[sustran] Re: Terrorism, Transit and Public Safety

[Chris Holloway]

I agree with LH.   This occurrence in England has been a time of
significant social upheaval, which is normally the case after an
incident where several lives and injuries have been sustained.   The
analysis by Litman is appropriate and should boulster the use of public
transit which inherantly and generally is a most safe means of
transport.

Chris Holloway
Ottawa 

-----Original Message-----
From: Nawdry [mailto:nawdry at austin.rr.com] 
Sent: July 9, 2005 11:45 AM
To: Jonathan E. D. Richmond
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Subject: Re: Terrorism, Transit and Public Safety


Please see my cursory comments below...

LH

At 07/09/2005 00:51, Jonathan E. D. Richmond wrote:

>We should all roundly condemn the so-called "paper" on "Terrorism,
>Transit and Public Safety" from self-appointed expert Todd Litman. I
have
>long known that Litman's work must generally be discounted because of
its
>bias and lack of analytical quality. However, it is one thing to be an
>advocate of something you believe in, but it is quite another to
cheapen
>the value of life in the wake of a terrible tragedy.

Jonathan Richmond is hardly on solid ground to attack another
researcher's 
professional integrity and to accuse anyone's work of "bias and lack of 
analytical quality". His own work is replete with contradictions, misuse
of 
data, sophistry, and other devices deployed to advance his own obsessive

infatuation with and promotion of highway-based transport modes and 
corresponding hostility to non-highway public transport modes.  For 
example, responding to one of Richmond's attacks on Portland's light
rail 
transit (LRT) system in 1998 (I believe in Richmond's report, "New Rail 
Transit Investments - A Review "), TriMet's very reasoned, fact-packed 
rejoinder included the following characterizations of Richmond's work:

* His estimate of new ridership "is questionable and seems odd..."
* Richmond used data from two entirely different sources (using
different 
data-collection methods) interchangeably
* Thus, "it is inappropriate to use two conflicting sets of numbers and 
then draw the conclusions one wants from each set as Mr. Richmond has
done...."
* Richmond's attack is "not comparing apples to apples" in its
comparison 
of rail vs. bus operating and maintenance costs - particularly with
respect 
to the cost of way maintenance.
* Richmond's claim of that the "arrival of light rail" produced a 
"deterioration" in Portland's bus system performance and "dramatic 
reductions in financial viability" is characterized as blatantly
untrue".

Coming from a transit agency, these condemnations of Richmond's
methodology 
and assertions, I believe, are unusually vigorous.

>"Terrorism, Transit and Public Safety" is an example of "bait and
switch."
>If Litman was selling used cars, he would be in trouble with Canada's
>consumer regulations for such a practice. Of course, many people will
have
>been drawn to this paper expecting some insight into the problems of
>terrorism and steps that might be taken to make public transport more
>secure. Instead, the "paper" is a hastily dashed-out piece of advocacy
for
>transit.
>More than 50 people have been killed and 700 injured in the bombings
which
>took place in London. It is unacceptable for even one person to be to
be
>killed or injured for reasons of hatred. We have a Jewish saying that
"to
>save one person is to save the world," and we all have a shared duty to
>stop terrorism from hurting anyone. There is not a point at which we
have
>done "enough" to make the world safe: We must continue our efforts
until
>we are sure of success.
>And yet, what does Litman do? In his paper (www.vtpi.org/terror.pdf),
he
>gives us a brief paragraph to state that acts of terror have occurred
on
>public transport, and then goes straight away to declare that "Yes,
>despite such events, public transit is still an extremely safe form of
>trvel." A chart is shown to demonstrate that public transport fatality
>rates are lower than for car travel. This is doubtless true, yet it is
not
>only irrelevant to the particular situation of terorrism, but it
cheapens
>life itself when advocacy of this type takes precedence over an
analysis
>of how to combat terrorist activity.

On the contrary, Todd Litman's well-documented study is a timely and
highly 
relevant contribution to public discourse which positions the entire
issue 
of transport safety in perspective at a time when public transport is
being 
portrayed, explicitly and implicitly, as inherently dangerous.

