General Motors had it coming

Tomorrow morning, General Motors, the former automotive powerhouse, will finally be humbled. Most of the articles I've read about the "tragic turn" discuss the cost to the nation (est. $50B as our government holds their hand) and the lost jobs (about 20,000 maybe lost in U.S. and 1,000s more in Europe), but I have not read one article about the biggest lost opportunity in the history of the truly American corporation: the street car.

In The Geography of Nowhere, Kunstler writes that GM didn't have to limit itself to the auto industry and he notes that cars, for the most part, were not always the most favored form of transportation as they are now. Richmonder Frank Julian Sprague actually installed the first practical streetcar system in Downtown Richmond and by 1900, 90 percent of all streetcar systems used his patents. Unfortunately, the streetcar companies usually operated separate of the city governments and were not nearly as subsidized as the auto industry. As early as 1916, the Federal government began spending money ($75M) for roads. Then, during the roaring twenties, the automobile lobby gained significant influence after Ford's model T made driving cars a much more attainable dream for the less affluent. There was an evil plan hatched during this time and it's object was the the American streetcar system.

In 1925, General Motors purchased the Yellow Coach company and thus began the demise of streetcars. In the following decades, GM (or a close partner) would systematically purchase financially unstable electric streetcar companies and replace them with bus systems. In 1935 GM partnered with Omnibus Corp. (whose Chairman was also head of Yellow Coach), purchased and replaced New York's streetcar system in what Kunstler writes was "an eighteen-month period despite a hue and cry among its riders" (Geography 91). The next year GM parts suppliers joined Standard Oil of California and Firestone Tires and Rubber to form a new company that proceeded to purchase and ruin streetcar systems in San Jose, Stocton and Fresno, Ca. Besides a $5,000 speed bump of a fine in LA for criminal conspiracy, the company was relatively unimpeded as it replaced an additional 100 electric streetcar lines with gas powered buses. Wikipedia tells us that the year 1949 was the year the streetcar service (pictured above) ended in Richmond. It is even more sobering to know that during the same year the local leadership decided to build what is now I-64, I-95 and the Downtown expressway (demolition pictured below) through the most prominent Black neighborhoods (keeping in mind segregation was still stiffly enforced) and the working poor White (Twentieth Century Richmond). While one generation of public transportation was ushered out, another was paraded in as the savior of "urban blight," White commute and eventually the solution to racist segregation post-civil rights.

The story of the streetcar in America is a story of corporate greed and nearsighted city planning. By the time the US Senate's subcommittee on Antitrust and Monopoly began a full investigation (1974) of the business practices of GM in the first half of the century it was far too late to rectify the wrongs. In the way of transportation, what was once dependable, public and cheap became isolationist, expensive and exploitative. Our oil consumption increased, our sprawl increased unhindered by transportation limitations and our nation became the monster we see today. I have no remorse for the current demise of General Motors because this corporation lost its best opportunity for diversification. Rather than become a successful streetcar and auto company, GM, GM parts suppliers and Firestone shrewdly decided that there was one way to fast money: Privately owned and managed automobiles.

Today in Richmond, there are leaders like Bill Pantele that desperately want to return to the streetcar system. I applaud the way Pantele brings streetcars back to the forefront of public discourse, but without the support of some serious cash (held by someone who probably doesn't live in the city) I can't see us going back. Recently, I've been given the opportunity to watch two of the leaders at GRTC, Larry Hagan and John Lewis, present their vision of public transportation in Richmond and streetcars are in the plan. First they hope to simulate the streetcar service with a bus system called Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) that operates on the same circuit logic. If profitable, a transition into streetcars would certainly be logical. As we all know, logical is not the most fitting adjective to describe Richmond city leadership, but with a new mayor, a soon-to-be new governor, stimulus funding and the green revolution we might just find our way back to the days of Sprague and his streetcar. The progress that came with cars, it seems, is not as liberating as we might have thought and America needs a bit of a history lesson.


*P.86 in Geography of Nowhere starts the section about streetcars
*This link from Christian Science Monitor (among countless others) talks about GM bankruptcy:
http://features.csmonitor.com/politics/2009/05/29/can-government-be-trusted-to-steer-a-gm-bankruptcy/

Citizen Transportation Advisory Committee

I went to the last CTAC meeting a few weeks ago and I saw a man from GRTC give a presentation about their concept of a Main St. Station multi-modal transportation hub. I really enjoyed the presentation and I was almost sold until I realized what their plan would do to the current train shed. I understand the majority of the steel was already stripped from the shed, but I do not want to have to look at an extreemely spread out ramp system in the middle of Shocko Bottom. I do agree that we need a new system but I just do not think this need warrants the creation of such a monster behind the Main St. Station. The other plan they proposed was a multi-hub system that would incorporate several hubs along Broad St. from Rocket's Landing to Libbie Place. This system would be more efficient than the current system, but would not have the benefit of providing citizens with one place where you know you can get a bus. Either way, it seems as though this whole system of transportation needs to be reevaluated because the ridership is often so low. Busses are not fuel efficient forms of mass transportation if they are empty. For this reason, the city needs to continually give grants and tax breaks to companies that build high-density buildings along Broad street and downtown. I am encouraged by the renovations of Miller & Rhodes and the Carpenter Theater. Here's to a future.

