Air Quality, Climate Change, and Transport

Asian haze makes its return

2010-10-20T21:00:00.000-07:00

Kaye Patdu

Figure 1 Regional Haze Map
Source: NEA Meteorological Services Division

Over the past few days, Singapore and some areas in Malaysia have been enveloped in haze as a result of open burning in Sumatra, Indonesia (Figures 1 and 2).

As seen in Figure 3, the prevailing southwesterly to westerly winds carried in some smoke haze from the fires in Sumatra (National Environment Agency [NEA], 2010). According to Malaysia’s Department of Environment (DOE), decline in air quality levels was first recorded around noon on Saturday, 16 October (Bernama, 2010).

Figure 2: Regional PM10 Conc. 20/10/2010
Source: Nea Meteorological Services Division

Yesterday, the 24-hour Pollutant Standards Index (PSI) reading at 4PM was at 80 (categorized as ‘moderate’ air quality). The Strait Times reports this as the highest 24-hour reading in Singapore since 2006–when Singapore was last experienced severe haze conditions (Gunasingham, A., 2010). According to NEA’s Haze Outlook yesterday, there is still possibility that some slight haziness may remain until the next couple of days. This morning, the 3-hour PSI reading from 7AM to 10AM was at 71.

In Malaysia, deterioration in air quality levels have been reported in certain areas, such as in north Johor, Malacca, Negri Sambilan and Sengalor in the past few days (Star Online, 2010). The Air Pollutant Index (API) for Muar in Johor reached 311 as of 5PM yesterday. This corresponds to ‘hazardous’ air quality. As part of the measures to reduce health impacts, schools in Muar were closed and thousands of masks were distributed to the residents (Jakarta Globe, 2010). Hazy conditions in several areas had also decreased visibility. In several areas in Malacca, Kuantan, Batu Pahat and Petaling Jaya, visibility declined to between 4 and 7 seven km (Bernama, 2010). As of 7AM today, 21 areas had ‘moderate’ air quality (API from 51 to 100) while the rest had ‘good’ air quality.

Figure 3: Wind direction in Indonesia, Singapore
and Malaysia. Source: The Strait Times.

The recent haze conditions just occurred a few days after the 6th Meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the ASEAN Agreement on Transboundary Haze Pollution on 13 October 2010 in Bandar Seri Begawan, Brunei Darussalam. During the meeting, ASEAN Member States pledged to remain vigilant and continuously monitor and implement haze preventive activities with anticipation of possible periods of dry conditions despite of the expectation that inter-monsoon season will help to subdue hotspot activities (ASEAN Secretariat, 2010).

On 20 October, Channel News Asia (2010) reported that Singapore’s Environment and Water Resources Minister Yaacob Ibrahim said that the ASEAN environment ministers may need to meet again to discuss additional measures to address the haze issue if the situation gets worse.

For more information:

Malaysia: Member of the public may call DOE at toll free line 1800-88-2727 or access http://www.doe.gov.my for API updates.

Singapore: Members of the public may call NEA Call Centre at 1800-CALL NEA (1800-2255 632) or access www.nea.gov.sg for any feedback or update on the situation.

Online Resources:

ASEAN Haze Action Online: http://haze.asean.org/index.php

ASEAN Agreement on Transboundary Haze Pollution: http://haze.asean.org/hazeagreement/

Singapore Haze Action Plan: http://app2.nea.gov.sg/psi_hazeplan.aspx

Singapore PSI: http://app2.nea.gov.sg/psi.aspx

Understanding Singapore PSI: http://app2.nea.gov.sg/psi_faq.aspx

NEA Meteorological Services Division: http://www.weather.gov.sg/wip/web/ASMC

Malaysia API - http://www.doe.gov.my/apims/index.php

Malaysia Meteorological Department: http://www.met.gov.my/

Is the PSI reading in Singapore the same as API in Malaysia? http://app2.nea.gov.sg/psi_faq.aspx

Brunei PSI - http://www.env.gov.bn/psireading/index.htm

Health Guidelines on Haze: http://www.moh.gov.bn/satisticshealthguidelines/guidelines.htm

References:

ASEAN Secretariat, 2010. “Media Release: 6th Meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the ASEAN Agreement on Transboundary.”13 October 2010. [Online]. Accessed: 21 October 2010. URL: http://haze.asean.org/news/1286960156/Media+Release:+6th+Meeting+of+the+Conference+of+the+Parties+to+the+ASEAN+Agreement+on+Transboundary

Bernama, 2010. “Open Burning in Sumatera Causes AQ in Peninsula to Deteriorate.” 19 October 2010. [Online]. Accessed: 21 October 2010. URL: http://www.bernama.com.my/bernama/v5/newsindex.php?id=536844

Channel News Asia, 2010. “Quick meeting among ASEAN ministers needed if haze worsens.”20 October 2010. [Online]. Accessed: 21 October 2010. URL: http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/singaporelocalnews/view/1088213/1/.html

NEA, 2010. “News Release: Haze Outlook as of 19 October 2010.” [Online]. Accessed: 21 October 2010. URL: http://app2.nea.gov.sg/news_detail_2010.aspx?news_sid=20101019289272714168

Gunasingham, A., 2010. “Air quality worst since 2006.” Strait Times. 21 October 2010. [Online]. Accessed: 21 October 2010. URL: http://www.straitstimes.com/BreakingNews/Singapore/Story/STIStory_593407.html

Jakarta Globe, 2010. “Haze from Indonesia Forces Malaysian Schools to Shut: Report.” 20 October 2010. [Online]. Accessed: 21 October 2010. URL: http://www.thejakartaglobe.com/home/haze-from-indonesia-forces-malaysian-schools-to-shut-report/402343

Star Online, 2010. “Haze woes in Johor and Malacca.” 20 October 2010. [Online]. Accessed: 21 October 2010. URL: http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2010/10/20/nation/7261543&sec=nation

Haze likely to stay at least 3 days, says NEA

Quick meeting among ASEAN ministers needed if haze worsens

Singapore Government Urges Indonesia to Deal with Haze from Forest Fires

Haze woes in M'sia too

Air quality showing slight improvement: Thick haze blankets Singapore

Air quality in Singapore worst since 2006

Haze from Indonesia Forces Malaysian Schools to Shut: Report

KL's vanishing twin towers

Haze health guide

Air quality drops but remains at acceptable levels

Haze in Singapore due to Sumatra fires

More news available at: http://cleanairinitiative.org/portal/news.

When roads are claiming lives of people

2010-07-13T23:32:00.000-07:00

Charina Cabrido

Kathmandu Valley claims to have one of the highest mortality from pedestrian accidents in South Asia. There is no single day that passes without the news of road accidents claiming lives of the people. The recent Metropolitan Traffic Police Division (MTPD) statistics suggest that road accidents in Kathmandu Valley for the fiscal year 2008/2009 witnessed a record-high in the last 17 years, reaching 137 deaths followed by 127 in the year 2004/2005. Based from MTPD’s data, a total of 1,594 deaths are recorded in their statistics since they started their database system in 1993, and this are the only legitimate numbers that are recorded.

The lack of traffic lights on the roads has been identified as a major cause of road accidents in Kathmandu Valley. Traffic police recorded 372 road accidents in the month of April 2010. The traffic light system was introduced in 1995 to minimize road accidents. However, the lights installed at 10 major intersections in Kathmandu are not fully operational due to excessive load-shedding.

Another source of lives claimed on roads is the wrong dividers. A traffic policeman said youngsters were the major violators of traffic rules. The road dividers used retro-reflective safety device, cat‟s eye, then plastic cones, but still the traffic violators did not care. They ignore road dividers to the extent that nowadays they have started jumping over dividers to cross the road.

Walkability – the ignored component of Urban Transportation System

Walkability is the overall support for the pedestrian environment. This has grown increasingly important as the world urbanizes and motorized modes of transport restrain travel on foot. There are many aspects in the pedestrian environment that contribute to the overall concept of a walkable community. This concern encompasses virtually every aspect of the pedestrian experience. In Kathmandu, walkability is a largely unmeasured and grossly underappreciated component of the urban transportation system.

In the recent study conducted by Clean Air Initiatives for Asian Cities and Clean Energy Nepal, it was found out that in Bhaktapur City, pedestrian obstructions mostly come from furniture that is deposited by furniture shop owners at the side of the road. Roads are paved but the pathways remain congested and in poor conditions. Free crossing is possible in most part of the surveyed road stretches but parking of vehicles on pathways still obstruct majority of the pedestrians.

The road stretch from Dudhpati area (Siddha Pokhari) up to Byasi has no proper parking spaces allotted for vehicles and footpaths are lacking. Vehicles are also using the footpaths as parking grounds in Changi Narayan Bus Park and Nagarkot Bus Park.

The road stretch from Kamalvinayak to Jagati is under construction and creating re-suspended dust.

