Groveton:
Thank you for the data on school performance on the DISSAPOINTMENT CUBED string.
I wonder what the scores are for Dale City and Bristow profiled in ANATOMY OF A BAD COMMUTE where citizens have the highest average commutes so their children have the benefit of “good” schools?
Think how much better South Lakes SATs would be if it were one of two high schools managed by a Reston Community Board of Education instead of the educational administrator dominated “consolidated” Fairfax County Board serving over 1,000,000 citizens. (EMR’s father was an elected school board member of a small pyramid in the 40s and fought consolidation...)
Think how great it would be if all highschool pyramids were coterminous with a Beta Village and every Neighborhood had its own school and every Cluster had a preschool program to match its needs. That was advocated by many in the 60s and quashed by the educational “professionals” in the name of “efficiency” and big travel budgets – See today’s WaPo.
Think how great it would be if every Zip Code was coterminous with a Beta Neighborhood so that there was data to guide citizens in their decisions concerning Balance and moving components from Beta to Alpha status.
Think how great it would be if every Cluster was a Census Block (and every Neighborhood as Block Group) so there would be data to guide citizens in their decisions....
Small is Beautiful and in the long term sustainable.
EMR wonders if Adolfo Carrion Jr.(new director of White House Office of Urban Affairs), or Derek Douglas or anyone else Carrion hires to help him or to whom he listens would understand how great it would be...
EMR is also concerned that there will ever again be the resources to implement this evolution — Yes, the Resources that have been burned up to create the Wealth Gap.
EMR
Friday, February 20, 2009
PEC Still Pursues Fight against Big Grid
The Piedmont Environmental Council case against the high-voltage transmission line across the Northern Virginia piedmont is still alive and kicking.
First, the PEC scored a victory in the Fourth Circuit Appeals. This comes straight from a PEC email update:
Second, the latest numbers for electricity demand fall short of the projections that Dominion used to justify construction of the power line, the PEC contends. Reports the Fauquier Times-Democrat:
The online version of the Times-Democrat story does not say what that data is, nor does it include a response from Dominion.
Miller said the SCC should reconsider its October 2008 approval of the transmission line, based as it was on now-outdated data.
A host of new technologies are in the development pipeline that could transform the electric power industry, moving it decisively away from the Big Grid model of remote power plants connected to population centers by huge transmission lines to a Distributed Grid model based upon a "smart" grid and smaller, more numerous power sources in and near the population centers. The current recession, which is more severe than anyone predicted a year ago, undoubtedly will crimp NoVa electricity demand. That could buy time to put into place new energy conservation programs, renewable energy resources and the regulatory structure to tie it all together without the need to build the expensive and intrusive power line.
First, the PEC scored a victory in the Fourth Circuit Appeals. This comes straight from a PEC email update:
"The US Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond yesterday released its decision in a case brought by the Piedmont Environmental Council, multiple States and parties, regarding rules set by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission in implementing the Energy Policy Act of 2005. "The decision directly upholds a State's right to reject a transmission line project without fear of the federal government stepping in to overrule that State's determination. In plain language, the utilities do not get a second chance if the State rejects a line based upon the merits," said Christopher G. Miller, PEC President."
Second, the latest numbers for electricity demand fall short of the projections that Dominion used to justify construction of the power line, the PEC contends. Reports the Fauquier Times-Democrat:
"Economic data from the Federal Reserve of Richmond to PJM's own data and forecasts highlight that the evidence and rationale for" the line "no longer exists" ... Miller said in a statement. "Why should Virginia taxpayers be forced to pay for something that is not needed?"
The online version of the Times-Democrat story does not say what that data is, nor does it include a response from Dominion.
Miller said the SCC should reconsider its October 2008 approval of the transmission line, based as it was on now-outdated data.
A host of new technologies are in the development pipeline that could transform the electric power industry, moving it decisively away from the Big Grid model of remote power plants connected to population centers by huge transmission lines to a Distributed Grid model based upon a "smart" grid and smaller, more numerous power sources in and near the population centers. The current recession, which is more severe than anyone predicted a year ago, undoubtedly will crimp NoVa electricity demand. That could buy time to put into place new energy conservation programs, renewable energy resources and the regulatory structure to tie it all together without the need to build the expensive and intrusive power line.
Wednesday, February 18, 2009
DISAPPOINTMENT CUBED
On 29 January 2009 PewResearchCenter (sic) published a social and demographic trends report “Denver Tops List of Favorite Cities (sic): For Nearly Half of America, Grass Is Greener Somewhere Else.”
The report was picked up by CNN and other media outlets. EMR downloaded it and read it with interest and disbelief.