I have now arrived

This is a section of Hull between Thirteenth and Fourteenth. It's partially vacant, dilapidated and forgotten by most of the big money in Richmond. But a stretch of buildings like this one is what puts a smile on my face. As I was making the drive from Sandston to the city, I came upon these buildings and actually got excited because I remembered why I am so in love with this city. It was like I was a prophet seeing the god of smarter growth create something perfect. The buildings are beautiful, close together, walkable and diverse. They are historic, they are near the downtown core and they are within walking distance of hundreds of houses on the adjacent streets. If I had unlimited resources, this is the first stretch of buildings I would revitalize.

And off onto the high seas

Here you find me driving (and taking a picture at the same time which may or may not be safe) toward that place we call a city. This asphalt is essentially what we have created to replace rivers in our modern society. Trains, certainly, course through our nation, but it is roads that have become more prolific over the last 100 years. They have done nothing for the identity of an area, roads do not add life to a field, and there is no way you could make the argument that a road is place that Americans call home. We are comfortable on roads because we grow up on roads, but a home is a place that you inhabit, improve and in which you invest.

There's little "commitment" to our areas of development and developers often "leap frog" over entire regions to become the next big new development. Thus we move out farther and farther into the hinterlands and it is roads like this one that have allowed the expansion. Unfortunately, the empty department stores along the way tell us that our system is not very sustainable.

I have to add that there's a condo development downtown that has made it's slogan, "No commute time, just live time." Of course there's no front yard, but in my experience I tend to use yards less than I imagined I would ... and now that I have a 30+ minute commute I almost never go outside. If I lived where I worked? Maybe I'd spend more time outside, maybe not, but I wouldn't burn gas in the process.

The sobering truth

This picture is a perfect depiction of the sober truth behind development: Developing farmland necessitates expensive, new infrastructure. This is a story told across the nation, but in this region we can learn to direct the growth to areas that are already equipped with drainage, electric, gas and sewage utilities.
The current economy may have stalled this particular development (there is a silver lining) but you can already see the huge concrete tunnel pieces like this one preparing the area for drainage. Currently, the grass and dirt is creating a system of water drainage (and filter), but when the area is developed there will be a huge need for water management as water flows off of the blacktop and concrete. The people living in the new houses will send their children to schools that will need to be built and the roads in the development will need to be maintained. In other words .. it's expensive to start from scratch, but the costs are often hidden.

Beauty?

This forest-lined street might as well be ... anywhere. The picture certainly has more green space than blacktop, but the "natural look" is nothing more than a deception. The trees remain because some developer decided to leave a buffer for the houses he/she was building. The buffers are not really green because they are no more than five feet thick (you can see a house through the foliage on the right) and merely a facade covering a bedroom community. This street starts our journey toward a city.

As soon as I realized that Partnership for Smarter Growth was going to host an educational workshop out in Midlothian, I knew that the drive would be both educational and demoralizing.

Although the workshop was a success, I couldn't help but think about the irony of having a conservation and smart growth workshop on a golf course ... one of the most inefficient uses of green space and water. On top of the obvious irony, I gradually realized that the location of the golf course was going to force me to travel through every type of city structure in Richmond. As I will soon learn at the PSG Bus Tour, principles of smart growth are best taught from a car (the symbol par excellence of suburban transit) rather than in a dark room. The next few posts are going to present a series of personal photos that I took while driving from the Independence Golf Club (pictured above) in Midlothian to the PSG office in downtown Richmond ... I'll add a little commentary along the way.

Local priorities ... highway repairs

Every morning I wake up to cars driving by on the highway less than a quarter mile away from my room. Recently, the Richmond Times Dispatch (our local White newspaper) published a news article (link below) about a repair project on Hwy 64. The article said "The $43.3 million I-64 project will repair and resurface 5.6 miles of much-patched pavement on both sides of the six and eight-lane highway." 43.3 million dollars for a 5.6 stretch of highway? That's over half of one million dollars per mile per lane of highway. When I read the article I thought about the fact that we spent a whole afternoon stuffing envelopes hoping that we might be given $5,000 dollars in return.

I'm tired of the American public failing to understand that in order to maintain our isolationist system of transportation we are paying more money than we could ever really fathom. Instead of all of our money going to transportation that is available to everyone (street cars and trains) we put vast sums of money into transportation that is really only available to those who can afford to own, maintain and fuel a car. It is not surprising (considering our healthcare system follows much the same logic), but it is unjust and we must correct our ways.