In daily trips made by pedestrians, 57.4% of the respondents said that walking is perceived to have the highest exposure to air pollution, affecting health and visibility. According to Clean Aair Network Nepal study in 2008, the ambient concentration of Particulate Matter (10 ug/m3) in Kathmandu city is 120 ug/m3, five times higher than the World Health Organization standards. Except for 2006, PM10 levels are generally higher than the national standard (120μg/m3), and consistently exceed WHO guidelines (20μg/m3).

The main source of PM10 in the ambient air of Kathmandu Valley is smoke from vehicles, dusty and unpaved roads and burning of tires during bandhs. This particle pollution contains microscopic solids or liquid droplets, small enough to get deep into the lungs and cause serious health problems.

When respondents were asked about their top five priorities in improvement of pedestrian facilities in Bhaktapur, it revealed that wider streets received the utmost priority, with removed obstacles coming in as second, followed by easy access to other transit transfers.

What the Government is saying?

The Planning Committee in Bhaktapur mentioned that there is no yearly budget allocation system for pedestrian infrastructure or sidewalk development until this date. Budget is granted as per needed condition. There is inadequate pedestrian facilities-related design or guidelines that could have supported the budget release for pedestrian improvements.

Currently, the Bhaktapur Durbar Square is declared as World Heritage Site and a vehicle free zone for more than 20 years. The Municipality is planning to extend the same initiative to make the whole core area of Bhaktapur as vehicle free zone.

Walkability: A Governance Challenge

Increasing number of vehicles

The number of cars in Kathmandu Valley has increased tenfold over the last 15 years, largely because banks have had few other viable investment opportunities amid deteriorating security conditions. To make matters worse, only 126km of new roads have been constructed. According to the Department of Transport Management, there are 444,700 registered vehicles in Bagmati zone, most in the Kathmandu Valley.

Government Transitions

Managing the footpath and evicting street vendors in Kathmandu has always been a tough job for the municipal police. In 2006, a full report on how to manage sidewalk vendors was submitted to the government.

Due to government transitions, the initiative to manage vendor encroachment remains delayed and the situation is getting worse by the day.

Road Maintenance

Roads in Kathmandu Valley are indeed in a sorry state. Most of the roads are ridged and drivers are at risk. Driving on these roads makes drivers apprehensive that they might hit people or damage their engine. Consequently, their vehicle consumes more fuel and takes more time to reach their destination. Due to machinery problems and the heavy pressure of vehicles during the day, the Road Department’s manpower has to work at night, and this has caused road deformities. Due to the low quality of road repairs, at least one-fourth of all roads deteriorate every year due to the lack of maintenance.

Traffic Management

Traffic enforcement measures must be duly matched by town and country planning and traffic engineering measures to ensure a smooth and orderly movement on the roads. The current system of traffic enforcement is manual, and offences are written down on preprinted forms. The violators are punished randomly. In the absence of any central database, tracking habitual offenders becomes extremely difficult, resulting in poor deterrence.

Way Forward

Nepal needs to come up with an integrated framework on pedestrian road safety, urban planning and transport infrastructures that will promote sustainable urban modes of transport in the country. This integrated framework must coordinate all actions of government ministries and departments working on road safety, infrastructures and traffic issues.

Best practices!

Dedicated and properly designed paths for pedestrians and cycle users are included in the construction of newly built roads.
Formulation and implementation of mix modes of transport, including exclusive zones for non – motorized transit on specific areas within congested urban zones.
Showcasing pilot projects from sample cities to demonstrate the improvements that are possible through improved usage of pedestrian facilities for other cities to replicate.
Nepal needs to promote electric based transport system to cut dependency on imported fossil fuels, reduce emissions of greenhouse gases and local air pollutants.

Provision of pedestrian amenities such as greenery, waiting sheds, crossing points, ramps for differently-able persons and street lights must be placed in strategic locations to meet the intended objectives of protecting pedestrians, walking space and promote pedestrianisation in the city.
Activities on footpaths such as street vendors must be properly controlled to secure pedestrian safety.
Strict enforcement of measures against unsafe traffic behaviors must be implemented.
Public awareness campaigns must be employed to strengthen motorist and pedestrian behaviors and promote pedestrian safety on the road.
Current allocations for road safety, infrastructures and public awareness campaigns should be adequate to implement an effective integrated policy on sustainable urban transport in the country.

Pedestrianisation promotes road safety and clean air

2010-06-24T23:03:00.000-07:00

Chin Cabrido

The Kathmandu Metropolitan City (KMC) recently closed the Hanumandhoka Durbar Square from all kinds of vehicles as part of the government’s initiative to preserve the monument zones and reestablish the World Heritage Site as pedestrian friendly area. This aims to secure the safety of people walking in the city.

In Kathmandu, large section of population prefers to walk. In fact, 18.1 percent of daily trips are made entirely on foot, and of the nearly 56.5 percent of the commuters who use different modes of public transport, a large percentage walk as part of their daily commute. However, inadequate planning has lead to many unnecessary fatalities and injuries. According to study conducted by Kathmandu Valley Mapping Program (KVMP), pedestrians represent up to 40 percent of all fatalities in Kathmandu City in 2001.

The Clean Air Initiatives for Asian Cities and Clean Energy Nepal proposed for the implementation of exclusive zones for non – motorized transit within congested urban zones based from the results of its walkability survey. What KMC has done is something that we must applaud for. Urban cities with improved land use and transportation planning deliberately include pedestrianising streets to contribute to good health and quality of life. Based on a study made by the WorldWatch Institute, a short, four-mile round trip of walking helps reduce 15 pounds of pollutants in the air that we breathe.

The heritage walk project in Hanumandhoka Durbar Square motivates people to take action to improve Kathmandu’s air quality. It reminds us that walking is the most socially inclusive mode of transport and is available to most people, regardless of age, gender, education or income. When you walk, you contribute to the creation of a healthy environment by reducing traffic congestion, air and noise pollution and creating a safer, more social and liveable community.

It also creates a good impression for many visiting tourists in this country that there are safer and quieter roads that is designed entirely for the people. Pedestrian facilities that create safe and attractive environments with a range of amenities will encourage walking and attract visitors to these areas.

Pedestrian-friendly urban design is one of the key enabling conditions for effective transit systems. It tends to lower crime rates and accidents. With the segregation of people from vehicles, the safety of pedestrian and transportation abilities are greatly improved.

The concept of pedestrianisation is relatively simple, its benefits almost immediately apparent, but its implementation is hardly easy. This is not only under KMC’s turf, it is everybody’s responsibility that road security practices are being followed to ensure that safer and quieter roads bind us all.

The Hanumandhoka Durbar Square displays a wide area of clean and quiet road exclusively for pedestrians.

Families enjoy the morning walk around the historical landmarks.

Walking in Hanumandhoka Durbar Square promotes cleaner air and healthy lifestyle.

Some Solutions to Reduce Emissions from Transport Lie outside Our Cities – Case Study of India

2010-06-23T05:41:00.000-07:00

Sudhir Gota

Developing countries are at a crossroads as current decisions and investments in the transport sector are set to lock-in GHG (CO₂) and air pollutant emissions for the next decades. There is reason for concern as sustainable transport policies that incorporate air quality and climate change are being developed and implemented at a slow pace, risking irreversible damage to the environment and people’s welfare. This is further aggravated by the global economic recession, which has lead to economic stimulus packages in developed countries for roads, the automotive industry, and related transport infrastructure. If developing countries follow this lead by prioritizing vehicles instead of people, it is certain that CO₂ emissions, air pollution, congestion, and other transport related problems will worsen.

It has been analyzed that, based on a business-as-usual scenario for motorization in India, the main trends from 2005 to 2025 are:

· The number of total vehicles would grow at 8.70% per year, an increase from 49 million to 246 million between 2005 and 2025.

· CO₂ emissions from road transport would increase at 7.75% per year, which is higher than many other Asian countries, from 203 million tons in 2005 to 905 million tons by 2025. Passenger transport represents 45% and freight transport represents 55% of total CO₂ emissions from road transport in 2005; this ratio would remain approximately the same in 2025.

· PM emissions from road transport would decline until 2025 by 1.88% per year due to the adoption of stricter fuel and vehicle emission standards, while NO_x emissions would increase at a rate of 2.37% per year. However, PM emissions would subsequently rise again due to the continued rapid vehicle growth, especially if emissions standards are not further tightened (Euro IV and above).

· Only about 22% of total CO₂ emissions from land passenger transport in India are attributed to intracity movement in these 29 cities. It is probable that the remaining 78% of CO₂ emissions come from other 498 cities (India has a total of 527 cities with over 100,000 people but limited data are available) and movement of passengers and freight from one city to another (intercity transport).

