[sustran] Re: MMRDA will file PIL to block Tata's Rs1 lakh car

[Lee Schipper]

Almost right. Sweden has the same kinds of weekend car use as Denmark, in fact
commuting to vacation homes in Sweden uses far more fuel than the homes themselves.
But there are more car=less people in Denmark than in Sweden -- simply more
1 car families and fewer two car families in Denmark. The car that is left in the family is used more.
In other words, both countries have the same kinds of city car use, but Denmark gets the same
use per capita out of fuel vehicles/capita. And the taxes in Denmark are so important that
the government has been resistant to having lower acquisition and higher use taxes.

The high acquisition taxes do force the Danes to live with significantly smaller cars than the swedes, who have the heaviest and most fuel intensive cars in Europe. But Danish new cars have fewer fuel saving
technologies installed than the equivalent German new cars (where new car taxes are relatively light.) Lew Fulton did a very careful comparison of  these countries' and US new cars when we were both
at the IEA and that's what he found.   Since energy-saving technology costs are also taxes at the same
high rate in Denmark, the tax discourages implementation relative to Germany. fuel prices in the two countries were close, so it was hard not to conclude that the high taxes force the sizes of the
cars down in Denmark but also discourage efficiency technology for a given car. Not surprisingly, 
US cars of roughly comparable sizes have fewer fuel saving options because fuel prices were so much
lower (when we made the comparisons) in the US than either in Denmark or Germany!

>>> "Anjali Mahendra" <anjali.mahendra at gmail.com> 7/13/2007 12:48 PM >>>
Yes, I see the point about the relationship between household car ownership
and use not being the same in all places.  On Lee's point about the Danes, I
have heard that those who own cars in Danish cities use them less within
cities, where transit and bicycles are used much more.  Total VMT are higher
because cars are used for weekend trips, esp. visits to homes in the
countryside.  Is that right?  The low car ownership seems correlated with
income given that ownership taxes are so high.
 
But you look at a city like Delhi in India where transit options have been
dismal so far and worsened by the fast-paced spread of the city--and you
find car ownership directly correlated with use.  Cars are considered a
"necessity".  People consider themselves "handicapped" without a car.  All
working members of a household need a car--it's the only way they can get to
work--and the way land is being developed has contributed to it.  So you see
dense apartment blocks with 4 cars per household and parking designed for a
car per household.  Chuwa's story of Penang sounds very familiar.

The picture of car ownership in Mumbai is not as bad though it is worsening
as the suburbs become denser (new laws for higher FSI in the suburbs are
contributing to this).  The richest of households own multiple cars where
the minivan may be used mostly on weekends and not in the city, but by and
large, car owners will use their cars in Indian cities.  The prestige of
owning a car and incentives provided through low-rate auto ownership loans
coupled with close-to-nil parking (or other usage) charges for driving in
the city, poor transit in many cases, and most importantly, the land
development patterns make people own their car and drive it too.

-Anjali


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