Noone knew that they wanted to drive on highways until they were constructed. The largest building project in the history of the USA is the intricate system of asphalt and concrete arteries coursing through our nation. It seemed like a good idea at the time ... but now looking back it was the worst idea possible. It (along with racism) ruined our city core and led us like the pide piper out into sprawl. Now, we are left with the declining infrastructure and a love/hate relationship with the machines that we thought would bring us freedom.

Here at Partnership for Smarter Growth, as with most non-profit organizations, we spend much of our time raising money. With an operating budget below $100,000, we're not exactly big dogs, but we advocate for smarter growth in the entire region and most of the city-wide initiatives we advocate (Bike/ped) would cost less than a few hundred thousand dollars each. That's why it is so difficult to stomach the price tag attached to highway construction and repair. In a moment of desperation late after a long day and evening of work Sheila looked at me and said, "The thing that sucks about non-profits is that you're always asking for money." I have to agree, but the thing that sucks more is to know that there is more money than we would ever need going in every direction except that of smarter growth.

http://www.timesdispatch.com/rtd/business/transportation/article/VDOT211_20090520-233805/269042/

PSG and Van Jones

There are many proposed solutions to the current energy and environmental concerns. The Democratic Party is recommending a Cap and Trade system with wind and solar while The Republican Party is championing offshore oil and nuclear power, but both of these proposals seem to fall short (ok, one falls shorter than the other.) The Green Collar Economy, by Van Jones, is both an analysis of past environmental movements and a vision for the future of environmentalism and society in America. To Jones, environmentalism is more than just a stopgap measure applied at the end of a destructive cycle. Instead, Jones considers the greatest possibility of the next wave of environmentalism is a movement that both addresses the growing socioeconomic inequality and the rampant environmental destruction in America. The title of the book refers to what is now a fairly commonplace concept: The role of blue-collar workers on the production side of the green movement. This green economy will be similar to the current system but with an emphasis placed on the environment. This new emphasis will give a tool as simple as a caulk gun a new purpose weatherizing buildings and increasing energy efficiency.
Jones believes that through an environmentally conscious federal works program, the economy can make a significant shift. The final goal of this process is to build the economy and protect the environment at the same time.
Because he considers this movement to be a public works program in addition to an environmental movement, Jones presents a critique of similar movements in the past. From the conservation movement of Teddy Roosevelt to the FDR’s new deal, the needs of Blacks and immigrants have always been marginalized and silenced. For this reason, Jones is particularly interested in the role of minorities and poor Americans in the next green movement to see that history is not repeated. The difficulty in a collaboration between poor and wealthy Americans is that the two demographics are often concerned with different issues. While many working poor in America often care deeply about social justice concerns close to home such as pollution and asthma, the wealthy promote more distant concerns such as ice caps melting and deforestation. Through his analysis of the past, Jones illustrates the fact that environmentalism has historically been a movement of the elite rather than a movement of the people. It’s unfortunate that the two parties have not communicated because both the poor and the rich have many of the same concerns, but the only difference is that the poor are often already suffering from the effects of poor decisions. Examples include asthma and lead poisoning, but according to Jones, the most pressing social justice issue in the Black community is the penal system. This concern led Jones to eventually conceive the slogan, “Green Jobs, Not Jails” in order to link the two often distanced value systems and hopefully provide a productive alternative for the deplorable legacy of criminal justice in America. This is a message of the people – a message of proactive and inclusive investment in the future of our environment and social fabric.

Non-Profit Cattle Prod

Monday was my first day on the job and happened to be the annual steering committee retreat for the Partnership for Smarter Growth. Eight and a half hours later there was a pile of over-sized Post-it notes rolled up like a bunch of maps I picture under the arm of a cartographer or plans in the hand of an architect. To PSG, these over-sized Post-it notes are both the map and plans for the years to come. A little cattle prod for a non-profit that forces us to realign ourselves with the vision of smarter growth in the Richmond region.

Since the meeting, Sheila and I have been analyzing, re-arranging and compiling the wealth of information and opinion gleaned from the retreat and attempting to craft a strategic plan and vision statement for the organization. Two people, one huge task. We have finished much of the work, but it seems like every change requires the two of us to think out loud for at least thirty minutes. How do the pieces fit together? That's the million-dollar (more like $90,000) question ... we will soon have a much clearer road map. We will almost know where we are headed.

A very good place to start

Richmond, Va. is the city I discovered as almost an afterthought when I came to the University of Richmond. Since then I've realized that the city is the main event and life in the West End is pristine and predictable.

My purpose for keeping this blog is twofold: 1. To recount my observations at an internship with Partnership for Smarter Growth (PSG) so that I can later analyze my reflections.
2. To share my thoughts (both educated and anecdotal) about the life of someone working long hours to advocate smarter growth while commuting in from the (albeit older) suburbs of the Richmond West End.