If the current city trip mode share is retained, CO₂ emissions would increase 2- or 3-fold between 2008 and 2025, due to a rapid growth in urban population and in the number of trips.
If the cities are able to increase the current non-motorized transport (NMT) and public transport trip shares by 5% each with a reduction in motorized transport share, the CO₂ emissions in 2008 would reduce by 9.16% and 6.21%.

A simple sketch analysis of intercity transport contribution to India’s total CO₂ emissions from road transport indicates that a 442 km stretch of 4-lane national highway may approximately correspond to the total passenger transport emissions from intracity movement in Bangalore. Similarly, CO₂ emissions from intracity passenger transport in Delhi are comparable to a 772 km stretch of highway.

The high emission from traffic in National Highways needs to be tackled by the government to reduce the environmental impact. The reason for relatively high emissions from national highways is that freight transport dominates the highways (52% of the vehicle mode share) whereas 2- and 3-wheelers are more present on typical urban roads (about 40% of vehicle mode share). Because 2- and 3-wheelers are more fuel efficient and emit less CO2 than larger vehicles, emissions from urban road transport are relatively lower compared to highways. A second reason could be high empty truck movements due to inefficiencies in freight logistics. Nearly 88% of the truck fleet is under unorganized operators.

Key recommendations for government and stakeholders are as follows:

Policies and projects should have a stronger focus on making cities livable and accessible for people, rather than on just improving the flow of vehicles in cities, by integrating transport demand management (i.e. reducing the number of trips made and distances traveled), public transport, and non-motorized transport into urban development and transport policies.
Policies and projects should aim to reduce CO₂ and air pollutant emissions from the outset, thus creating a low carbon and emission transport system, rather than adding emission mitigating measures to transport policies and projects after they have been designed. Land use and urban planning is critical in influencing transport demand and behavior thereby reducing the emissions thus improving the health.
Indian cities are not maximizing the density influence to reduce the emissions. Many cities which are dense are showing high emissions because of insufficient public transport and high influx of private vehicles. Many Transit oriented development initiatives are being taken by city governments, but much remains to be done on land use-transport-environment integration.
The National Highways carry a huge amount of traffic. Considering high emissions from road based mode of transportation, the government needs to revise feasibility and environmental impact assessment (EIA) guidelines to include emission quantification and mitigation measures in the selection of projects.
Urgent attention is needed for freight transport, which currently contributes to 55% of road transport CO₂ emissions. Most freight vehicles use diesel fuel which contributes to relatively high PM emissions and black carbon (“soot”), which in addition to being an air pollutant is considered a major contributor to global warming. Both urban transport and freight transport should receive equal attention.

Fuel Quality in Asia & Philippines Today

2010-06-13T17:17:00.000-07:00

Preeti Jain

Continuing with the challenge for a balance towards policies and practices for achieving cleaner fuels in Asia, I do agree that for Asian context we cannot simply follow what developed countries are doing, but then at the same time we need to ascertain that there is no compromise on socio economic and environmental benefits. Asia with nearly ~60% of world population holds wide economic disparity among countries in the region and there is enormous burden especially on the developing countries to meet the growth targets in a sustainable and environmentally responsible manner. In a wide array of factors responsible for affecting environment, fuel quality and emission norms are essentially important to manage air pollution. Looking at the chronology of fuel quality development in Asia, most of the countries in the region are on the march towards cleaner fuels; however still there is a key question; how to achieve a balance in policies, practices and their effective implementation in an economically efficient manner. There is indeed a strong correlation between fuel, vehicles, refineries producing them and financial framework to upgrade fuel quality. However, it is important that we first understand where we stand today, what are our unique strengths or weaknesses and how we can adapt with respect to the external environment. Taking a glance on cleaner fuels in Asian context first, for pollution abatement today the fuel quality regulation needs to be combined with vehicle emissions standards to frame the country specific roadmap.

Among Asian countries; Singapore, Japan, Hong Kong have taken a proactive role towards Euro 4 standards and beyond; followed by carefully planned action plan by India, China and Philippines to adopt Euro 4 standards nationwide. However, still there are many Asian countries like Malaysia, Indonesia, Pakistan and Vietnam that have only road maps for Euro 2, while countries including Bhutan and Cambodia, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri-Lanka do not even have any formal fuel quality or vehicle emissions road maps in place. The planning and implementation for removal of lead from gasoline had been remarkable in the Asian subcontinent. However, when it comes to sulphur levels (Figure 1,2) [1] there is still a contrast in the approach in the region where countries like Japan switching to ultra low sulphur content and at the same time we have countries still struggling to move ahead and manage with Euro 2 fuel quality standards.

If we look at the quality specifications of Euro 2 & Euro 4 gasoline fuel; aromatics, sulphur and benzene are the main components that need to be capped. However, in case of diesel fuel, it’s more complex as sulphur reduction involves substantial investment for refining industry. Moreover, in new generation Euro 4 vehicles the use of high Sulphur fuel may poison the catalytic converter and thus the envisaged benefits from the vehicle technologies may not be attained. This discussion holds special importance in Asian context where diesel consumption for on-road vehicles is much more (50%) than ECD countries (34%) or even World total (37%). Moreover, the higher growth for diesel vehicles in these countries is attributed to the favorable tax incentives to diesel being commercial fuel used in trucks, transit buses and other transport as well.

Even in the case of Philippines, diesel is mainly used in public and transit vehicles including jeepneys, which is a problem as they emit higher levels of particulate matter and oxides of nitrogen due to less stringent fuel quality and vehicle technology lack particulate and NOx traps. Though for diesel fuel Cetane number, density, distillation characteristics and PAH content are important but to enable functioning of emission control devices (ECDs) fitted in the diesel vehicles sulphur content of the fuel is the most important parameter. The sulphur level which is currently 500 ppm for Euro II in Philippines need to be reduced to 50 ppm for Euro 4 to maximize the benefits of vehicle technology for reducing the emissions and attain ambient air quality benefits.

To meet Euro 4 target there are certainly technological and financial hurdles, as fuel quality and vehicles technology is not just domain of one industry rather it’s a business preposition of different stakeholders. Whenever we talk about cleaning up vehicles in developing countries, we need to consider and understand role of various technologies and requirement of fuel quality to achieve the end motive of cleaner environment. Besides, cleaner fuels will have a better impact with both new and old generation of vehicles to reduce emissions. There is indeed a price for the incremental costs, estimates show that for meeting fuel sulfur in Asia would cost 0.2-0.8 US cents/L for gasoline and 0.5 – 0.8 US cents/L for diesel, with additional 0.6 cents/L for further reductions to 10 ppm or below for diesel fuel [2]. However, going back to the rationale of cleaner fuels for better environment and public health, there is a time to plan and act now. The path to reach cleaner fuels may be complex but at the end of day if we see the long term benefits; there is certainly a call to keep the marathon on towards achieving cleaner fuels…because it is ultimately us who has to take the decision….

"We generate our own environment. We get exactly what we deserve. How can we resent a life we've created ourselves? Who's to blame, who's to credit but us? Who can change it, anytime we wish, but us?" - Richard Bach

1. International Fuel Quality Centre, http://www.ifqc.org/

2. A Roadmap for Cleaner Fuels and Vehicles in Asia; 2007 Asian Development Bank and Clean Air Initiative for Asian Cities Center Inc.

India Transport Emissions – 2007 – Quantifying emissions without reliable data

2010-05-13T08:33:00.000-07:00

Sudhir Gota

You simply cannot generate reliable emission estimates without accurate data. In fact, I would not hesitate to claim that “Without reliable data, transport emissions forecasting is as good as “fortune telling””. You need to consider the numbers with a pinch of salt or many a times consider the estimates as only numbers!

The reason why I am coming up with such an argument is because yesterday India released its 2007 Green House Gas inventory. I think it has some big problems with the transport estimates. It claims that the “road transport sector emitted 123.55 million tons of CO2e, which is 87% of the total emissions from the transport sector”. The transport sector emissions include all GHG emissions from road transport, railways, aviation and navigation. It suggests that “the total number of registered vehicles in the country has increased from 5.4 million in 1981 to 99.6 million in 2007. Two wheelers and cars constitute nearly 88% of the total vehicles at the national level”.

The problem with the total numbers of vehicles in India is that registered vehicles cannot be used for estimates as we don’t have active scrappage/renewal system. Not many people have an idea as to how to guess the number of vehicles on road. Even the activity information (vehicle travel/year in km) is not available on public domain and often people borrow the numbers from some isolated studies and from other countries or other researchers.

