The government of Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chretien recently outlined a new long-term political agenda. It includes a proposal for major changes to transportation that would affect traffic bottlenecks at crossing points like the Ambassador Bridge. The Bridge is the biggest trading corridor between Canada and the U.S. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Dan Karpenchuk reports:
Transcript
The government of Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chretien recently outlined a new long-
term political agenda. It includes a proposal for major changes to transportation that
would affect traffic bottlenecks at crossing points like the Ambassador Bridge. The
Bridge is the biggest trading corridor between Canada and the U.S. The Great Lakes
Radio Consortium’s Dan Karpenchuk reports:
Prime Minister Jean Chretien calls it part of his Kyoto plan, which is intended to reduce
traffic congestion on the main highway link along the north shore of Lake Ontario all the
way to the U.S. border for almost 24 hours a day that highway looks more like a moving
warehouse as goods travel by truck north and south of the border.
But the emissions from thousands of trucks each day are creating smog from Toronto to
Buffalo to Detroit.
Chretien’s plan is to shift more truck traffic to rail and water.
Ken Ogilvie of the environmental organization, Pollution Probe, says it’s a positive step
but it needs more government incentives similar to those in the U.S.
“What the United States is ahead of us on and should and could do a lot more is on the
policy side of tying some of this funding to make sure there is improved rail and transit
systems.”
Ogilvie says further study would be needed to determine whether the plan would simply
shift environmental problems to the Great Lakes and to rail infrastructure on both sides of
the border.
For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Dan Karpenchuk in Toronto.
Some motorcycle riders are concerned that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is unfairly targeting bikers with a proposal to reduce motorcycle emissions. Illustration courtesy of ABATE of Illinois.
The Environmental Protection Agency wants to clean up pollution from motorcycles. Motorcycle enthusiasts don’t want the government telling them how to operate their street bikes. It’s become a battle between bikers and bureaucrats. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester Graham reports:
Transcript
The Environmental Protection Agency wants to clean up pollution from
motorcycles. Motorcycle enthusiasts don’t want the government telling
them how to operate their street bikes. It’s become a battle between
bikers and bureaucrats. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester
Graham reports:
(pipe sound #1)
Bikers turn their heads when they hear a pair of exhaust pipes cackling
by. The sound catches their attention as much as the style and chrome on
the motorcycle. Bikers such as Neil Toepfer say making changes such as
with exhaust pipes are a part of the culture of motorcycle enthusiasts.
“That’s how we express ourselves, making changes on the bike that make
it even more fuel efficient or perform the way that we the rider want it to perform.”
And the sound of the bike is a big part of identity for many riders.
(pipe sound #2)
But motorcycle riders such as Toepfer say they’re concerned about an
Environmental Protection Agency proposal that would crack down on
motorcycle exhaust systems. Toepfer and others have gone so far as to
ride their bikes to Washington to let Congress know they oppose the
EPA messing around with their freedom to modify their bike pipes.
“The thing with the EPA… and I’m probably going to get
somebody’s nose out of joint when I say this… but the EPA is just a
government agency. They don’t answer to the people. They don’t listen to
the people. They’re bureaucrats that have their own agenda.”
Toepfer is being mild compared to what some other bikers are saying
about the EPA. There seems to be a bit of a culture clash. A poster on
the internet by one motorcycle riders association depicts a mock-up of
an assault rifle toting EPA official in riot gear. The caption reads “He’s
from the Government, but he’s not here to help.” It goes on to read “He’s
here to take your heritage. He’s here to take your freedom. He’s here to
take your motorcycle.”
Many bikers say they don’t understand why the EPA is going after their
motorcycle exhaust pipes…
(pipe sound #3)
Mike Hayworth is the owner of Watson’s Wheels of Madness, a custom
motorcycle shop in Alton, Illinois. He suspects the problem is either the
government bureaucrats don’t have enough to do… or do-gooders who
can’t mind their own business…
“These environmentalist people, they want to rule our lives
and they’re going to take and do whatever they can to say ‘We got to stop
this and we got to stop that.’ What kind of pollution does a motorcycle –
there’s not enough motorcycles in the United States to pollute anything.”