In Chapter 32 – The Land Resource concerning the problems with “best places” listings EMR said:
“A recent survey by the Pew Research Center finds that nearly half of the citizens of the US of A believe that the grass is greener somewhere else and would like to move there if they could. See End Note Six
6. The January 2009 report by the Pew Research Center titled “For nearly half of America, Grass Is Greener Somewhere Else” is at once an important land mark and an encyclopedia of bad Vocabulary with extensive use of Core Confusing Words and aggregation of data that obscures the importance of the work.”
THE FIRST DISAPPOINTMENT is that a lot of money was wasted asking important questions using a Vocabulary that was not defined. This Vocabulary was guaranteed to generate a wide array of conflicting Neural Linguistic Frameworks – a topic discussed in Columns #s 71, 72, 73 and 75 and in TRILO-G Chapter 26. – Gibberish: The Vocabulary of Babel.
For starters, the title is deceptive. The study focused on the 30 largest MSA’s, not “cities.” Boston (pop 590,000) is included by Charlotte (pop 611,000) is not. That makes a huge difference when one gets to DISAPPOINTMENT SQUARED. David Brooks, demonstrating typical journalistic Geographic Illiteracy, missed this point completely.
Beyond the fact that nearly half of the citizens polled see the grass greener where they are not now living (See TRILO-G Chapter 1. – Wild Abandonment) most of the data is corrupted by poor Vocabulary and superficial analysis. One has to read the questions and the data aggregated to plumb the depth of the silliness but here is a peek:
What do “city,” “suburb,” “small town” and “rural” mean to each of the participants?
Lets take some examples from the northern part of Virginia:
Is Clifton, VA (a Town under Virginia law) that exists in the middle of Fairfax County one of the largest municipalities in the US of A (Fairfax County CONTROLS most of the municipal level services and governance provided to citizens of the Town of Clifton and each of the “local” County Supervisors represents over 100,000 citizens) a “small town”?
How about the Town of Vienna that is one of the Village-scale components of Greater Tysons Corner, the 8th largest commercial center in the US of A?
Is the City of Fairfax City a “city” a “suburb” or a “small town?”
Some who live in each of these three locations would give all four answers as to where they are and what they prefer, given their personal experience.
Similar examples are endless, especially in the R=20 Miles to R=70 Miles Radius band from the Centroid of the National Capital Subregion.
The study reinforced what has been said about Creative Class preferences and provided work for former WaPo staff (some of whom did similarly flawed work when working for the paper) but other than that, the study is largely a waste of time and a waste of a wonderful opportunity.
DISAPPOINTMENT SQUARED
On 16 February, David Brooks wrote an Op Ed for the NY Times. (Posted as a comment by an “Anon 8:15 AM” in BACK TO “BELTWAY BURDEN.”
David Brooks, like many “journalists” likes to think of himself as a free thinker and is sometime viewed as an iconoclast. He is a “story teller” as defined in The Shape of The Future. Brooks gets paid because he is an entertaining writer. Most important to The New York Times, they can sell Autonomobile advertisements because Brooks along with John Tierney, Joel Kotkin and others appear in the paper. See THE ESTATES MATRIX.
There is not much in the Brooks Op Ed that is “wrong” but it leaves a profoundly distorted impression with anyone who does not understand more that Brooks about Amsterdam and Denver and far more about human settlement patterns than Brooks.
Is Brooks talking about the Zentrum of Amsterdam or the Amsterdam New Urban Region? They are different places and in fact some settlement patterns in the later would appeal to a wide spectrum of those seeking greener pastures.
The places Brooks says people are attracted to are places where “the boundary between “suburb” and “city” is hard to detect.” Like that is not the case elsewhere? The BIG difference is most of the places Brooks lists – and not just Portland – have a Clear Edge around the Core of the New Urban Region unlike the Washington-Baltimore and Houston New Urban Regions.
Brooks does not mention that ALL the places he lists as being attractive have had a explosion of share-vehicle system construction over the last two decades. And an explosion of transit related development. They are LESS auto dependent than many places in the National Capital Subregion – for example Dale City and Bristow.
Denver is known for its Light Rail system and station area development and the BRT system in the Zentrum. There is the Lower Downtown / Coors Field, Invesco at Mile High, redevelopment of Stapleton and other urbane living and working environments. Some are approaching Balance.
Sure there are critics of non-autocentric settlement patterns. Many paid directly or indirectly by Autonomobile Enterprises. The market makes clear that those who believe what the pro-Autonomobile shills spout make up about 20 percent of the population. Those who actually put their money where their mouth is and buy urban dwellings is the pattern and density that Wendell Cox, Joel Kotkin, John Tierney, the American Dream Foundation, Reason et. al. – and relish the David Brooks snarkyness – make up about 12.5 percent of the population.