In order to highlight the data issues, following are some of the critical issues

1. Vehicles

a. No breakdown by mode type and engine technology (e.g. Euro 1 or Euro 2 compliant, etc.)

b. limited data on active vehicle fleet

c. No data on splitting small cars with big cars, MUV’s, LCV’s

d. Isolated surveys to determine age of the vehicles

2. Fuels

a. No fuel split available - gasoline, diesel, alternative fuel

3. Activity

a. No data on urban vs rural share of movement

b. Occupancy – how many people/load

c. Annual surveys and proper methodologies on vehicle-km travelled, passenger-km travelled, and tonnes-km rarely exist

d. Reasonable data on fuel consumption per km travelled on various transport modes. This issue is critical as quoted values from lab testing differs from actual on road values

4. Emission factors

a. lack of locally representative emission factors for existing vehicle fleet

Coming back on the India’s 2007 estimate of 123 million tons in 2007 for an activity information of 99 million vehicles is too low as seen from the below graphic. In fact the estimates of CO₂ /vehicles is lesser (1.2) than what researchers have quantified for passenger transport (ratio of 1.5 for passenger vehicles. Including commercial vehicles in estimation would expand this figure to a range of 2 to 4).

Strangely, the same authors, in an earlier study had quantified 106 million tons in 2000 with 48 million vehicles. Then why is that the doubling of vehicle numbers not showing impact?

One thing that hits hard in the below graphic is the huge variation of CO₂ and vehicles. It seems that researchers do not agree with each other … a classic case of elephant and the blind men !!

Are we ready for Euro IV?

2010-05-05T19:39:00.000-07:00

Preeti Jain

In May 2009, when I landed in Manila to pursue MBA Programme at Asian Institute of Management, it was a place for temporary retirement from my job at Indian Oil Corporation Ltd., where I was working as Researcher on alternate fuels, fuel quality issues and urban air quality; a subject close to my heart. But soon after meeting CAI Asia experts in Manila, I had a chance to understand the issues pertaining to the fuel quality and urban environment in the country. Manila to me is not different from India in terms of political debacle for power, developmental issues and at the same time with its efforts to move towards Euro 4 for cleaner environment. India took a proactive action in leapfrogging for fuel quality in the year 2000 by adopting European emission and fuel regulations and later in October 2003, ‘National Auto Fuel Policy’ was announced with a phased program for introducing Euro 2 - 4 emission and fuel regulations by 2010. Similarly Philippines is also on its path towards leapfrogging to Euro 4 and amidst all this consistent efforts of CAI Asia towards a better environmental for the people in Asia is really commendable.

Among many wandering questions for clean environment efforts in Philippines, I think I am right to ask these questions to the powerful political lobby in this country busy with upcoming elections. Where does the environment stand in the political agenda?

In Philippines, where health problems like asthma, bronchitis, premature deaths related to air pollution are on the rise, it’s the time to think and act now, because as responsible citizens of this democratic country, development should be for the people and not at the cost of people. In the Philippines, the estimated population of about 92 million people has very uneven distribution, majority of which is distributed in its urban centre. Looking at the demography of the country, 4 out of 10 persons reside in Metro Manila and the adjoining regions of Central Luzon and Southern Tagalog. To support this large population for their energy needs, the country is largely dependent on crude and coal import besides its own resources of geothermal, hydro and wind power. In terms of power mix, oil consist of just 8% as compared to coal (25%), geo (18%), hydro (16%) and natural gas (32%) in this country but majority of same is imported.

Source : http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshowpics/3095992.cms

As far as transport sector is concerned, it’s primarily dependent on fossil fuels with nearly 5.53 million registered vehicles with an average growth rate of 4.55%. In Metro Manila, transport is augmented by three main railway networks LRT (Manila Light Rail Transit System), MRT (Manila Metro Rail Transit System) & PNR Philippine National Railways. Besides road transport, there are busy seaports and aviation traffic consuming a good share of petroleum products. Manila has an advantage of its proximity with the sea where pollutants emitted from motor vehicles is soon converted to secondary aerosol particles thus preventing inhalation of toxic fine particles by people. But still there is matter of concern because ambient levels of pollutants like oxides of sulphur and nitrogen and particulate matter are significantly higher than WHO guideline values. A recent study by Greenbaum and co-workers from the Health Effects Institute USA found that in Asian countries including the Philippines there are high levels of particulate matter>100 μg/m3 and the probability rate of illness and death increase at ~0.5% with every increase of 10 μg/m3 of PM10. To curb this pollution and mounting health problem, the transport sector plays a significant role. However the question is how fuel quality, meeting Euro 4 standards becomes crucial to lower the environmental impact of motor vehicle emissions.

For this we need to understand that a comprehensive pollution control strategy consists of advanced vehicle technology, clean fuels, stringent vehicle I&M Programmes and better transport infrastructure & planning. To achieve better outcome it is important that fuels and vehicles are looked upon as a system and policies are designed in that direction. There is no doubt that substantial cost involved in upgrading technology for fuels and vehicles but if we look at economic terms, the benefits of clean vehicles and fuels will certainly far outweigh the costs. Though if I look from a common man perspective I need to make him understand why fuel quality is so important?

Fuel quality is important as performance of exhaust treatment emissions especially particulate trap or catalytic converter device for gasoline and diesel powered vehicles depend on the sulphur content of fuel. The different parameters of fuels in a way are indicative of their pollution potential; for instance fuel Sulphur is responsible for emission of oxides of nitrogen, carbon & sulphur, hydrocarbons, particulate and toxics both is gasoline and diesel. The efficiency of diesel fuel in the form of Cetane Number indicates better combustion thus lower hydrocarbons and oxides of carbon and nitrogen. Similarly in the case of gasoline parameters such as Reid Vapor Pressure (responsible for emission of oxides of carbon, nitrogen, hydrocarbon etc.), Aromatics and Benzene (cause toxics, particulate and oxides of nitrogen),Oxygenates (responsible for carbon monoxide), olefins (affect reactivity and toxicity) and Distillation cut (affects hydrocarbons and oxides of nitrogen) are important. World over greater emphasis is being given to fuel sulphur as it immediately helps to lower sulphur dioxide (from Existing Vehicles both old and new), particulate matter (diesel powered vehicles), oxides of carbon/ nitrogen and hydrocarbons from vehicles equipped with catalytic devices. The advanced vehicle technologies of Euro 4 standards or higher can work efficiently only with fuel with lower sulphur content as high sulphur cause poisoning of catalytic converter. Further, the attempt of make existing vehicle clean by retrofit technologies will also work more efficiently and effectively with low sulphur fuel.

Looking at the Philippines, the move from Euro I to Euro II has significantly helped to lower emissions but still the vehicle technology is underachiever if being run on low quality fuel. In order to meet desirable air quality and better health for people, it is time to leapfrog to Euro 4 fuels and reap its health benefits. However to ensure that standards for fuels and vehicles are developed simultaneously; government bodies like the Department for Energy for fuel quality, the Department of Transportation and Communications, the Land Transport Office, the Land Transport Franchising Board, the Department of Trade and Industry, the Department of Science and Technology for complementary vehicle technology need to come forward to act now. There is already a move towards Euro 4 with discussions with various stakeholders; however, to meet Euro 4 standards, supply and demand sides aspects of fuel need to be looked into. The supply of fuel is primarily either through import of products or by refining, in such scenario need for compatible refining capacity is of key importance which involves substantial financial cost.

In most of the Asian countries where tax structure in quite complex, there are concerns by refineries for granting incentives for such leapfrog initiatives. At the same time the Oil Industry has another dimension to add that vehicle effects are much greater than fuel effects in reducing emissions where fuel sulphur is a key enabler and certain parameters have marginal impact on emissions and can be better curbed by improving vehicles technology. In a country like the Philippines where the vehicular fleet consists of new generation of two wheelers, bikes, passenger cars, LCVs, HCVs, SUVs and at the same time old generation of two stroke side cars, jeepney, old trucks/ buses, trailers etc., in such circumstances the Oil Industry have concerns that the impact of fuel quality achieved through huge investment may be diluted, thus regulations for improving fuel quality should adapt to local conditions. This concern is important for Policy makers to decide on cost-effective measures while ensuring local supply security. Looking back again from a common man’s perspective who recognize the ultimate effect in terms of better air quality and environment for himself and his family. I am of the view that though there may be an option of focusing on few fuel parameters, but looking at a bigger picture of World Fuel Quality and Vehicle Technology standards Harmonization, benefits that fuel quality improvement and vehicle technology holds, it is the right time to leapfrog towards Euro 4, where the oil and vehicle industry should be given clear guidelines with time frame and scope of specification changes to move forward.

CO2 EMISSIONS FROM RAILWAYS – USE OF EMISSION FACTORS

2010-05-02T06:19:00.000-07:00

Sudhir Gota

Quantifying emissions from Railways (including LRT/MRT) is really tricky. Some of the variables which often trouble analysts are – use of construction, technology and occupancy factors which can make or break an analysis. Last year, Mikhail Chester brought forward a very interesting analysis on complete carbon footprint of transport modes and this study was critically accepted. The study provided a comprehensive environmental life-cycle assessment of not only vehicle and fuel components but also infrastructure components for automobiles, buses, commuter rail systems and aircraft. Many processes were included for vehicles (manufacturing, active operation, inactive operation, maintenance, insurance), infrastructure (construction, operation, maintenance, parking, insurance), and fuels (production, distribution). The vehicles inventoried in the study were sedans, pickups, SUVs, urban diesel buses, light rail, heavy rail and aircraft.

