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Originally Posted by adam-machiavelli
Mr Eade, you have just won the prize for most perverse use of the carbon footprint to argue in favour of more freeways. The difference in emissions between a private car traveling at 60 or 100 km/h is small in the greater scheme of things. GHG emissions would actually be reduced because more gridlock would lead more people to get in the habit of taking transit and travel shorter distances to meet their various needs. This would reduce the demand for big-box style retail and increase demand for many, smaller retail outlets with smaller distances between each. Also, I've seen the early work on Ottawa's 100 year plan and it calls for a gradual transition of the Queensway from auto-oriented expressway to multi-modal regional transport corridor. Just sayin'.
Everyone must be made aware of the following fact: To cap global warming at 2 degrees in 50 years, humanity must reduce its carbon emissions to 10% of today's levels by 2050. If we continue our current rate of consumption growth, global temperatures will rise more than 5 degrees in 50 years. Failure to meet severe emissions reductions will leave most of our planet uninhabitable for humans. Building another freeway will only accelerate this process.
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Well, I’m afraid I can’t agree with some of your statements, and I think you have changed your reference for some of the points. For example, your original statement was that you would be adding intersections to the 60 Km/h roadway that the Queensway was to become; however, in your rebuttal, you ignore the intersections and seem to be referring to free-flowing cars at 60 Km/h and at 100 Km/h. I will go back to my original assertion that I use less fuel traveling along a highway from point A to B than I do along a ‘City’ road – one with intersections – for the same distance.
Let’s say that I have a 2004 Chevrolet Impala. This vehicle was rated the most fuel efficient vehicle in its class in 2004, but it still uses 11.0 litres per 100 Km in the city; which is roughly what it would be using as it drove along your new 60 Km/h ‘City’ street. In contrast, it uses ‘only’ 6.7 litres per 100 Km on the highway. Now, just for fun, let’s ‘drive’ from Richmond Road to St. Laurent along the Queensway alignment; a distance of about 16.5 Km. At Highway speed I would use about 1.1 litres of fuel; if this were a ‘City’ road, I would burn 1.8 litres of fuel. Further, if I drove back and forth for the 250 work days in the year, I would burn approximately 350 more litres of fuel every year after you converted the highway to a city road. Sounds like a great way to NOT reduce GHGs.
If I drove a 2004 Cavalier, the fuel consumption would be 6.0 L/100Km on the highway and 9.4 L/100Km for the city road so I would be using 1.5 litres along your road, instead of 1.0 litres along the Queensway; so just burning an extra 250 litres every year. A great way to save the world.
I’ll take the prize you are offering, but I am not entirely arguing FOR more highways. I think there are some places where it makes sense to move people and their vehicles in the most efficient manner possible and places where there should be interference. I simply don’t make blanket judgments that all highways are bad and the cause of the ruination of the world.
Also, I think your time-frame is way out if you think that causing more gridlock is going to ‘chase’ people onto transit in the short term. You are talking about the need to reduce GHGs by 2050, but in order to do that there would need to be drastic changes to the public transit system in Ottawa before then. With the current plan in place, there will be a huge expenditure which will effectively rob us of any chance to really expand the transit network before well after 2031. Without expanding the network, there will not be much of a hope of providing service to those you are hoping will leave their cars in favour of public transit. Unless, of course, you have magic and can tap your cane on the floor three times and change the entire infrastructure and attitude of the city.
I am amused by your description for the gradual change of the Queensway. You say that this is Ottawa’s 100 year plan to change the provincially owned freeway. Well, the City can ask, but the Province can say “No.” The province has already made commitments to widen the 417 through much of Ottawa, providing more capacity for cars and trucks. The Province has recently been more open to adding HOV lanes and allowing Bus lanes along the sides, but this is probably about as much of a “multi-modal regional transport corridor” as you will get. It is VERY unlikely that there will be pedestrian and/or cycling facilities added along the 417. The idea of adding rail lines along the 417 has been thrashed out time and time again, and every time so far it has come out as a poor idea; there just isn’t the potential ridership along that corridor to make it worthwhile. That leaves more bus lanes along the 417, which can potentially happen, but probably on a more temporary basis and outside of the central part of the city; since the 417 does not go downtown.
An example of this would be adding extra lanes to the eastern 174/417 so that buses can still get downtown during the conversion of the Transitway to rail. Once the conversion was completed, the bus-lanes would be surrendered back to the Province to be used for general traffic. There would be no need to have bus lanes along the 174/417 corridor if the train ran along beside it. In the west end, the situation would be similar since there are already plans for a (rail-convertible) Transitway to parallel the 417 out through Kanata.
Perhaps the plan is to add buses onto the 417, mixed in with the general traffic. That would make it a bit more multi-modal, but would result in unreliable bus service during the peak periods.
Where can we see this early work on Ottawa's 100 year plan?
I was going to let it go, but it is so blatant that it irks me:
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Failure to meet severe emissions reductions will leave most of our planet uninhabitable for humans.
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Do you honestly believe this or is it just something you are transcribing from the back of a pamphlet some-one handed you on the street?
Think for a minute about all of the places on the planet that man currently inhabits, everywhere from the high north to the deep south; and then think of the temperature ranges that exist in the world. Do you really think that even a 5 degree difference is going to make “most of our planet uninhabitable for humans”? In the years when the Thames River froze, did all the Brits leave? Did the ancients who used to pick grapes on Greenland all die of heat-stroke? Humans are remarkably adaptable animals and have been able to make their homes in some of the least hospitable areas on the planet’s surface, and, for short periods, even in space. To make such a rash statement as the above is just plain thought-less. Should humans do more to help keep the environment clean – absolutely! – but making claims like the above doesn’t help.
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