You would think from their writing that they are standing up for the oppressed masses who are being deprived of the American Dream by demon socialist forces.
But go ahead and write this fun stuff. It sells papers and makes for “balanced journalism” just like Peanut Corp of America represents good old American competition.
DISAPPOINTMENT CUBED
Rather than try to use the Brooks Op Ed to understand how to change the unsustainable trajectory of civilization, the Brooks item is used by Bloggers to club EMR. They have not bothered to read the Pew report or consider what Brooks is really saying.
NMM why are you so ready to abandon the market? Why are you so delighted to hop on yet another ideological hobby horse?
The responses to ANATOMY OF A BAD COMMUTE and to BACK TO “BELTWAY BURDEN” show again how ineffective the Blog format is to help citizens understand how to evolve away from dysfunctional human settlement patterns.
If citizens want challenging work, the most interesting companions and access to a sustainable Countryside they need to figure out how to evolve functional Urban settlement patterns. The alternative is places like Dale City and Bristow and in the end, Collapse.
Ok, there are will be places where one can make a living by “taking in one another’s laundry,” over winter by eating root vegetables and driving to 20 year old cars – Cuba in the Heartland.
A sustainable trajectory for civilization that is anything like the current level of amenity depends on real research and real journalism, not story telling.
EMR
The report was picked up by CNN and other media outlets. EMR downloaded it and read it with interest and disbelief.
In Chapter 32 – The Land Resource concerning the problems with “best places” listings EMR said:
“A recent survey by the Pew Research Center finds that nearly half of the citizens of the US of A believe that the grass is greener somewhere else and would like to move there if they could. See End Note Six
6. The January 2009 report by the Pew Research Center titled “For nearly half of America, Grass Is Greener Somewhere Else” is at once an important land mark and an encyclopedia of bad Vocabulary with extensive use of Core Confusing Words and aggregation of data that obscures the importance of the work.”
THE FIRST DISAPPOINTMENT is that a lot of money was wasted asking important questions using a Vocabulary that was not defined. This Vocabulary was guaranteed to generate a wide array of conflicting Neural Linguistic Frameworks – a topic discussed in Columns #s 71, 72, 73 and 75 and in TRILO-G Chapter 26. – Gibberish: The Vocabulary of Babel.
For starters, the title is deceptive. The study focused on the 30 largest MSA’s, not “cities.” Boston (pop 590,000) is included by Charlotte (pop 611,000) is not. That makes a huge difference when one gets to DISAPPOINTMENT SQUARED. David Brooks, demonstrating typical journalistic Geographic Illiteracy, missed this point completely.
Beyond the fact that nearly half of the citizens polled see the grass greener where they are not now living (See TRILO-G Chapter 1. – Wild Abandonment) most of the data is corrupted by poor Vocabulary and superficial analysis. One has to read the questions and the data aggregated to plumb the depth of the silliness but here is a peek:
What do “city,” “suburb,” “small town” and “rural” mean to each of the participants?
Lets take some examples from the northern part of Virginia:
Is Clifton, VA (a Town under Virginia law) that exists in the middle of Fairfax County one of the largest municipalities in the US of A (Fairfax County CONTROLS most of the municipal level services and governance provided to citizens of the Town of Clifton and each of the “local” County Supervisors represents over 100,000 citizens) a “small town”?
How about the Town of Vienna that is one of the Village-scale components of Greater Tysons Corner, the 8th largest commercial center in the US of A?
Is the City of Fairfax City a “city” a “suburb” or a “small town?”
Some who live in each of these three locations would give all four answers as to where they are and what they prefer, given their personal experience.
Similar examples are endless, especially in the R=20 Miles to R=70 Miles Radius band from the Centroid of the National Capital Subregion.
The study reinforced what has been said about Creative Class preferences and provided work for former WaPo staff (some of whom did similarly flawed work when working for the paper) but other than that, the study is largely a waste of time and a waste of a wonderful opportunity.
DISAPPOINTMENT SQUARED
On 16 February, David Brooks wrote an Op Ed for the NY Times. (Posted as a comment by an “Anon 8:15 AM” in BACK TO “BELTWAY BURDEN.”
David Brooks, like many “journalists” likes to think of himself as a free thinker and is sometime viewed as an iconoclast. He is a “story teller” as defined in The Shape of The Future. Brooks gets paid because he is an entertaining writer. Most important to The New York Times, they can sell Autonomobile advertisements because Brooks along with John Tierney, Joel Kotkin and others appear in the paper. See THE ESTATES MATRIX.
There is not much in the Brooks Op Ed that is “wrong” but it leaves a profoundly distorted impression with anyone who does not understand more that Brooks about Amsterdam and Denver and far more about human settlement patterns than Brooks.
