The Greenest American Cities

Top 10 Cities for Green Living (Scientific American, Aug. 16, 2011)

A rating of US cities by how well they perform when it comes to living green is the focus of today’s review. The two top cities under each category are shown below. Overall, New York City scored highest, winning the top spot in 3 of 5 categories: thinking, transportation and walkable.

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Peformance Prices for Parking

Progress in immobility – How optimization of stationary traffic can improve traffic flow (8 page pdf, Donald Shoup, ITS magazine- The Magazine for Intelligent Traffic Systems I 2/2011, Siemens, July 2011)

The patron saint of parking, Donald Shop, is the focus of today’s review. He points out the many issues caused by free parking and the need to do three things to create more mobility: “Charging performance prices for on-street parking, spending the revenue for local public services, and removing off-street parking requirements”

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On-Street Parking

The importance of on-street parking (Steve Mouzon, New Urban Network, Aug. 10, 2011

Today’s focus is on the need for on-street parking and why the alternatives are unsafe, bad for business and generally bad for the urban environment.

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Gridlock – real or imaginary?

Traffic Gridlock: The Real Deal or a Pile of Nonsense? (26 page pdf, Barry Wellar, Jul. 28, 2011)

The focus today is on an analysis by a leading Ottawa expert on mobility, Prof. Barry Wellar. He sees the use of the term “gridlock” as a dichotomy between “research-based, and deserve to be treated as the real deal” or “not research-based, and deserve to be dismissed as a pile of nonsense”. The answer is left to the reader of his paper to answer. That said, the causes of gridlock and the impacts it might have on mobility in general and the environment in particular are worth examination.

(26 min YuTube video, May 14, 2011)

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Traffic Air and Sound Pollution Impacts on Blood Pressure and Hypertension

Long-Term Urban Particulate Air Pollution, Traffic Noise and Arterial Blood Pressure (30 page pdf, Kateryna Fuks, Susanne Moebus, Sabine Hertel, Anja Viehmann, Michael Nonnemacher, Nico Dragano, Stefan Möhlenkamp, Hermann Jakobs, Christoph Kessler, Raimund Erbel, Barbara Hoffmann, |Environmental Health Perspectives, Aug. 9, 2011)

The focus today is on research into the impacts of long term exposure to emissions and noise from heavy traffic (greater than 22,000 vehicles/day) on blood pressure. The results point to a link  even when the increase in PM concentration is small, because even a small increase over the long term has large impacts in population health terms.

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Investing in Toll Roads Internationally

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For Whom the Road Tolls: Reviewing Listed Toll Roads, Bridges and Tunnels (Seeking Alpha, May 3, 2011)

Today’s review article contains an investment analysis of 23 toll roads in 8 countries which differ significantly both in national financial policies and in the amounts invested and the returns and dividends. While Italy has the largest market capitalization for one toll road (Atlantia SPA), China’s roads offer the most attractive prospects with equity ratios as high as 70%.

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Mid-Town Freeways, Sprawl and Quality of Life

A Distant Mirror: 40 Years of Urbanism in Vancouver (Nicholas Kevlahan, Raise the Hammer, Aug. 2, 2011)

Vancouver is the only major city on the continent that does NOT have a freeway through its centre. Result? It has developed into an urban planner’s dream with high population density and a quality of life that is the envy of many in leading cities around the world. Today’s review article examines the development of Vancouver over the last three decades and compares it to a comparably sized city, Hamilton, located west of Toronto which itself has sprawled in all directions thanks to its own freeway bisector, the 401.

The road not taken

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Health Impacts of Future Heat Waves as a result of Climate Change

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Projecting Future Heat-related Mortality under Climate Change Scenarios: A Systematic Review (43 page pdf, Cunrui Huang, Adrian Gerard Barnett, Xiaoming Wang, Pavla Vaneckova, Gerard FitzGerald, Shilu Tong, |Environmental Health Perspectives, Aug. 4, 2011)

The focus of today’s review article is on the heat-related deaths likely under climate change scenarios that extend out 50 years. A literature search revealed that heat waves are the single largest cause of deaths of any severe weather and women particularly elderly women tend to suffer the most. Acclimatization to warmer temperatures is an important factor to avoid exaggerating the mortality impact. Air pollution will add to the impact from heat waves.

