Blogs

There have been reports for some years about the Volkswagen 1-litre car, so called because it would travel 100 kilometers on one litre of fuel. That is the equivalent of 235 miles per gallon. Earlier reports were that the car would be marketed by now.  read more »

Vice President Joe Biden announced today a plan to spend $53 billion over the next six years on passenger high-speed rail projects that will help reach the goal of giving 80 percent of Americans access to high-speed rail within 25 years.  read more »

The head of the group pushing the Los Angeles plan for an NFL stadium, Anschutz Entertainment Group, doesn't understand why anyone would be suspicious of the finances behind his plans for a downtown football stadium. From the LAT:  read more »

The Houston Chronicle editorial board recently argued that light rail is key to combating Houston's traffic congestion problems. But if you look at the three cities with worse traffic congestion than Houston - DC, Chicago, and LA - they have much more transit, including tons of light rail in LA. Transit clearly hasn't solved the problem in these cities. These people aren't stuck in that traffic because they like it - it's because the transit doesn't go where they need to go or isn't timely.  read more »

Governor Chris Christie of New Jersey is looking like a prophet now. In late October, the Governor cancelled a new tunnel across the Hudson River between New Jersey and New York City, because of the potential for cost overruns, which would be the responsibility of New Jersey taxpayers. By that point, the cost of the tunnel had escalated at least $1 billion to $9.7 billion.  read more »

The highly respected Californians for Responsible Rail Design (CARRD) has released a new cost estimate for the phase 1 Los Angeles to San Francisco high-speed rail line. Based upon an analysis of California high-speed rail Authority documentation, including stimulus grant applications and other internal sources, CARRD estimates that the line will now cost $65 billion, rather than the current estimate of $43 billion.

The CARRD release indicated:  read more »

The California Air Resources Board had good intentions when it developed a cap-and-trade plan to meet greenhouse gas standards, but according to a San Francisco Superior Court Judge, the Board made a few mistakes that will delay their efforts. The Air Resources Board is acting in response to AB32, California’s Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006, which calls for the reduction of carbon emissions to 1990 levels by 2020.  read more »

In his new book, Last Exit: Privatization and Deregulation of the U.S. Transportation System, Brookings Institution economist Clifford Winston contends that transit subsidies are largely the result of labor productivity losses, inefficient operations and counterproductive federal regulations.  read more »

Even if Australia is a beautiful place to live, it is far from affordable. Results from the Demographia International Housing Affordability Survey show that some of the country’s major cities rank near the bottom of the list of areas with affordable housing. Out of the 325 cities analyzed, Perth ranks 291st, Melbourne ranks 321st, and Sydney ranks 324th.  read more »

"Within 25 years, our goal is to give 80 percent of Americans access to high-speed rail." With this ringing statement in his State of the Union address, President Obama injected new hope into the flagging spirits of high speed rail advocates. Predictably, spokesmen for industry associations, progressive advocacy groups and other stakeholder interests praised the President’s goal as a symbol of his renewed commitment to support investment in infrastructure. But hardly any one we spoke to at the TRB meeting took the President’s ambitious goal seriously.  read more »