Is Brooks talking about the Zentrum of Amsterdam or the Amsterdam New Urban Region? They are different places and in fact some settlement patterns in the later would appeal to a wide spectrum of those seeking greener pastures.
The places Brooks says people are attracted to are places where “the boundary between “suburb” and “city” is hard to detect.” Like that is not the case elsewhere? The BIG difference is most of the places Brooks lists – and not just Portland – have a Clear Edge around the Core of the New Urban Region unlike the Washington-Baltimore and Houston New Urban Regions.
Brooks does not mention that ALL the places he lists as being attractive have had a explosion of share-vehicle system construction over the last two decades. And an explosion of transit related development. They are LESS auto dependent than many places in the National Capital Subregion – for example Dale City and Bristow.
Denver is known for its Light Rail system and station area development and the BRT system in the Zentrum. There is the Lower Downtown / Coors Field, Invesco at Mile High, redevelopment of Stapleton and other urbane living and working environments. Some are approaching Balance.
Sure there are critics of non-autocentric settlement patterns. Many paid directly or indirectly by Autonomobile Enterprises. The market makes clear that those who believe what the pro-Autonomobile shills spout make up about 20 percent of the population. Those who actually put their money where their mouth is and buy urban dwellings is the pattern and density that Wendell Cox, Joel Kotkin, John Tierney, the American Dream Foundation, Reason et. al. – and relish the David Brooks snarkyness – make up about 12.5 percent of the population.
You would think from their writing that they are standing up for the oppressed masses who are being deprived of the American Dream by demon socialist forces.
But go ahead and write this fun stuff. It sells papers and makes for “balanced journalism” just like Peanut Corp of America represents good old American competition.
DISAPPOINTMENT CUBED
Rather than try to use the Brooks Op Ed to understand how to change the unsustainable trajectory of civilization, the Brooks item is used by Bloggers to club EMR. They have not bothered to read the Pew report or consider what Brooks is really saying.
NMM why are you so ready to abandon the market? Why are you so delighted to hop on yet another ideological hobby horse?
The responses to ANATOMY OF A BAD COMMUTE and to BACK TO “BELTWAY BURDEN” show again how ineffective the Blog format is to help citizens understand how to evolve away from dysfunctional human settlement patterns.
If citizens want challenging work, the most interesting companions and access to a sustainable Countryside they need to figure out how to evolve functional Urban settlement patterns. The alternative is places like Dale City and Bristow and in the end, Collapse.
Ok, there are will be places where one can make a living by “taking in one another’s laundry,” over winter by eating root vegetables and driving to 20 year old cars – Cuba in the Heartland.
A sustainable trajectory for civilization that is anything like the current level of amenity depends on real research and real journalism, not story telling.
EMR
Understand Economics By Reading History
BR readers must read Niall Ferguson’s “The Ascent of Money: A Financial History” (2008).
This historian, I say again – historian, nails the current economic crisis when he is writing back in 2007. Calling it blow by blow and laying out the options so accurately validates his credentials.
Ferguson’s book is a tour de force on the modern history of economics.
He describes how the financial revolution preceded the Industrial Revolution. He makes the case for money as the root of most progress. (I try to project that in the future in my writing about a Munificent Destiny based, in part, on growing capital).
He shows the influence of culture. And individuals innovate. New ideas make a difference. Economics evolve.
Yet, it always comes back to capital and the essentially human influences – fear and greed rage – that shape the economy.
Socialism and special interest statism transform personal theft into public theft.
Ferguson shows how China and the U.S. are like England and the U.K. in the 19th Century.
Likewise, he shows how catastrophes are overcome.
And, that this current crisis isn’t unique as the politicians are bleating. It’s a bubble. The U.S. – and other countries – have gone through other bubbles.
This bubble doesn’t compare to a real catastrophe. Like what happened in the South when the capital value of the money went to zero in 1865. It took 90 years and 3 generations to come back.
Great book. Easy reading. No math skills needed other than recognizing which numbers are bigger than others – when the author lays out what happens and why.
Super perspective on the current crisis. How President Bush screwed things up with his bailout actions. And how President Obama’s actions so far are precisely the wrong things to do. Likely, soon to be followed by more wrong – and detrimental – actions.
This historian, I say again – historian, nails the current economic crisis when he is writing back in 2007. Calling it blow by blow and laying out the options so accurately validates his credentials.
Ferguson’s book is a tour de force on the modern history of economics.
He describes how the financial revolution preceded the Industrial Revolution. He makes the case for money as the root of most progress. (I try to project that in the future in my writing about a Munificent Destiny based, in part, on growing capital).