The important argument made by Chester was that one needs to closely look at the occupancy of Rails and its built infrastructure which often tip the scales. But, more often researchers think that one can always borrow the emission factors from different sources and this would provide some estimates of reasonable accuracy. This is a myth.

In order to demolish the argument of usage of common emission factor, we summarize many of the emission factors [1]available online. The data collation was further helped by inputs from ADB-TA - Reducing Carbon Emissions from Transport Projects.

It is to be noted that emission factors have been quantified using different methodologies with different boundaries. What sets them apart is the huge variation. The variation is between 16 to 1200 g/pkm. The Asian MRT’s which have very high occupancy ratios have values between 20 to 110 g/pkm. Segregating heavy rails, MRT and LRT may help in refining this further. However, it is to be noted that emission factors cannot be constant but dynamic with time in order to reflect changes in design, occupancy and other factors.

Thus, one cannot borrow the emission factor straight away. What one should do is to measure the fuel/electricity consumption to derive emissions. There is no easy way out.

[1] Please send us a request in case you would like to access the sources.

Cartoons as a Mass Communication Strategy for Sustainable Transport

2010-04-21T20:28:00.000-07:00

Sudhir Gota

The first thing most of us often notice in the newspaper is the editorial cartoon – an art of the moment drawn to illustrate message in a comic way. The illustrations often reside in our memory for a long time and thus newspapers use cartoons as a means to provide the knockout punch – to create an immediate impact among the audience.

This benefit of quick impact provides huge potential for educating masses on sustainable transport issues. To initiate the paradigm shift, a huge effort needs to be made in changing the mindset of transport consumers and policy makers. Cartoons in newspapers can provide the not only an easiest way of reaching vast segment of audience– educated to non-educated, children to elders, urban and rural people etc., but also creating lasting impact in few seconds.

When editorial cartoons are supported by think pieces written by editors, policy makers and experts, it creates the momentum at the grass route level thereby increasing the support for the paradigm shift in transport. One needs all the support when trying to create solutions by attacking the demand and breaking the trend of using infrastructure as a magic bullet.

Take the case of Ahmedabad BRTS, where media played a constructive role in highlighting various issues related to BRTS, educating the people and providing constructive criticisms which enabled it to become a best practice BRT in Asia. Without media support, things become very difficult for policy makers and political support for radical actions often evaporates.

In order to capture as to how newspaper cartoons can create lasting impact, transport cartoons from times of India newspaper (TOI) from India where collated from the period January-2008 till now. This newspaper is extremely popular in India and supposed to have the largest circulation among all English-language newspapers in the world. According to some estimates it has a print readership of 13.3 million and its online version reaching a record 159 million page views in May 2009. Scanning through 840 newspaper editions though is a time consuming process, extracted collection is very impressive with many transport related stories being told with simple images.

Studying the cartoons from last early 2008, fuel prices and congestion has been the favorite topic of the artists. In 2008, newspapers used cartoons many a times to create awareness on fuel consumption and rising fuel prices. Climate change and COP discussion was another favorite topic during 2009. Many cartoons were localized to suit domestic audience to create greater impact and many also relied on quotes to add the punch. The stories were conveyed from the perspective of common man.
Though, few cartoons took potshots against Delhi BRT, many were highlighting the poor pedestrian infrastructure. Surprisingly, considering very high accident fatalities, not many cartoons highlighted the road safety aspects.

Please find some of the collection below. Please source all the cartoons to Times of India and do send them positive feedback and request for more transport related cartoons @http://epaper.timesofindia.com/index.asp. Many a times such efforts can create lasting impression and thus resulting in better outreach.

See the cartoons @ http://cleanairinitiative.org/portal/system/files/Times_of_India.pptx

FREIGHT TRANSPORT – THE MISSING LINK

2010-03-26T04:47:00.000-07:00

Sudhir Gota

Will more trucks on more roads yield higher GDP?

Under the changing climate many cities are initiating several city based passenger transport strategies to combat growing externalities from transport. When we hear interviews, read papers – we often see policy makers charting down the magic bullets to solve the negative spillovers from transport and most often they overlook one vital clog in the wheel – freight transport.

In Asian countries, trucks are the most visible freight carriers with mini vans playing significant roles within cities. The truck-freight growth often shadows GDP growth rates thus making policy makers assume that more trucks on road would invariably mean spiraling increase in GDP. More often this is misapprehension.

Though trucks offer highest flexibility, increase in trucks means high rebound congestion with each additional truck slowing down others and thus ensuring that that we are moving our freight while accelerating the consumption of valuable resources. In order to keep the movement easy on the pocket we often subsidize diesel with devastating consequences.

The other misapprehension floating in the market which many agencies quote is

“Equipment utilization rates for the trucking fleet, which average 60,000 km to 100.000 km per truck-year, are less than a quarter o f those in developed economies”

This is used as a basis for expanding roads without realizing the fact that average trucks in developed countries cover the same distances.

In order to understand the importance of trucks on environment and transport, let’s consider the case of China;

“Diesel vehicles (majority freight) constitute only 12% of total fleet in 2005. Since they are commercially operated, they travel length and breadth of the country accumulating mileages. This increases the share of diesel in total vehicle kilometer travel to nearly 29%. Since the trucks operate at low economy and efficiency, the share of diesel vehicle in total CO2 jumps to 72% and in PM emissions to 91%!!”

Or Thailand

“The share of total energy consumption is 51% for the freight transport mode, 32% for the nonurban passenger transport mode and 17% for the urban transport mode”

Or India

“Unfortunately the rail road mode share competition does not replicate zeno’s paradox. In 1950’s the rail-road ton-km share was 90%-10%. In 2000 it is 27%-73%. Volume in both the sectors show positive growth but rail represents slow growth, road represents high. With government doubling the investments on super highways roads would continue to attract more freight in future.

It’s clear that the freight contribution in transport is huge and thus provides the most opportunities. There are many reasons for the inefficiency in the Asian logistics sector, prime being fragmented market.

Majority of trucking industry is divided with multiple operators. Consider China, where majority oftrucking companies have on average around one truck and fewer than two employees. A decade earlier, India had 77% of fleet under operators owning 5 trucks or less and now 86% of total fleet is still under unorganized operators.

With no coordination this leads to high deadheading. In fact in many Asian countries deadheading amounts to nearly 30-40% of total truck VKT. There are ripple effects of such deadheading. In order to maximize the loaded movements, the operators have to resort to overloading which not only aggravates the injury to the road pavement but also consumes high energy. More often due to overloading, in order to silence the authorities, the truck drivers pay a huge bribe.

Having small operators’ to dominate the field mean that the vehicles being used to transport freight are not only old but also are size in-efficient. In fact the ratios in China and India are approximately 1:1 of truck trailers to truck tractors. This ratio is often 2-3 : 1 in developed countries. The impact of such inefficient vehicle fleet does not only pinch the pockets of operator but also the tax payers as higher axle loading of 2-3 axle trucks damages the road thus requiring frequent strengthening.

The pavement damages by overloaded trucks not only pinches the taxpayers’ pockets but also chokes the lungs and damages the environment as more often it disturbs the balance in speeds – first effect being reduction in average speeds to less than 20 kmph to tackle poor roads, the authorities starts slowly rebuilding the roads thus draining the resources and environment further and as soon as the roads are finished it increases the speeds beyond normal or beyond the limit where one can save energy thus increasing the fuel consumption.

It’s no surprise that authorities are changing the codes fast. Over the past decades many countries have increased the legal axle limits to accommodate such higher axle loads. India’s legal single axle load limit is now 10.2 tons, which used to be 8.16 tons decade earlier. Thailand’s maximum axle load limit is 8.2 tonnes while the truck-load limit is 25 tonnes, which was increased from 21 tonnes in 2006.

The impact of thicker pavement and overloading on environment is so complex that it is a detailed study topic inUC Berkeley Center for Future Urban Transport where many people are researching on it.

In the urban environment, the impact needs to be understood from the perspectives of traffic management and air pollution. Cities build bypasses after bypasses to push the trucks out of city limits which boomerangs with disastrous consequences because of sprawl and city freight distribution. In a city like Tianjin (China), trucks contribute 44% of PM and 54% of NOx emissions.

Consider the case of Delhi, experts here used the traffic management option commonly adopted in Asia i.e. to ban truck movement in daytime. Though this initially reduced the PM levels during the daytime, however, due to the rapid growth in truck numbers during the night time, the contribution of trucks to day-time PM levels is increasing as night time emissions linger into the daytime.

