support to an effect of exposure to traffic-related

air pollutants from early pregnancy on fetal growth during mid-pregnancy.”