He shows the influence of culture. And individuals innovate. New ideas make a difference. Economics evolve.
Yet, it always comes back to capital and the essentially human influences – fear and greed rage – that shape the economy.
Socialism and special interest statism transform personal theft into public theft.
Ferguson shows how China and the U.S. are like England and the U.K. in the 19th Century.
Likewise, he shows how catastrophes are overcome.
And, that this current crisis isn’t unique as the politicians are bleating. It’s a bubble. The U.S. – and other countries – have gone through other bubbles.
This bubble doesn’t compare to a real catastrophe. Like what happened in the South when the capital value of the money went to zero in 1865. It took 90 years and 3 generations to come back.
Great book. Easy reading. No math skills needed other than recognizing which numbers are bigger than others – when the author lays out what happens and why.
Super perspective on the current crisis. How President Bush screwed things up with his bailout actions. And how President Obama’s actions so far are precisely the wrong things to do. Likely, soon to be followed by more wrong – and detrimental – actions.
Sunday, February 15, 2009
BACK TO "BELTWAY BURDEN"
The ULI, et. al. report BELTWAY BURDEN that Larry Gross called to everyone’s attention at
http://commerce.uli.org/misc/BeltwayBurden.pdf
is a very good piece of work. The Real Estate Section of the 14 February WaPo has a brief summary under the title “Factoring In the Cost of Getting Home.” By the way the entire Real Estate section (usually printed in two parts) was six pages on the 14th.
The report is a very useful contribution to understanding EMR’s post ANATOMY OF A BAD COMMUTE.
Upon further review a few comments:
EMR wonders why it was call “BELTWAY BURDEN?” The burden is not the “Beltway,” it is dysfunctional location and the radial distance from the Core focused job locations.
The data is collected on a Census Block Group basis – which is very good – but it is aggregated by municipal jurisdiction. Think how much more clear the message would be if:
• It was noted that 85 percent (or more) of the jobs in the National Capital Subregion that are not jobs that directly support residential land uses at or below the Village scale (e.g. food and beverage, etc.) are located in the little red boxes on the maps, and
• The data was aggregated by Radius Band and by organic component of human settlement pattern. If it is too much to ask to be aggregated by organic component of human settlement pattern, how about Radius Band and Census Designated Place?
Equally important, it would have been much more effective it the report included all the territory that is in the National Capital Subregion. That would mean putting back in the MSA, the areas taken out for political reasons after the 2000 census such as Winchester and Frederick County VA., Culpeper and King George Counties, etc. While they were at it they should have included Rappahannock and Madison Counties in Virginia, the relevant counties in West Virginia and Maryland so that all the jurisdictions within a 70 mile radius from the Centroid of the Subregion are included. That is clearly what the 2000 Census indicated is in the commuting shed.
A complication that comes from multi-state Subregions is indicated by the listing of Fredericksburg, VA as the jurisdiction with the lowest cost. Also if Maryland treated “cities” as independent entities as Virginia does, Frederick, Md might well rank as well as Fredericksburg, VA. Lumping Frederick, Maryland with Frederick County Md. makes it look like the Maryland city is $10,500 higher in average total cost.
Another suggestion would be to not interchangeably use “community” and “neighborhood” and to clearly define what is meant by both terms.
Then there are two overarching issues:
No where is there a discussion of the need to evolve Balanced Communities in order to bring down the costs.
Second, and related, is implicit reinforcement of the Large, Private Vehicle Mobility Myth.
On the front page of the 14 February WaPo three is a story about the Regional impact of the latest federal stimulus package. “Regional Impact: Billions Slated For Area Schools, Transportation.” Buried six paragraphs down on the jump page is the following:
“The more than $1.6 billion for transportation represents a fraction of what officials (sic) said is needed to unclog roads in the region beset by some to the country’s worst commutes.”
NO, NO, NO
There is no amount of money will “unclog” roads if the money is spent just on transport facilities. There must be a redistribution of demand (aka, functional settlement patterns). This redistribution must match the capacity of the transport facilities with the demand. Building more facilities just induces more widely scattered urban land uses that generate more per capita demand and more congestion.
Belief that there is a way to build ones way out of congestion is the Large, Private Vehicle Mobility Myth as documented by Tony Downs cited in THE ANATOMY OF A BAD COMMUTE.
On a related note under the THANK YOU LARRY post, Larry asked:
“If the "right sized house in the right location" includes homes that are near "shared vehicle" facilities - would that include the use of "shared vehicles" 50 miles from work - as long as they still lived in a "right sized" home?
“In other words - is there also a requirement that the "right location" not use shared vehicle systems for home to work commutes?”
EMR believes Larry already knows the answer to this question but...