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Risk Assessment and Air Pollution Epidemiology

Improving the Linkages between Air Pollution Epidemiology and Quantitative Risk Assessment (23 page pdf, Fann N, Bell ML, Walker K, Hubbell B, Environmental Health Perspectives, Aug. 4, 2011)

Today’s focus is on the link between the assessment of health risk on the one hand and the analysis of causes and effect of health impacts through epidemiology- and how one can complement the other. The review article considers a number of aspects: estimated effects, air quality, population and health data.

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Reaching Climate Stabilization by Reducing Non-CO2 emissions

Non-CO2 greenhouse gases and climate change (Abstract, S. A. Montzka, E. J. Dlugokencky & J. H. Butler, Nature 476, 43–50, Aug.4, 2011)

Stabilizing climate change  requires reducing emissions from carbon fuels alone by almost 100%.  It is clear that even if the world found a way of doing this that it would not be achieved in a century or more- far too long to avoid the impacts from a changing atmosphere. The article reviewed today examines the non carbon gas emissions which have much shorter lifetimes in the atmosphere , contribute significantly to climate change and therefore represent an opportunity to reach stabilization more quickly than through  CO2 emission reductions alone.

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Deciding on When and How to Toll Roads

Big Numbers Win Prizes (Robert Bain, Apr. 8, 2009)

Making the decision to begin tolling and then choosing which way to toll is a challenge that many municipalities and countries face today. Today’s review article looks at 21 ways that toll revenue and traffic are exaggerated or incorrectly estimated- and suggests ways to approach the topic in more objective and rationale ways, in order to decide on the optimum choice.

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What is the Better Indicator of Health Impacts from Particles- Black Carbon or PM?

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Black carbon as an Additional Indicator of the Adverse Health Effects of Airborne Particles Compared to PM10 and PM2.5 (44 page pdf, Nicole AH Janssen, Gerard Hoek, Milena Simic-Lawson, Paul Fischer, Leendert van Bree, Harry ten Brink, Menno Keuken, Richard W Atkinson, H Ross Anderson, Bert Brunekreef, Flemming R Cassee, Environmental Health Perspectives, Aug. 2, 2011)

Particulate Matter (PM) has long been used as a basis for indicating health impacts from vehicle emissions. In the report reviewed today, another indicator, Black Carbon (BCP), was found to have a greater sensitivity to proximity to roads and on mortality and is being recommended as an additional pollutant standard.

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Vehicle Emissions in Chinese Cities

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Poor air quality hits many big cities (Li Jing, China Daily, Aug. 2, 2011)

Today the focus is on the state of air quality in China’s cities, 40% of which are rated “poor” according to the Ministry of Environmental Protection. The main source of the pollution, as in major cities elsewhere, is vehicle emissions which have intensified in China in the last decade or two with the increase of vehicles and population.

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Monitoring Local Pollution Across Canada

Creating National Air Pollution Models for Population Exposure Assessment in Canada (7 Page pdf, Perry Hystad, Eleanor Setton, Alejandro Cervantes, Karla Poplawski, Steeve Deschenes, Michael Brauer, Aaron van Donkelaar, Lok Lamsal, Randall Martin, Michael Jerrett, and Paul Demers, Environmental Health Perspectives, volume 119, number 8, August 2011)

Today’s focus is on a study of how well the national air pollution network, supplemented by satellite data and regional land use regression modeling, can estimate local variability in 7 Canadian cities. Modelling improved the  prediction of variability of NO2 from 18% using standard interpolation to 43% with supplemental data and techniques.

NO2 model (0-105 ug/m3)                                                               0                    1,000 km (1 km resolution)

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Managing Hot Spots in Urban Municipalities in England

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Mapping Air Quality Action Plan Guidance available to Local Authorities (52 page pdf, prepared by Entec UK Limited for DEFRA, Apr. 14, 2011)

Since legislation was enacted in 1995 to improve urban air quality in the UK,  over 200 local authorities have declared over 500 Air Quality Management  Areas (AQMA). The report reviewed today critically reviews the effectiveness of the guidance provided to the local authorities, identifies some shortcomings  and makes recommendations. The lack of progress in reducing roadside emissions is notable.

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Car Dependency and Exclusion from Social Mobility

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Transport & Social Exclusion – A survey of the Group of Seven nations (44 page pdf, Summary Report, Editor: Dr Karen Lucas, Transport Studies Group, University of Westminster, the FIA Foundation, Feb. 2004)

Today’s focus is on the many ways that the mobility needs of the poor and disadvantaged are met (or not) in G7 nations. The review article compares the extent of car dependency and the extent to which national transportation policies affect this mobility with large differences between North America on the one hand and Europe on the other. One factor is the degree of sprawl and large distances in Canada and the USA, as well as the greater access to alternative modes such as public transit in Europe and Japan. Value pricing (and congestion charging and road pricing)  is being explored in the US (less so in Canada) to partly overcome this.

