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

[Daryl Oster]

> -----Original Message From Markus Sander; Sent July 13, 2007 5:19 AM
> To: sustran-discuss at list.jca.apc.org
> Cc: 'Global 'South' Sustainable Transport'
> Subject: [sustran] Re: MMRDA will file PIL to block Tata's Rs1 lakh car
> 
> On Tue, Jul 10, 2007 at 12:05:14PM -0400, Daryl Oster wrote:
> 
> > The motorcycle, car, and jet have already beaten the bike, bus, and
> > train in transportation value
> >
> > The ONLY way to beat the car is by implementing a transportation mode
> > that offers a quantum improvement in VALUE for most people.
> 
> I agree up to here.

I am glad we agree that value improvement is key to sustainable
transportation.  


> 1) The VALUE is more than price/distance. For example, the car offers
> you to carry around a part of your private property. If someone parks a
> car, the parking space is temporarily his private territory. That's
> something you can't do with a bike (unless safe bike parking boxes are
> offered).

I agree that it is not only the direct costs that are important, but also
external costs, AND time costs too.  The benefit of transportation should be
(in my mind anyway) fixed --moving people or goods between two points with
reasonable safety and comfort - this is reduced to passenger*km, or ton*km
units.  And I also agree that there are many other non-transportation
benefits that are not related to transportation, yet unfortunately are often
a big part of people's transportation decision.  

Parking is related to transportation, and often is treated as a separate
issue -- a storage problem = added cost.  Fee based parking on public ROW is
a common transportation cost.  Public vehicles also have storage issues, if
comparisons are made to cars, these storage costs for public transport
vehicles must also be considered.  

 
> 2) You are absolutely right that the car has beaten bike, bus and train
> by VALUE. The key problem is that USING a car is to cheap for the user.
> Car use is massively subsided:
> 
> + exclusive road space for free. No one can walk, sit, trade, talk on a
>   street dedicated for cars -> Solution "Road Pricing" or "Shared Space"

I agree that roads are not always paid for exclusively be use fees like
tolls or fuel tax, AND there are many areas where fuel a very high fuel tax
is more than sufficient to pay for the roads AND in many cases diverted to
pay for much more in addition.  

In the case of a small fuel efficient car (let's try to keep to the thread's
topic), the fuel tax may cover less than the incremental space the car
takes.  A more equitable solution would be to cost by GPS tracking and
billing by actual use (adjusted according to weight for instance so trucks
that do more damage pay a higher cost for their space.  This would add about
$100 to the cost of the car, and would be offset in added value in use to
avoid congestion, etc.


> + costs for parking garages are often subsided by the city council

Business owners will often provide parking to attract more business, and the
cost is added to the cost of business service -- so it is then true that
those who pay the same price (but require no parking) will subsidize some of
the parking cost for those who use the parking.  Fee based parking is common
and generally fair (not incurring subsidy from others); yet fee based
parking often subsidizes others!  Consider that a parking garage in a CBD
must pay property tax based on the highest and best use of the property --
and the tax rates are based on, and used to pay for many government services
NOT inuring from parking cars. 


> + bothering city inhabitants for free -> there's no "noise fee"

It is difficult to determine the value of silence, and cars are not the only
things that make bothersome sound in a city.  It is however possible to
recover some cost from excessive noise.  I have (in my younger days)
received fines for having a car (or radio) too loud, and many municipalities
have sound pressure limits that could incur fines if exceeded.  

In an effort to keep this thread on topic: In the case of the proposal to
ban a particular high value car; how might this affect the noise?  IMO, cars
are often much quieter than the motorcycles they might displace.  


> + streets are build with money from *all* people, wheather they're using
>   a car or not (other transportation modes need less road space)

Most governments place a heavy tax on motor fuels, and often the money is
not used to build roads but diverted to other use.  Please also consider
that the typical speed of a car is often greater than a pedestrian or
cyclist partially or completely compensating for the additional space
required (more space but less time using that space could result in the same
per passenger mile use factor).  

 
> + car users also don't pay for the bad live quality they cause

Nor do cars always receive credit for the good living conditions they
promote.  (Muscle powered transportation is not completely cleans or healthy
either - consider the manure problem in streets of old).  

When comparing value it is very important to compare with the same
dispassionate terms and measures for all cost and benefit categories for all
alternatives.

> + car users don't pay for people that get sick of air pollution and/or
>   noise

Nor do trains, or bikes, or pedestrians.  Consider that pedestrians spread
infectious germs more efficiently than someone in a car, so it could be
possible that cars might be actually due some credit for a net saving of
lives.  To accurately sum all health costs and benefits of all transport
modes to compare to Tata's Rs1 lakh would be a daunting study.  Insurance
rates are a good indicator of actual cost (or value).

 
> + health insurances (which are paid from all people, not only car users)
>   pay for the consequenses of car accidents, air pollution, ...

Most governments impose strict liability requirements on cars, and the
relative risks of most car models can be accurately compared, and by law
fully compensated for by insurance premium collection (plus a reasonable
profit to the insurance company that underwrites the relative risk).

> In summary, use of car is cheap for the user and very expensive for the
> community. If car users had to pay for all the things they cause, the
> car would lose imediately.

This may be true, and it also may be true of ALL transportation modes --
even walking, and especially trains, or horses even worse.  

 
> So I disagree that we have to change our strategy and offer something
> different that offeres improvement in value. We have to stop increasing
> the VALUE of a car use by subsidary.
> 
> --
>  (c) markus

A subsidy is a cost to non-beneficiaries, and you are correct that we must
seek ways to eliminate subsidies for ALL modes to the greatest extent
practical.  IMO, an open and fair market that encourages innovation often
finds better solutions than governments.    

I hope we agree on the use of the term "subsidy". --- A subsidy is gift that
has no expectation of recovery.  An investment (unlike a subsidy) IS
recovered in a period of time through fees paid by those who use or benefit
from the investment.  


I am all for improving the living condition of communities.  Investing is
sustainable transportation that maximizes value with out requiring (or
giving) subsidy from (or to) non-beneficiaries is one of the best tools to
use to accomplish this.  

A mode that requires subsidy (especially government subsidy) indicates poor
overall value, while modes offering the highest possible ratio of total
benefits to total costs (greatest value) will generally be profitable for a
community.  

Best regards,

Daryl Oster
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