Functional and intelligent application of “commuter rail” and “inter-urban” service started as a way to get a few of the residents of what was already a relatively Balanced urban enclave to a job location. By definition most of the residents of the enclave – large or small – lived, worked and secured services IN the enclave. Later day illusions that most residents can hop on the train (or on a PRT or a heavy or light rail shared-vehicle system) is just the shared-vehicle version of the Large, Private Vehicle Mobility Myth.
That is why station-area Balance AND system wide Balance between system capacity and settlement pattern generated demand is so important. Today, most of the METRO system trains leave most of the METRO stations essentially empty most of the time due to a lack of Balance and thus the huge cost.
Now back to Larry’s question.
If the shared-vehicle system serves origins and destinations that are 50 miles apart and if most of the station-areas are Balanced then there is no reason A FEW of the station-area workers cannot travel 50 miles if that is what works best for their Household.
EMR
http://commerce.uli.org/misc/BeltwayBurden.pdf
is a very good piece of work. The Real Estate Section of the 14 February WaPo has a brief summary under the title “Factoring In the Cost of Getting Home.” By the way the entire Real Estate section (usually printed in two parts) was six pages on the 14th.
The report is a very useful contribution to understanding EMR’s post ANATOMY OF A BAD COMMUTE.
Upon further review a few comments:
EMR wonders why it was call “BELTWAY BURDEN?” The burden is not the “Beltway,” it is dysfunctional location and the radial distance from the Core focused job locations.
The data is collected on a Census Block Group basis – which is very good – but it is aggregated by municipal jurisdiction. Think how much more clear the message would be if:
• It was noted that 85 percent (or more) of the jobs in the National Capital Subregion that are not jobs that directly support residential land uses at or below the Village scale (e.g. food and beverage, etc.) are located in the little red boxes on the maps, and
• The data was aggregated by Radius Band and by organic component of human settlement pattern. If it is too much to ask to be aggregated by organic component of human settlement pattern, how about Radius Band and Census Designated Place?
Equally important, it would have been much more effective it the report included all the territory that is in the National Capital Subregion. That would mean putting back in the MSA, the areas taken out for political reasons after the 2000 census such as Winchester and Frederick County VA., Culpeper and King George Counties, etc. While they were at it they should have included Rappahannock and Madison Counties in Virginia, the relevant counties in West Virginia and Maryland so that all the jurisdictions within a 70 mile radius from the Centroid of the Subregion are included. That is clearly what the 2000 Census indicated is in the commuting shed.
A complication that comes from multi-state Subregions is indicated by the listing of Fredericksburg, VA as the jurisdiction with the lowest cost. Also if Maryland treated “cities” as independent entities as Virginia does, Frederick, Md might well rank as well as Fredericksburg, VA. Lumping Frederick, Maryland with Frederick County Md. makes it look like the Maryland city is $10,500 higher in average total cost.
Another suggestion would be to not interchangeably use “community” and “neighborhood” and to clearly define what is meant by both terms.
Then there are two overarching issues:
No where is there a discussion of the need to evolve Balanced Communities in order to bring down the costs.
Second, and related, is implicit reinforcement of the Large, Private Vehicle Mobility Myth.
On the front page of the 14 February WaPo three is a story about the Regional impact of the latest federal stimulus package. “Regional Impact: Billions Slated For Area Schools, Transportation.” Buried six paragraphs down on the jump page is the following:
“The more than $1.6 billion for transportation represents a fraction of what officials (sic) said is needed to unclog roads in the region beset by some to the country’s worst commutes.”
NO, NO, NO
There is no amount of money will “unclog” roads if the money is spent just on transport facilities. There must be a redistribution of demand (aka, functional settlement patterns). This redistribution must match the capacity of the transport facilities with the demand. Building more facilities just induces more widely scattered urban land uses that generate more per capita demand and more congestion.
Belief that there is a way to build ones way out of congestion is the Large, Private Vehicle Mobility Myth as documented by Tony Downs cited in THE ANATOMY OF A BAD COMMUTE.
On a related note under the THANK YOU LARRY post, Larry asked:
“If the "right sized house in the right location" includes homes that are near "shared vehicle" facilities - would that include the use of "shared vehicles" 50 miles from work - as long as they still lived in a "right sized" home?
“In other words - is there also a requirement that the "right location" not use shared vehicle systems for home to work commutes?”
EMR believes Larry already knows the answer to this question but...
Functional and intelligent application of “commuter rail” and “inter-urban” service started as a way to get a few of the residents of what was already a relatively Balanced urban enclave to a job location. By definition most of the residents of the enclave – large or small – lived, worked and secured services IN the enclave. Later day illusions that most residents can hop on the train (or on a PRT or a heavy or light rail shared-vehicle system) is just the shared-vehicle version of the Large, Private Vehicle Mobility Myth.