The problem is further compounded when there are multiple agencies having stakes in freight movement. One of the studies from Philippines listed down 41 agencies/organizations/institutions which needs to be brought together to discuss solutions.

Clearly, the magnitude of issues dictate urgent actions.

Wait for the next blog for solutions...

Transport Infrastructure Efficiency

2010-03-17T05:13:00.000-07:00

Which kind of transport investments are the most efficient?

Sudhir Gota

This question bothers many policy makers. Answering this question is rather difficult as different projects require different scale of investments which carry variable load and satisfies diverse set of consumers. Also it would be wrong to assume that we can always build different alternatives physically having same bunch of people using it.

Knowing the above limitations, we can still assess efficiency of infrastructure requiring different set of investments – from High Cost such as Metro, to median ranged projects such as BRTS, Roads to low cost projects such as bikelanes and footpaths.

Let’s consider the following projects – Metro, BRTS, Expressway of 4 lane, two lane urban in high income zone, two lane urban in Low income zone, Bikeways and Footpaths and thus using the law of averages to evaluate the construction cost efficiency.

In order to compare efficiency – one needs average capacity and average cost. Let’s make an assumption as detailed in below table.

	Capacity (average person/hour)	Cost (million USD)
1 km of Footpath of 2m wide	2400	0.1
1 km of Bikeways of 3m wide	3000	0.15
1km of two lane urban (Low income)	4500	1
1km of two lane urban (high income)	2600	1
1 km of Expressway of 4 lane	8500	3.5
1 km of BRTS	16000	2
1 km of Metro	60000	35

1. The Metro represented here is a replica of Bangalore Metro being constructed now. Its estimated to cost 35 million USD/Km.

2. BRTS – The BRTS taken above satisfies 8000 pphpd and costs 2 million USD/Km. this represents an average BRTS which is being constructed in many Asian cities.

3. Roads are tricky as they can carry a highly variable set of volume. So let’s assume LOS “B” and and 7% as peak hour volume. Lets also assume that a freight vehicle is equivalent to a vehicle carrying 15 passengers. ( this thumb rule matches with Value of time concept)

a. consider 35000 PCU/Day for Expressway – 4 lane

b. consider 15000 PCU/day for 2 lane urban road

c. Occupancy of 1,2,1.5 and 25 for two, three wheeler, car and Bus

d. Assume 50% mode share of freight in expressway and 9% in urban roads ( data Indian Roads)

e. Assume 55% two wheelers in low income and 55% Cars in high income areas

f. The other mode share epitomizes typical Asian roads ( 6% of vehicles as Bus)

4. Use Passenger Car Units to convert PCU’s into vehicles and then using occupancies break down the vehicles into passengers

5. Consider Bikelanes to carry 3000 cyclists/hour suggesting a dense network as seen in Delhi BRTS costing 0.15 million USD/km

6. Consider footpaths to carry 2400 persons/hour at a speed of 1.2 m/sec indicating LOS B. It may cost approx ) 1million USD/km.

Using the same money as required for constructing 1 km metro, one can on an average construct

18 km of BRTS
10 km of four lane Expressway
35 km of two lane urban road
235 km of Bikeways
350 km of footpaths

Thus normalizing different projects into same investment of say 1 km of metro and thus using the capacities and length, we can calculate efficiencies.

The below graph gives the efficiencies

The low cost projects such as bikeways and footpaths in fact provide best efficiency!!

They are 12 to 14 times more efficient than a system like metro. The above calculations can be made more useful by including operation costs and emissions. But the footpaths and bikelanes would be the winners but they often receive least attention and funding.

HIDDEN EMISSIONS FROM TRANSPORT

2010-02-02T22:11:00.001-08:00

Sudhir Gota

Latest news from Mumbai got many people excited about Monorails and its impact on emissions. The news report claimed that on an average the mono rail would save 3500 tons/year/km. This kick started a debate on emissions savings from metro rail projects and its hidden component – construction emissions. The debate pitchforked the main issue of infrastructure construction as a significant component of transport emissions. Experts believe that we do a great disservice to entire emissions argument from transport by not considering such hidden aspects and we need to consider whole emissions argument from transport with a pinch of salt. Researchers like Mikhail Chester have proved that Construction is significant component of total life cycle and should not be neglected.

Gigantic infrastructure projects take ages to plan, get approved, and finally to get implemented in a developing country. Bangalore metro substantiates the above statement. Mass rapid system in Bangalore have been studied from past late 1980’s and it was only until in early 2000’s that some actual planning was initiated. Main construction for approx 40 km of metro was initiated in 2006 and the people would only get a chance to experience the system in the year 2012. By the time metro starts chugging along the Bangalore streets, things would have changed. This argument is in fact more worrisome for elevated roads and isolated flyovers which take two years as an approximate to complete in a city like Bangalore. While the traffic suffers, emission gets multiplied and finally it opens to jam-packed traffic created by land use manipulations by builders anticipating zero congestion.

Massive projects require huge quantities of material, machinery and workers which create many leakages in emission profile. Research coming out from Japan reinforces this argument that expensive metro can in fact accumulate high intensity of emissions during construction. Researchers from Nagoya university have estimated that a station of the Superconducting MAGLEV generates emissions of magnitude 2,430[t-C/station] during construction only. Many researchers in order to to simply the calculations argue that only the emissions generated during material production be considered as a basis. But then, research also suggests that material movement, use, disposal can accrue 42% of production emissions.

The above argument looks minute in nature if we consider emissions quantified from Cairo Subway which shows that construction emissions are equivalent to 28 years of operation emissions !!

This above arguments raises an important related question –

would High speed rails really save emissions?

There has been tremendous push for such massive projects in developing countries in the name of climate change. Do we really need such expensive solutions to “reduce” emissions? Literature suggests that high speed rails emit approx 73 grams/passengerkm during operations. Indian railways preliminary estimates suggest that a High-Speed Rail consumes 0.933 litres of fuel per 100 km travelled, in comparison to the 4.04 litres consumed by an airplane and 5.69 litres consumed by an economy car. But, what remains hidden in the entire argument is fact about construction emission. Experts have suggested that high-speed rail can produce some 10 million metric tons of CO2 per year during construction.

Back of the envelope calculations suggest that a kilometer of high speed rail would cost anything from 10-20 million $/km in developing countries when neglecting land costs. Even if we blindly assume that emissions are being saved by such corridors, can developing countries really afford it?

We need more debate and need to see more numbers as massive construction can really change the game!!

“HYBRIDS” RULE PHILIPPINES STREETS – PART 1

2009-11-28T02:29:00.000-08:00

By, Sudhir Gota

‘Josephine Guittu ‘drives a Hybrid for living in Manila.

In case if you are wondering if he has cracked the “technology” barrier to own a cheap non polluting vehicle then you are mistaken. Instead, few weeks earlier he used to be a part of problem which makes millions sick in Philippines i.e. air pollution. He used to drive what can be described as a modified re- engineered two wheeler with a sidecar, powered by a polluting non-efficient two stroke engine. He used to drive across the local streets in Manila, ferrying 2-6 people at one time, creating a visible “wave of smoke” from the tailpipe across the city. When the distance travelled is as high as 100 km/day, the problem is definitely injurious.

But past few weeks have transformed his life as he proudly displays a new four stroke tricycle which “pollutes” less and he saves valuable imported fuel while providing transport solution to poor-middle class people. He was extremely lucky to be a part of 20 drivers who got help from the government and other stakeholders like “Partnership for Clean Air” in becoming less polluting. They designed a revolving-fund scheme to grave his two stroke out of the system.

But, there are thousands of “Josephine Guittu” still waiting for help while people breath polluted air in Manila.

My colleague ‘Bert Fabian’ considers tricycles to be a tri-dimensional problem: “it’s a political, social and transport issue”. He is correct when he says that it’s beyond “cradle to grave” issue for the policymakers. It’s a “political” and “social” problem which needs equal attention. A typical tricycle driver earns daily 100-150 pesos on an average which forces him to have insufficient food and worse quality of life. Research has shown that driving in polluted environment and having insufficient food results in many health issues including very low blood vitamin C levels. But theyare helpless!

More and more people venture into the tricycle market due to ballooning unemployment, raising congestion and demand for more mobility. With limited number of old tricycles getting out of system and huge number of tricycles getting inside the system, even tricycle operators can see the reduction in the size of the “pie” of commuters. With increasing competition, comes increased fatality. Already 54% of all injuries occurring in Philippines are street-induced. Thus, high number of problems associated with its unique role in providing cheap (approx 10 pesos for 5 km is a bargain considering its accessibility) mobility, the issue needs immediate solutions.

Government and other agencies have been trying to use different strategies based on “convenience” to reduce the environmental impact thus facing limited success. Many strategies have been tested under different areas with different support system namely -

1. Tricycle capping by Coding scheme, Volume reduction program, Phase-out etc.
2. Identifying illogical operators (anti-colorum drive)
3. Tricycle lanes
4. Regularization with common color per zone
5. Integrated terminals
6. Restricted accessibility with speed controls
7. Promotion of four-strokes and alternative fuels etc.
8. Promotion of human powered transport
But, the problem is “magnitude”.