That same argument is being made in Washington, D.C. Thomas Wyld is
a lobbyist with Motorcycle Riders Foundation. He says a study by the
California Air Resources Board found that street bikes were only
responsible for six one-thousandth of a percent of all motor vehicle
emissions.
“And if you took that pollution inventory of motor vehicles and
made it equivalent of a 100-yard football field, street motorcycles would
occupy a quarter of an inch on that field.”
Wyld adds that motorcycles are fuel efficient, reduce traffic congestion,
and take up less parking space. Wyld says those are things the EPA
should be encouraging instead of pestering bikers with exhaust
emissions restrictions.
(pipe sound #4)
The EPA is a little baffled by all the noise about the emissions proposal.
Don Zinger is with the EPA’s Office of Transportation and Air Quality.
He says the bikers don’t understand the proposal…
“These new requirements will have absolutely no effect on
existing motorcycles.”
Zinger says any new restrictions on exhaust systems would only affect
new motorcycles that come off the assembly line after the restrictions are
implemented… probably four years from now.
And Zinger notes… motorcycles pollute a lot more than most people
realize.
“A typical motorcycle built today produces about 20 times as
much air pollution as a new car today over every mile that’s driven. 20
times. That’s pretty significant.”
So, the EPA says street motorcycles should be made to pollute less, as
the EPA has required many other types of vehicles to do.
Many bikers believe the EPA is targeting street motorcycle riders
because they’re a small segment of society with a reputation of being on
the wild side. EPA officials say bikers won’t notice a difference in the
sound or performance of the bikes under the proposed emissions
restrictions… but it will mean they’ll pollute less.
(bike pipes leaving the scene)
For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, this is Lester Graham.
Some motorcycle riders are concerned that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is unfairly targeting bikers with a proposal to reduce motorcycle emissions. Illustration courtesy of ABATE of Illinois.
The Environmental Protection Agency is considering new rules to reduce pollution from motorcycles. The EPA says street bikes pollute far more than cars or even SUVs:
Transcript
The Environmental Protection Agency is considering new rules to reduce
pollution from motorcycles. The EPA says street bikes pollute far more
than cars or even SUVs. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester Graham
reports:
The EPA’s proposal would require new motorcycles to substantially
reduce exhaust emissions. The EPA says the average new motorcycle
pollutes 20 times more than the average new car. Don Zinger is with the
agency’s Office of Transportation and Air Quality.
“The motorcycle standards have been in place since 1980. In
other words, they have not been changed in 22 years now. So, we think it’s
appropriate to consider more stringent standards for motorcycles.”
Bikers are concerned that the emissions restrictions will affect the
performance of motorcycles. They also say the EPA is trying to take
away their right to change how their bikes sound. Many bikers feel the
rumble of their motorcycle is a statement of their individuality. EPA
officials say they just want the motorcycles to pollute less.
For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, this is Lester Graham.
In the mid-1960’s, the federal government started requiring metropolitan areas to come up with regional plans in order to get government grants for everything from highways to housing. That forced officials from large cities and from the suburbs to sit down at the same table (in many cases for the first time) and think about what was best for the entire region; not just their own town. From this effort, sprang the regional planning movement, but things aren’t always easy, and certainly don’t always go ‘according to plan.’ The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester Graham reports on one region’s attempt to plan for growth:
There are four major regional planning orgnizations in the Chicago metro area:
In the
mid-1960’s, the federal government started requiring metropolitan areas to come up with regional plans in order to get government grants for everything from highways to housing. That forced officials from large cities and from the suburbs to sit down at the same table — in many cases for the first time — and think about what was best for the entire region, not just their own town. From this effort, sprang the regional planning movement. But things aren’t always easy and certainly don’t always go ‘according to plan.’ The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester Graham reports on one region’s attempt to plan for growth:
If you were to gather around the coffee pot in the morning at just about any place of business in just about any suburb of just about any big city, the topic of conversation would probably not be the weather, or last night’s big game, or even politics. Nope. More than likely it would be about how long it took to get to work. Lots of people drive an hour, ninety minutes, or even longer to make the commute. So, why not move closer, you might ask. The answer could very well be “Can’t afford it.”