That is why station-area Balance AND system wide Balance between system capacity and settlement pattern generated demand is so important. Today, most of the METRO system trains leave most of the METRO stations essentially empty most of the time due to a lack of Balance and thus the huge cost.
Now back to Larry’s question.
If the shared-vehicle system serves origins and destinations that are 50 miles apart and if most of the station-areas are Balanced then there is no reason A FEW of the station-area workers cannot travel 50 miles if that is what works best for their Household.
EMR
Southern-Fried Management
The horror story of Lynchburg's Peanut Corporation of America only gets more gruesome. This little company that operated out of a backyard garage is involved with the deaths of nine people and illness of 637 others in 44 states and Canada from Salmonella due to egregiously unsanitary working conditions at PCAs plants in Georgia, Texas and Virginia.
Stewart Parnell, the company chief who sold tainted peanut butter in food products used by school children, soldiers and the elderly, took the Fifth when interrogated by a Congressional committee this past week. His firm is now bankrupt, the plants are closed and Parnell faces possible criminal charges and a raft of civil suits.
Media accounts, especially by The Washington Post and Georgia newspapers, note that Parnell's factories operated under horrific conditions. Rat and other rodent feces were widespread, roofs leaked and allowed defecating birds to fly about inside, salmonella-tainted vats of peanut butter continued on in the production process although company officials knew it.
And workers who complained were fired or otherwise intimidated.
What is amazing is how such treatment of non-union labor, coupled with food processing conditions straight out of the 19th Century, are still tolerated while the Employee Free Choice Act, which would level an uneven playing field when it comes to union elections is the Big Bogeyman across boardrooms and among right wing pundits especially in the South.
This reactionary behavior just shows how things really don't change in the anti-union South and how workers are "simply luck to have a job, Boy," and should have no say in how they organize, how they work or what contributions they might make to their safety and that of the company they work for and the public. I know of what I speak. My first job 38 years ago was at a rabidly-anti-union small town newspaper in North Carolina. I was a labor organizer and negotiator at The Virginian-Pilot when it was trying to force the local bargaining unit the recertify in the 1970s (it failed) and later worked twice for anti-labor Media General as a reporter and a manager.
The free choice act would allow workers thinking about exercising their legal right to organize to do so more easily. They would merely have to sign a card. Right now, the local or bargaining unit must hold a formal secret ballot supervised by the government's NLRB. Problem is, the voting gives management a major and easy target to turn up the screws and intimidate workers into rejecting the union.
Right-wing editorial writers and pundits, putting on their funny glasses, naturally see it the other way. Here's a gem from a December editorial in the Richmond Times-Dispatch:
"The comically named Employee Free Choice Act, more popularly known as the card check bill, would essentially eliminate the secret ballot from union organizing elections and force companies to accept the unions' most outlandish demands when negotiating workplace contracts. It would open workers to blatant intimidation by union partisans -- forcing employees to declare publicly whether they support efforts to organize."
The big and secret joke here is that Media General, owner of the newspaper, forces new workers to sign a document saying they have read and condone a "corporate philosophy" that Media General wants to be union-free. This is what has been known as a "Yellow Dog" contract that tries to take away the legal rights of workers to organize. We're back to "You lucky to have a job, Boy!" Who is intimidating whom here?
Ditto, the pathetic Bacons Rebellion, the formerly erudite e-zine that has been taken over by a bunch of right wing public relations people, marketing salesmen, spin doctors and other hacks. Here's an excerpt:
" . . . a major U.S. labor leader has already boasted that the passage of the Act will enable unions to gain 15 to 20 million new members in the next 10 years, thus essentially doubling union membership in our country. Labor union dues and revenues would increase by five billion per year resulting in increased union economic and political clout. Instead of simply leveling the playing field, the Wall Street Journal has recently opined that the EFCA would result in “union supremacy.”
Lawdy!
What's needed in Virginia, especially in this downturn, is a major and sophisticated rethinking of labor relations. Unions should not be seen as a bunch of Hoffa thugs, workers can make important suggestions about safety and efficiency, and they can be partners with management.
For an example, consider a new book called "Why GM Matters," written by a close friend of mine, Bill Holstein, with whom I have worked on and off for 23 years. Bill is an expert, former foreign correspondent with long experience writing about business in China, Japan, and other places. He was with UPI in Kabul when the Soviets showed up and he knows a lot about American and Japanese car companies. In his timely book, he contrasts how Toyota treats its workers and how GM used to:
"Part of the profound knowledge was based on a deceptively simple axiom. Toyota managers relied on workers to make cars, so it built a manufacturing system around their needs. For Toyota, this had led to a completely different relationship between management and labor. In the bad old ways at GM, management dictated what would be built and with what equipment. It really didn't care how the workers made the vehicles, consequently, workers didn't really care how good the cars were."
