Jonathan Golob — the most consistently intelligent writer on the Slog — has an exceptional post about why the oil supply will rise to meet demand. Uniquely for the Slog, the comment thread (including our very own Daimajin) is also well-informed and constructive. Daimajin had a similar post here last year.
As transit advocates, we sometimes get into the “peak oil” argument to attack car use — “gas is going to cost $10 a gallon!” For all the reasons Golob states, this is a bad way to go.
There are multiple strong arguments for transit: an environmental one, a national security one, and the simple fact that to add capacity to corridors, a light rail line is massively more cost-effective than triple-decking I-5. Scare stories about expensive gas is the wrong way to go; the only way gas is getting that expensive is if we regulate and tax the stuffing out of it.
And that’s something we want to do. The two ways to discourage car use are to make it less convenient and make it more expensive. Since closing roads isn’t going to happen for the most part, we need to prepare the ground for legislative action to increase the costs of driving. In this context, using expensive gas as some kind of boogeyman sets up exactly the wrong kind of reaction.
This post makes no sense to me. A powerful argument for transit is that it is more cost-effective, and yet we should tax drivers into unconsciousness to create the reality that it is more cost-effective? What?
I own no car and ride the bus everywhere. I save $400-600 a month because of that decision. I came to this conclusion without being forced by People Who Know Better Than Me. The reality is that the majority of people will continue to value the flexibility and comfort of personal transit over the cost and other compromises (e.g. unpleasant odors) of public mass transit. Don’t punish people for thinking differently, just don’t reward them.
Chris,
It’s abundantly clear from the post that I’m talking about the cost-effectiveness of constructing a rail line vs. more highway lanes, not the cost-effectiveness of commuting with one mode or the other.
I suppose you’re probably not familiar with the economic concept of negative externalities, which is complicated to explain at the moment. So how about this simpler argument:
If the objective is to get people to reduce their consumption of oil for climate and/or security-related reasons, then the current price differential you cite clearly isn’t enough for many of them. So, the logical course of action is to increase that price differential, so that more people feel the pain and switch to transit.
We are, of course, rewarding them for making the personal choice to use a car by subsidizing their roads, protecting their oil supplies, and promising to deal with the consequences of the environmental damage they cause.
In my lifetime every disaster I’ve had a gut feeling about has come to pass- including the fact that, due to wishful thinking, Americans can just shrug off outcomes that would be regarded with horror by any civilized person.
So, it may well be that America will continue to act like a nation of mini-Bushes until the world can force us to grow up.
But that’s not the same as thinking that gas won’t go to $10 a gallon. Wishful thinking is not a plan.
I’m big on transit, but I wouldn’t want to be part of any plan to artificially raise the price of driving as a way of boosting transit ridership or awareness. I think that’s cutting off your nose to spite your face, and would seriously backfire. It’s a strategy that seems tailor-made for creating more opposition to transit.
When it comes to softer propositions like adding (small to moderate) taxes or tolls for drivers which in some way subsidize transit (at least its initial capital expenses), I think this can be honestly sold to the public. Smart, properly educated drivers can see the tradeoffs in paying to get some cars off the road by creating attractive transit options.
Oil shoots up and the dollar plunges
as we go into a financial crisis and
oil exporting nations stop exporting to satisfy internal demand of depleted oil fields (Mex, Ven, Rooskies). Yes,
I am comforted by your fable that oil
will drop in price.
Filling up your moped will be the equivalent US dollar cost as filling an SUV today, Even more cost with strip mined, water polluting, air polluting tar sand the externalized costs will be staggering. Tell me again how we are
just going to zoom around at 12 miles
per gallon on gas to cheap to meter at
the pump.