Housing costs in many suburbs are so high that the people who teach the kids, fight the fires, and fix the cars in the nice suburbs have to live in other less affluent communities where housing is cheaper. That’s because city officials in many suburbs encourage the building of expensive houses on big lots because it means a better tax base. But that also means many workers need to hop in their cars to get to work in those fancy suburbs.
Of course, when thousands of cars line up bumper to bumper to make the commute, you get traffic congestion.
“If you think it’s bad now, just wait. It’s gonna get worse.”
That’s Frank Beale. He’s the Executive Director of a group named Chicago Metropolis 2020. Metropolis 2020 put together a plan that looked at the Chicago area’s growth patterns and came up with some pretty dire forecasts. According to the study, if the Chicago region conducts business as usual, by the year 2030 there will be a 75-percent increase in auto miles traveled for work, shopping, and normal everyday trips. The time it takes to drive to work will be up 27-percent. And only about seven-and-a-half percent of housing units will be within walking distance of mass transit.
Beale says there’s seems to be a disconnect between local governments’ decisions to encourage big, expensive houses and the resulting need for more roads and additional lanes of traffic to handle all the commuters.
“More equitable
distribution of affordable housing and the employment centers would diminish the demand on the transportation systems. We seem to always only talk about roads. But, we only need roads because of how we’ve configured the land in the region.” Beyond the travel concerns, business as usual — according to the Metropolis 2020 study — means another 383 square miles of farmland will become subdivisions and strip malls in less than 30 years.
Organizations such as Metropolis 2020 are working together to try to educate and persuade the Chicago region’s 275 suburban mayors that the decisions they make will have an effect on the whole region.
Larry Christmas was once one of those mayors. He’s also spent his career running or working for regional planning agencies. He says as a mayor, it’s hard to think about the larger region when you are working to bring good growth to your town. It’s especially hard when regional planners want you to give up local control of land-use for the betterment of the larger region.
“And that’s something the communities don’t want to give up lightly even if there’s a regional argument that the collective local decisions may add up to bad regional development patterns.”
So, those looking at the big picture have their work cut out for them. The regional planners spend a lot of time at meetings with local officials, putting together roundtables to explain plans and trying to schedule meetings between antagonists.
One of the partners of Metropolis 2020 is the Metropolitan Planning Council. Executive Director Mary Sue Barrett says sitting down with those different interests and getting them to consider the reasons for bending a little here and there to adhere to a regional plan can pay off.
“To put it in practical terms, if you can get an environmentalist and a homebuilder and a mayor to agree on something, you can probably go get it done. And that’s what we try to do.”
And the regional planners try to get the mayors to listen on topics ranging from fair and equitable housing, to public transportation, and even taxing systems that sometimes encourage bad development with tax breaks.
But given the kind of expansive sprawl that continues to plague the Chicago metropolitan area, there’s still one question you have to ask of people such as Frank Beale with Chicago Metropolis 2020. That is: who’s listening?
“Well, the general assembly, the legislators are listening, the Mayor, the 275 suburban mayors are listening. They don’t always agree, but they’re listening.”
And as long as they keep listening, the people looking for better regional planning will keep trying to persuade the cities in the suburbs there’s a better way.
For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, this is Lester Graham.
New construction continues to spread into the countryside.
A new study looks at the quality of life in these suburban
developments.
People who move to the suburbs often say they’re escaping the stress of the city. But researchers are finding the suburbs cause a lot of stress for residents too, and the difference doesn’t seem to be as much about where you live as it is about how you live. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester Graham reports:
Transcript
People who move to the suburbs often say they’re escaping the stress of the city. But researchers are finding the suburbs cause a lot of stress for residents too. And, the difference doesn’t seem to be as much about where you live as it is about how you live. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester Graham reports.