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Suburban Sprawl, Road Building and Vehicle Emissions

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Lock-in Effects of Road Expansion on CO2 Emissions: Results from a Core-Periphery Model of Beijing ( 39 page pdf, Alex Anas and Govinda R. Timilsina, Working Papers, State University of New York at Buffalo, Jun. 9, 2010)

By applying a traffic speed model to the megacity of Beijing, today’s review article examines the relationship between the addition of urban roads to traffic speed and emissions of CO2 and to what extent public transit plays an offset role for these emissions.

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Australian Tax and Environmental Price Reform

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Tax Reform: Next Steps for Australia (42 page pdf, Commonwealth of Australia 2011)

Australia, Germany and the UK and a few other countries have governments whose policies are influenced by a party that promotes environmental and economic sustainabilility and keeps in power the party leading government, as long as its policies reflect the political reality. The minority Labour government in Australia is proposing a number of tax reforms including several that include environmental price reform in response to congestion, climate change and the graying population- as it affects traffic congestion, carbon fuel use and the need for equitable, used-based taxes. Portions of the Tax Reform Discussion Paper paper are quoted below.

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Diesel Exhaust Particulates and Heart Disease

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Combustion-derived nanoparticulate induces the adverse vascular effects of diesel exhaust inhalation (12 page pdf, Nicholas L. Mills, Mark R. Miller, Andrew J. Lucking, Jon Beveridge, Laura Flint, A. John F. Boere, Paul H. Fokkens, Nicholas A. Boon, Thomas Sandstrom, Anders Blomberg, Rodger Duffin, Ken Donaldson, PatrickW.F. Hadoke, Flemming R. Cassee, and David E. Newby. European Heart Journal Advance Access, Jul. 13, 2011)

Today’s review article explores the various gaseous and particulate components of exhaust from diesel motors in terms of vascular response and test various filters used to reduce health impacts.

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How Does Green Messaging in Transportation Affect Behaviour?

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The power and value of green in promoting sustainable transport behavior (11 page pdf, David Gaker, David Vautin, Akshay Vij and Joan L Walker, Environmental Research Letters Volume 6 Number 3, Jul. 26, 2011)

The question addressed by the review article today is how much does a “green” choice influence behavior when applied to transportation choices. The evidence presented indicates how much extra consumers are willing to pay per pound of emissions reduced (15 cents) and how this compares to how much time is saved, another strong motivator.

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The Future of National Highways

Inventing the Interstate (Tom Vanderbilt. New York Times, Jul. 15, 2011)
Highways are the focus of today’s review- in particular the national highway system in the USA which compares to the TransCanada Highway system in its larger neighbor to the north. Having reached a zenith in the late 1900s, as we start to see a decline in vehicle miles driven and as carbon fuel prices increase, one wonders how much longer these expensive systems will be viable. Alternatively, we are reminded of the Solar Roads project which could replace all that asphalt and polluting vehicles on these highways with non-polluting materials and emissions.

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What Determines Parking Rates Globally

Parking Rates Broadly Up – Worldwide (4 page pdf, Ross J. Moore Chief Economist | USA, Colliers, CBD Parking Rates, 2011)

The focus of today’s review is an update on a comparison of central business district (CBD) parking rates around the world. While one expects them to correlate well with real estate prices, one finds considerable differences, not only within a city but between cities. Parking rates are known to also impact on the degree of traffic congestion with higher rates favouring less congestion as a rule along with reduced vehicle emissions in downtown urban areas.

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Does Traffic Air Pollution Cause Cervical and Brain Cancer?

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Air pollution from traffic and cancer incidence: a Danish cohort study (33 page pdf, Ole Raaschou-Nielsen, Zorana J Andersen, Martin Hvidberg, Steen S Jensen, Matthias Ketzel, Mette Sorensen, Johnni Hansen, Steffen Loft, Kim Overvad and Anne Tjonneland, Environmental Health 2011, 10:67, Jul. 19, 2011)

The article reviewed today looks at exposure to traffic–related air pollution and its impact on various organs in addition to the well-studied impact on the heart and respiratory system. The conclusions indicate a significant link to cervical and brain cancer as well as impacts on the liver and kidney.

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