I'd like to think that at some point, the Old South can get more sophisticated. But old ways, such as union-bashing by newspapers and "think tanks" along with corporate behavior like that of the Peanut Corporation of America, die hard.
Peter Galuszka
Stewart Parnell, the company chief who sold tainted peanut butter in food products used by school children, soldiers and the elderly, took the Fifth when interrogated by a Congressional committee this past week. His firm is now bankrupt, the plants are closed and Parnell faces possible criminal charges and a raft of civil suits.
Media accounts, especially by The Washington Post and Georgia newspapers, note that Parnell's factories operated under horrific conditions. Rat and other rodent feces were widespread, roofs leaked and allowed defecating birds to fly about inside, salmonella-tainted vats of peanut butter continued on in the production process although company officials knew it.
And workers who complained were fired or otherwise intimidated.
What is amazing is how such treatment of non-union labor, coupled with food processing conditions straight out of the 19th Century, are still tolerated while the Employee Free Choice Act, which would level an uneven playing field when it comes to union elections is the Big Bogeyman across boardrooms and among right wing pundits especially in the South.
This reactionary behavior just shows how things really don't change in the anti-union South and how workers are "simply luck to have a job, Boy," and should have no say in how they organize, how they work or what contributions they might make to their safety and that of the company they work for and the public. I know of what I speak. My first job 38 years ago was at a rabidly-anti-union small town newspaper in North Carolina. I was a labor organizer and negotiator at The Virginian-Pilot when it was trying to force the local bargaining unit the recertify in the 1970s (it failed) and later worked twice for anti-labor Media General as a reporter and a manager.
The free choice act would allow workers thinking about exercising their legal right to organize to do so more easily. They would merely have to sign a card. Right now, the local or bargaining unit must hold a formal secret ballot supervised by the government's NLRB. Problem is, the voting gives management a major and easy target to turn up the screws and intimidate workers into rejecting the union.
Right-wing editorial writers and pundits, putting on their funny glasses, naturally see it the other way. Here's a gem from a December editorial in the Richmond Times-Dispatch:
"The comically named Employee Free Choice Act, more popularly known as the card check bill, would essentially eliminate the secret ballot from union organizing elections and force companies to accept the unions' most outlandish demands when negotiating workplace contracts. It would open workers to blatant intimidation by union partisans -- forcing employees to declare publicly whether they support efforts to organize."
The big and secret joke here is that Media General, owner of the newspaper, forces new workers to sign a document saying they have read and condone a "corporate philosophy" that Media General wants to be union-free. This is what has been known as a "Yellow Dog" contract that tries to take away the legal rights of workers to organize. We're back to "You lucky to have a job, Boy!" Who is intimidating whom here?
Ditto, the pathetic Bacons Rebellion, the formerly erudite e-zine that has been taken over by a bunch of right wing public relations people, marketing salesmen, spin doctors and other hacks. Here's an excerpt:
" . . . a major U.S. labor leader has already boasted that the passage of the Act will enable unions to gain 15 to 20 million new members in the next 10 years, thus essentially doubling union membership in our country. Labor union dues and revenues would increase by five billion per year resulting in increased union economic and political clout. Instead of simply leveling the playing field, the Wall Street Journal has recently opined that the EFCA would result in “union supremacy.”
Lawdy!
What's needed in Virginia, especially in this downturn, is a major and sophisticated rethinking of labor relations. Unions should not be seen as a bunch of Hoffa thugs, workers can make important suggestions about safety and efficiency, and they can be partners with management.
For an example, consider a new book called "Why GM Matters," written by a close friend of mine, Bill Holstein, with whom I have worked on and off for 23 years. Bill is an expert, former foreign correspondent with long experience writing about business in China, Japan, and other places. He was with UPI in Kabul when the Soviets showed up and he knows a lot about American and Japanese car companies. In his timely book, he contrasts how Toyota treats its workers and how GM used to:
"Part of the profound knowledge was based on a deceptively simple axiom. Toyota managers relied on workers to make cars, so it built a manufacturing system around their needs. For Toyota, this had led to a completely different relationship between management and labor. In the bad old ways at GM, management dictated what would be built and with what equipment. It really didn't care how the workers made the vehicles, consequently, workers didn't really care how good the cars were."
I'd like to think that at some point, the Old South can get more sophisticated. But old ways, such as union-bashing by newspapers and "think tanks" along with corporate behavior like that of the Peanut Corporation of America, die hard.
Peter Galuszka
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