Ahhh, living in the suburbs, quiet tree lined streets, green lawns, and in the distance a glimpse of undisturbed woods along a creek or maybe farmland rolling off to the horizon. Across the Great Lakes region, the suburbs are picture perfect. Well, maybe not quite perfect.
A group of researchers has been spending a lot of time in the sprawling Chicago suburbs to see what draws people to the area, what they like, don’t like, from where they move and whether they intend to stay where they are, in the ‘burbs. What they’ve found is that living in the suburbs is not quite as stark or as bleak or as sterile as some of the popular press portrays it. But at the same time it’s not as blissful as the images in the brochures printed up by developers.
Charles Cappell is a sociologist at the Social Services Research Institute at Northern Illinois University. Since 1991 he’s been conducting surveys of people living in the suburbs. Mostly it’s been about why they live there. Usually the participants talk about their children, safety for their kids, nice schools, and nice green space for the family. But, recently Cappell and his team have been probing a little more deeply.
“In subsequent surveys, in 2000 for example, we did measure stress and we do know that suburbanites experience stress. They’re stressed from the demands of suburban life, some of the friction. But, in general, they report a fairly good quality of life.”
Of course, part of that quality of life is due to the surroundings. But after moving to the suburbs many people miss some of the more urban conveniences. And so as the housing developments sprout, the retailers are paving parking lots right behind them.
“This is one of the contradictions of suburban life: they value the quiet, green, suburban lawns and openness, and they crave the convenience of the shopping malls.”
But with that convenience comes the inconvenience of congested traffic on roads not designed to carry such huge volumes. While cities and counties spend untold millions of dollars widening old roads and building new ones, the suburbanites cope with the stresses of back-ups.
Rich Green is a geographer at Northern Illinois. He’s watched as the suburbs have spiraled out away from Chicago, causing an intricate and massive spider web of new roadways. Still, some politicians are calling for more and bigger roads in the suburbs. U.S. House Speaker Dennis Hastert is calling for an interstate to be built in his district that will create a new outer-belt for the Chicago metro area, some nearly 50 miles away from downtown. But Green says the Interstates in the Chicago area have simply created corridors of development. Instead of relieving traffic, some experts say the interstates around Chicago have simply given sprawl better access.
“Clearly, building these interstates hasn’t corrected some of the problems that people were hoping for. Usually, if you expand a highway, you bring more people.”
Traffic hassles are not the only stress suburbanites face. In fact, the more serious stressors have to do with the cost of living there. During the heady days of the stock market boom, people started building bigger and better houses out on one acre lots on the fringes of the ‘burbs. Now, because of the poor performance of the markets, those houses –sometimes derogatorily called ‘McMansions’– are extravagances that some suburbanites are struggling to afford. But if they want to live in the new Chicago suburbs, they don’t have much choice. Prices have skyrocketed and there’s very little in the way of affordable housing being built.
Dick Esseks is a retired professor who’s been doing research for the American Farmland Trust. The Trust is concerned about the loss of farmland due to development. Esseks says many of those who moved to the suburbs did so when times were good, but with the downturn in the economy, some of those people face forced early retirement.
“When they go from full-time workers to pensioned workers, can they find housing in the same community, stay in the same church, stay in the same synagogue, stay in other associations?”
Esseks says because many of the municipalities require large lots, have very high standards for construction, and agree to annex large subdivisions of ‘McMansions,’ they leave behind the chances for more affordable housing. Only the very well off can afford to live in many of the suburbs.
Still, even with the weight of big mortgages hanging over their heads, bad traffic congestion, and other stresses, researchers have found suburbanites seem to cope better on average than their counterparts in the city. Sociologist Charles Cappell says there’s a reason for that, and it has to do with who lives in the suburbs. Cappell says it’s established that married people and people with families tend to deal with stress better than single people. Older people are less stressed than young people, and the suburbs have a much greater ratio of traditional families with middle-aged parents than in the city.
“Some of the differences between quality of life between urban and suburban experiences can be attributed to the fact that urban places are more stressful or there are higher levels of stress because of these reasons. There’s more single people. They’re younger. But, the sources of stress, environmentally, may be different, but I think the bigger indicators of stress are your kind of social environment, your psychological space, how you cope, what kind of support you have and families in spite of their increased burdens on time, really do offer emotional support.”