There are over 73,000 Two-Stroke tricycles in Metro manila alone. Research suggests that delaying action is expensive and unhealthy as it generates 22% more emissions and fuel use if tricycles in manila would be replaced in 10 years instead of 5 years. By acting within 5 years and replacing all two strokes we can save over 26 million liters of gasoline and 13000 tons of PM over next 20 years. This is a highly conservative estimate assuming that in no action scenario there would be only normal scrappage with slow replacement.

In fact, new replacement costs are 110 million$ for replacing all two strokes, with 20 million$ average savings/year for 20 years. In simple terms – we have to act fast as it makes a perfect economic-health sense. Designing a revolving fund with aggressive replacements can reduce the chunk of money involved but maximize the environmental benefits.

Dr. Manuel M. Biona who specializes in treating “tricycles” believes that “retrofits” can solve environmental problems of two strokes as many solutions are being designed which would further reduce the costs and maximize the social benefits. When I quiz him for the technological solutions being developed he suggests some phrases which sends my imagination for a toss - Gasoline Direct Injection Retrofitting, Four Stroke Engine Repowering, LPG Direct Injection Retrofitting and LPG Four Stroke Engine Repowering. Many solutions being developed needs governmental support in piloting in order to select the best performer in the group.

Also, considering the filipino ingenuity in keeping “alive” their tricycles we have to ensure that technology and non-technology solutions are cemented by political will to transform cities. We have to think of “sticks” with “carrots” like micro-financing schemes. When I describe the term stick – I mean regulation which is often lacking. Many drivers themselves know that by regulating we can increase the efficiency and income per driver but we often fail to react on time or take decision. The key to the solution is to design “micro finance scheme” with low interest rates for low income owners and drivers who can use the monthly money to pay back the funds. History has shown limited success if we don’t rely on low initial cost and low interest rates. Designing innovative “insurance” and “marketing” schemes is another option for the policy makers. This coupled with aggressive management strategies for limiting the numbers of tricycles and increasing the human transport facilities we can transform cities in Philippines.

Carrots with Stick can make “immortal” two stroke tricycles “mortal”. We just need the will to transform our cities. Thousands of “Josephine Guittu” are waiting for our help while millions are breathing polluted air, there is no time to lose.

Solution for Air Pollution – Kolkata Experience

2009-08-01T23:14:00.000-07:00

Sudhir Gota

Well I am keeping my fingers crossed to see the situation in Kolkata on Monday – August 3/2009. In case you are wondering “what” and “why” Monday – 3rd August is important for all of us – To just backtrack - Monday 3^rd august would be the first working day after the vehicles which are older than 15 years are removed from the active service to reduce the pollution in Kolkata. This means a significant chunk of the public transport and intermediate public transport fleet from the roads. Some estimates suggest that approximately 54% of vehicles are “old” and nearly 65% of vehicle population diesel powered. The problem is so injurious that pollutants like PM 10 exceed standards by 1.5 times.

The battleground was judiciary with environmentalists seeking pollution solution in high court. After many deliberations, court in july-2008 gave a ruling to ban commercial vehicles registered before Jan 1, 1993 from Kolkata and its outskirts. The ruling called for implementation of ruling by 31^st December 2008. Government realizing the magnitude of problem asked for extension until July 31 – 2009. There were efforts by some transporters to cancel the ruling by approaching higher judicial court (Supreme Court) but the strategy didn’t work and thus the ban had to be forcefully implemented by government.

There was lot of debate among stakeholders as to how severe is the problem. Interesting to note here is the debate among government and transporters as to how many buses would be taken off the roads?

Transporters are arguing that 7,000 out of 12,000 buses would be taken off the roads where as government is suggesting that 2,557 buses out of 21,230. This shows the classic case of not knowing the numbers. If we don’t know the numbers then how do we provide solutions? How do we plan alternate solutions? This takes us back to the question about the preparations for such a ban? What has the government done to provide an alternate solution to the people relying on such facility for transport and earning livelihood?

This question is in everybody’s mind and many kolkatans are bracing up for chaotic next week. I will not be surprised if the city comes to halt on Monday. Adhoc implementation without thinking of alternate solutions pushes people towards private transport. Latest statistics from ministry of Urban Development revel that nearly 58% of people rely on public transport and taxis for their daily travel. How do we accommodate their needs without investing on solutions for them? If every one of us are using green cars do we all really move?

I was surprised to find that Indian government even after launching the urban transport policy still thinks that flyovers are one of the major solutions to air pollution problem. If you don’t believe me than you should read this.

A New and Improved Manila?

2009-07-23T22:59:00.000-07:00

Britanny Cheng

Clean Air Initiative for Asian Cities Center

Standing on EDSA, I wave a bus down and soon a gigantic, smoking heap of metal barrels down the road and suddenly stops less than a foot away from me. I don’t know whether to be impressed by the driver’s spatial awareness or to be frightened that I was almost run over by the bus. I decided on neither and got on the bus; after all, it is my only way to get to work. I quietly sit down on a torn cushion seat and quickly hug my bag close to my body; a habit I have formed to protect my belongings. The bus stands still for another 5 minutes in a futile effort to gain more passengers. Finally, it moves and skilfully weaves out of the bus-ridden lane from whence it came. As the bus noisily rushes through EDSA, my body starts to feel a little numb; it is not used to the constant shaking of the bus. Then, the bus abruptly slows down and squeezes itself into the opposite lane to pick up more passengers. I can’t help but grow irritated at the constant stops of the bus. Again, I wait for the bus driver to give up and continue its course to my work place. However, a street vendor hops on the bus and attempts to sell newspapers and candies while the bus is standing still. Fortunately, immediately after the vendor steps off, the bus was on its way again. I finally arrived at my destination and noticed that the trip from my house in Cubao to my office in Ortigas took an hour and a half; that’s a new speed record. Today was just another weekday at work, but to most readers, this may have sounded like one bad day.

To my surprise, LTFRB chairman Alberto Suansing announced the removal of 4000 buses from the streets of EDSA. To say that my feelings were conflicting was an understatement. A part of me wanted to jump out of joy because I no longer had to fear for my life every single day; however, a part of me was worried about the consequences this sudden change may bring to this already troubled city of Manila. Buses themselves are not the problem. It’s perhaps the whole system. My experience in Singapore and other “richer” cities with buses is actually very pleasant. The buses are quite comfortable and usually reach the destination much quicker -- and definitely much cheaper compared to taxis. Also, a polluting bus may also be equally pollutive as 20 cars. Of course along EDSA, thousands of cars pass everyday. Just imagine how much they contribute to air pollution. I do not support the total abolishment of buses; these are critical assets to Manila’s public transportation; they are cheap, efficient and if maintained properly, eco-friendly. The intention of adding buses is to provide jobs and meet the public’s demand of public transportation; however, the excess of buses actually aggravates the problem rather than solve it, which is its original intention.

I hope that this initiative results in the improvement of the over-all bus system and looking at improving its services for the majority of poor passengers in the metropolis.

TRANSPORT REFUGEES – VICTIMS OF UNJUST TRANSPORT POLICIES

2009-07-17T02:33:00.000-07:00

Sudhir Gota and Bert Fabian

Clean Air Initiative for Asian Cities Center

Becoming “refugees” in our own cities

According to international refugee law , a refugee is someone who seeks refuge in a foreign country because of war and violence, or out of fear of persecution "on account of race, religion, nationality, political opinion, or membership in a particular social group”. Authors draw parallel from the term “refugee” in order to emphasize the growing social discrimination and exclusion of vulnerable road users while making transport decisions.

The authors have investigated various documents and newsreports to argue as to how we are increasingly becoming victims of our own solutions and thus becoming refugees in our own lands. In the subsequent sections, the authors have tried to explore various issues in order to prove this facet, while the WHO (2009) in the latest study provides a very good summary of victimization of vulnerable people.

“Our roads are particularly unsafe for pedestrians, cyclists and motorcyclists who, without the protective shell of a car around them, are more vulnerable. These road users need to be given increased attention. Measures such as building sidewalks, raised crossings and separate lanes for two wheelers; reducing drink-driving and excessive speed; increasing the use of helmets and improving trauma care are some of the interventions that could save hundreds of thousands of lives every year. While progress has been made towards protecting people in cars, the needs of these vulnerable groups of road users are not being met”

The externalities of transport

Outdoor air pollution alone causes an estimated 800,000 deaths each year. Research from the East & West Center based in Hawaii, U.S. on commuter’s exposure to PM 10 while walking in Hanoi (2006) are as high as 495µg/m3. The Health Effects Institute hospital and household studies in Ho Chi Minh City (2007) found a strong link between air pollution, especially ozone and NO2, and health impacts on young children in the form of acute lower respiratory illness.