This aspect has been well captured in the remarks of Dick Faulks:

 >>This is an excellent response to the huge media response
to the case in London. This is especially so in view of the
suggestion that commuters stay home if feeling that
too much danger is present.
The Bottom Line of such a suggestion might be that one
should get to work by taking one's own car or by carpooling!
"Terrorism, Transit and Public Safety" allows one to see that
such an alternative is far more dangerous to one's life!<<


>The graphs which are used as a tool to indicate cause and effect -- if
you
>have more transit you have less fatalities -- are likely misleading. Do
>the cities with more transit use have less fatalities *because* people
use
>more transit or for other reasons? We simply do not know. It is
possible,
>for example, that because the cities with the most public transport use
>are also the most congested, that they have lower traffic speeds than
the
>average, and therefore less opportunities for dangerous driving or
>accidents. I don't know whether that is the case, but I do know that
the
>simplistic presentation of facts Litman has assembled is designed to
>persuade readers of his cause, not to provide a scientific analysis.
Yet,
>is any of this discussion relevant to the issue at immediate hand,
>and which Litman disarmingly uses to bring people to his article, which
is
>that terrorism is increasingly putting us all at greater risk, and must
>be stopped?

There is nothing "misleading" or unscientific in presenting secular data

for comparative purposes - Richmond's own work is filled with such 
methodology (a major problem is that his comparative data are often 
incompatible or are derived from wildly divergent sources).  The
relevance 
of the data comparison has already been established, above.

>Next, and most offensively, Litman states that "Transit risks tend to
>receive more attention than risks associated with automobile travel...
>Incidents that kill or injure a few transit passengers often receive
>national or international attention, while automobile crashes that kill
a
>few people are so common they are considered local news, and injury
>accidents often receive no media coverage at all.
>Overall, transit passengers are much safer than motorists, and
residents
>of transit-oriented communities are safer than residents of
>automobile-oriented communities, even taking into account risks from
>murder and terrorism (Lucy, 2002). Terrorists would need to kill 30
>transit passengers every month in the U.S. before transit riders would
>face a similar risk as automobile occupants."
>In other words, even if terorism gets worse, Litman argues that until
we
>have at least 30 killings a month, people should carry on using
transit.
>This is not only deeply insulting and hurtful to those who have just
lost
>colleagues, family, and friends, but this cheap sales pitch distracts
us
>from our real duty, which is to ensure that everything is done to
promote
>safety for both car and public transport users. We should not wait for
30
>people a month to be killed, but we must take instead action to provide
>the security against terrorism necessary to stop killing. In London,
this
>requires a complex response, which involves not only improved
>intelligence, security procedures, and policing, but also public
>investment in the underground system because the dilapidated nature of
the
>infrastructure and the severe crowding that takes place on trains
during
>many hours of the day is itself a contributor to security breaches and
an
>increased probability of deaths and injuries in the event of an attack.
>And the appropriate response to traffic fatalities is not to simply
tell
>people to get on transit, even if terrorism escalates, but to devote
the
>needed public resources to provide education to stop such tragedies
>occurring. Since human error is responsible for the vast majority of
>traffic accidents, this implies a need for vastly improved
>driver education that should in fact start with values that children
learn
>in school and be continued in a new and reflective form of practical
>instruction that focuses on the responsibility of each and every
motorist
>on the road rather than with the teaching of mechanical skills.

Richmond is just throwing out red herrings here to justify his effort to

concoct a tempest in a teapot. The main intent of Todd's analysis
clearly 
is to underscore the inherent safety of public transport within the
context 
of urban mobility systems.  The issues Richmond raises are certainly
worth 
analysis, but in a different study.


>So, Todd Litman, shame on you for your cheap advocate statement in the
>aftermath of tragedy. Let us all turn instead to the real problems of
>combatting terrorism and improving safety, with the assumption that
each
>and every human life has infinite value and that not even one death is
>acceptable.


On the contrary, hearty congratulations are in order for Todd's timely
and 
apropos analytical perspective on this issue and especially at this 
critical time.  Clearly, Richmond is irritated by anything incorporating

sound professional analysis and data foundations to bolster the case for

investment in public transport, thus challenging the underlying premises
of 
Richmond's relentless crusade against it.

LH