So, people in the ‘burbs’, generally speaking, have a better support structure at home, and usually have the means to pay for a more comfortable, less stressful life to begin with. Cappell says getting out of the city and into the suburbs is not the answer to a stress-free life, but it just so happens there are a lot of people who live in the suburbs who are better able to cope with life’s stress.
For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, this is Lester Graham.
Sprawl affects urban and rural residents of every Great Lakes state. Rapid development continues to swallow farmland and leave impoverished urban cores in its wake. But one Great Lakes mayor believes there’s still time to preserve land and revive cities. Mayor John Logie shares this commentary:
Transcript
Sprawl affects urban and rural residents of every Great Lakes state. Rapid development continues to swallow farmland and leave impoverished urban cores in its wake. But one Great Lakes mayor believes there’s still time to preserve land and revive cities. Mayor John Logie shares this commentary.
Urban sprawl is alive and well in Grand Rapids, my hometown. The term refers to the insidious way that webs of suburbs, manufacturing plants, etc., are expanding in unplanned, ever-widening circles around our city. Such sprawl results in longer commutes, pollution, and the loss of undeveloped land. The American Farmland Trust reports that 70% of the country’s prime farmland is now in the path of rapid development. On the list of 30 of the most sprawling cities in the entire United States, Grand Rapids, which has experienced a 48% increase in its urban area between 1990 and 1996, ranks right in the middle, behind such hyper-growth communities as Las Vegas, Austin, and Tucson, but well ahead of Cleveland, Chicago, and Portland in our rate of sprawl increase.
This Land-use change has rarely been done in a responsible fashion. Some sprawl apologists say what we’ve ended up with is that’s the American Dream, and any problems are easy to fix. They say there’s plenty of land left in America. They say congestion would go away if we just build more roads. But sprawl matters. Pollsters say it’s the most important issue in the Country.
Distress about urban sprawl arises from many factors: loss of open space, traffic congestion, economic segregation, a lack of affordable housing, and a lost sense of community. According to Harvard University political scientist Robert Putnam, the longer people spend in traffic, the less likely they are to be involved in their community and family.
To solve these problems, it takes a combination of land conservation and real free market economics, which can actually provide smaller lots for those who want them. However, many communities try to maintain what they believe are high property values by allowing only large-lot homes to be built. This effectively excludes several types of households, including singles, some empty nesters, single-parents, and the elderly, along with lower-income people. And the favored “middle-class family” with kids, today represents just 25% of new homebuyers. Only 11% of U.S. households are “traditional” families with children and just one wage earner. One size no longer fits us all.
Here’s what we need now.
We need smaller houses in walkable clusters, town homes in real “towns,” lofts in vital urban neighborhoods, and affordable housing just about anywhere. The development of compact communities that offer urban amenities and street life will show that the market actually supports more density and more housing diversity—not less. But we’re not building communities like those; communities that can help reduce many symptoms of sprawl, including traffic. Instead, we’re just building new roads. But for every 10% increase in new freeway miles, a 9% increase in traffic is generated within 5 years as sprawl continues. You just can’t build your way out of gridlock. More importantly, today we can no longer afford to keep building new freeways. The key is building more walkable communities. All this depends on promoting different land-use patterns, and not just building new roads.
Property rights advocates argue against regional planning, or any planning for that matter. They say that people should have a right to develop their properties as they please. As a historic preservationist, I have heard that for years. But what if one person’s development decision adversely impacts another’s property, or the whole neighborhood, or the whole region? What if certain choices require more public tax dollars to pay for infrastructure and services than others? At the regional level, it is public dollars that enable development on private property. Without highways, roads, sewers, water systems, and public services, development cannot occur. Therefore, we must use the tool of government spending appropriately – and seek out and implement the most cost-effective public investments which creatively and positively support growth, but discourage sprawl. My name is John Logie, I’m the Mayor of Grand Rapids, Michigan.