In a 2009 survey, one in every five people in Hong Kong said they were considering leaving the city because of the air pollution. One in 10 was either seriously considering leaving or already in the process of leaving. Also results indicated that severest health effects aggravated by air pollution are associated with income with poor people as major sufferers.

The WHO in a 2009 study estimates around 150,000 deaths occurring in low-income countries each year due to climate change from four climate-sensitive health outcomes – crop failure and malnutrition, diarrheal disease, malaria and flooding. 85% of these excess deaths were found in younger children.

According to latest WHO estimates, nearly 1.27 million people die in road traffic crashes every year. In addition, road crashes cause between 20 million and 50 million non-fatal injuries every year and are an important cause of disability. Important aspects to be noted are:

• High share of “vulnerable group” in the traffic accidents. In fact, in low-income countries of South East Asia over 80% of those killed are vulnerable road users
• Over 90% of the world’s fatalities on the roads occur in low-income and middle-income countries which has 48% of vehicles
• 32% of countries in world have national or local level policies on walking and cycling
• 50% of world’s population lives in countries which do not have speed limits on urban roads (of less than or equal to 50 kmph) and for the countries which have some sort of speed limits, enforcement is very poor (in a rating evaluation only 9% of countries scored 7 or more in the range 1-10)
• Projections suggest that road traffic fatalities would be the fifth leading cause of death by 2030 with an estimated 2.4 million fatalities per year

Data from many cities (Pakistan, Nepal, Thailand, India and Philippines) suggest that average ambient noise levels range from 50-100 with 112db being maximum. Research on noise pollution is indicating that it causes more deaths when compared to heart disease. There is growing evidence that noise pressure levels exceeding 50 db(A) during night time are related to the development of high blood pressure and exceeding 65 db(A) during day time increases the risk for heart attacks in men. Research (footnote 6) indicates that, In a German city “Cologne”, for every third household moving out of city, noise and air pollution in the city was a crucial reason. It is to be noted that people walking, cycling and using public transport face the highest exposure thus are at greatest risk.

Urban sprawl induced development

Asian cities undergo a “push-pull” phenomenon. Many people are abandoning the cities in search of better quality of life and environment and moving out of such cities (push), on the other hand, there are still a high number of people migrating into such decaying cities in order to make a living (pull). Also, the trend of ‘slush and burn development’ is on the raise in many Asian cities. Private real estate developers are developing various periphery business districts and new commercial areas while abandoning the old decaying sections of the city in order to generate the economic boom. This kind of development needs to be understood in context of poor people.

The UN Food and Agriculture Organization report points out that the overwhelming majority of the hungry live in the developing world with 65% of them in just seven countries - India, China, The Democratic Republic of Congo, Indonesia, Bangladesh, Pakistan and Ethiopia. Majority of such poor migrate to cities and live in slums next to major corridors. Some reports indicate that Asian cities currently accommodate nearly 60% of total world’s slum population. In Delhi, approximately 45% of population are clustered into slums and live in inhuman conditions and have to face transport discrimination daily.

Sometimes the cleansing, densification and beatification process carried out for city development (sometimes solutions such as transport focused development which induces sprawl along public transport routes) creates more victims then solutions. Major benefits accrued by land because of such transport development are squeezed by rich people thus further marginalizing the poor.

Reports from Mumbai indicate that 1,5000 million INR Dharavi Redevelopment Project (DRP) is being opposed the very expert committee which was authorized by government. Reports indicate that the reason being possible damage to the livelihood of local people as well as the burden it will add to an already-densely populated area. Some reports indicate that from a city like Chennai alone about 100,000 people will be shifted out of the city as part of a clean-up. A news report quotes Jeb Brugmann as saying

“I have studied migrant communities in several places and one thing that stands out is that they all have a unique psychological profile — they are risk-takers with a strong entrepreneurial drive. Shifting these people to the margins, cutting them off from resources and opportunities is only a recipe for revolution,”

Several research papers have documented the impact of rail system on Bangkok landmarket. It is true that Bangkok has seen some transformation because of improvement in public transport facilities. But not many people have documented the impact of such projects on vulnerable people. ADB’s Urban Transport Project in Bangkok has documented some impact of the ADB’s urban transport project. Nearly 1220 households had to be relocated. The Performance Evaluation Report notes that

1. Increase in commercial area around the corridors ( exploitation of land for commercial reasons)
2. Of every 100 vehicles on the roads that benefit from the project road, 45% of the persons in them are estimated to be bus passengers.

3. Although the information is patchy, the main conclusion is that the relocation has not improved the lives of the relocated people because of project. The main issues were increased travel distances to work and separation from relatives. There were indications that a portion of the resettlers had become worse off: 49% had economic problems, and 44% took more time to travel, with only 9% taking less time.

With such increasing challenges, research from India and China indicate that people spend more on transport then on housing, health and education. With increasing prices, people tend to consume less food in order to afford higher transport costs.

Subsidizing the rich at the cost of the poor and the underprivileged

In 2008, increase in fuel prices severely affected governments that subsidized fuels. Fuel subsidies cost annually about 0.1-15 billion USD across various countries. The Indonesian government acknowledged that “with the increasing fuel subsidy, the government’s ability to fund programs which are oriented to the improvement of lives for the poor has dramatically reduced. These programs include education, health facilities, National Program for Community Empowerment, small business credit facilities, and the development of infrastructure. On the other hand, the fuel subsidy is mainly consumed by those who are not targeted by the program. As much as 40 percent of high income families benefit from 70 percent of the subsidy, while 40 percent of the lowest income families only benefit only 15 percent.”

The Elite and poor Neighborhoods in New Delhi

A recent walkability survey in Delhi by CSE, points out the deficiency in investment planning. It evaluated pedestrian facilities in a low income neighborhood with a high income neighborhood and found that- In Govindpuri (low income neighborhood) where about 100 persons walk per five minutes during peak hour had poorly foor facilities and in Aurangzeb Road (high income neighborhood) lined with ministerial bunglows, where only 3 persons were seen walking in ten minutes during the morning peak hour, has well designed and spacious footpaths.

Banning Cycle Rickshaws in New Delhi

In May 2006, the High Court of Delhi passed an order directing the municipal government to stop granting licenses for cycle rickshaws on Delhi roads, complete a ban on use of cycle rickshaws in Delhi's Chandni Chowk area, and introduce compressed natural gas buses in the area to replace the rickshaws. The reason citied was high congestion caused by cycle rickshaws. Estimates suggested that cycle rickshaws save more than 10 million motorized trips daily across the capital. Infuriated by the authority’s unjust intervention, many NGO’s fought the battle in judicial courts.
Many studies were quoted in the exchange. According to the latest reports, the Delhi High Court took an exception to the ‘unrealistic approach’ of the New Delhi Municipal Council (NDMC) in banning cycle-rickshaws in parts of the capital and slammed it for not fixing a limit on the number of cars a person can possess.

It suggested - ‘We find the guidelines are unrealistic. Why are you so enthusiastic in banning cycle-rickshaws? Why don’t you issue guidelines limiting the number of cars a person can have in the city?’
Though the court battle is still on but the condition of cycle rickshaw drivers have deteriorated over time due to harassment by authorities and fellow motorists. According to a survey by ITDP, the majority of cycle rickshaw drivers (54%) were landless laborer and over 30% were small/marginal farmers with majority of them illiterate. Their earnings from running the cycle rickshaw was around 2$-6$ per day.
It is to be noted that there has been no reports on reduction in congestion at the places where ban took place.

Banning Cycle Rickshaws in Dhaka

One of the main reasons of Cycle rickshaw growth in Dhaka has been the Dhaka City Corporation (DCC), decision on September 1, 2002 to ban two stroke auto-rickshaws. The demand for informal public transport and short trip lengths (<5km)

DUTP – 1998 report showed that the Rickshaws took only 38% of road space while transporting 54% of passengers in Dhaka. The private cars on the other hand, took up 34% of road space while only transporting 9% of the population.

HDRC study captured the before and after impacts of Cycle rickshaw ban. Few of the conclusions are presented below

a. Average monthly net income of rickshaw pullers decreased by 32%, from3,834 to 2,600 taka

b. The amount of money sent back to their villages also declined following the ban. Before the ban, on average rickshaw pullers spent 64% of net income and sent the rest (36%) to his village. Following the ban, the amount spent in Dhaka decreased by 27%, while the amount sent to the village decreased by41%.

c. Pullers compensated for loss of income by reducing food consumption, particularly of fish, meat, and cooking oil: for NMT pullers overall, 85.9%decreased their consumption of fish, 87.5% decreased consumption of meat,65.1% decreased consumption of cooking oil, and over half (55.3%) decreased consumption of vegetables.

d. There was an increase in the number of income earners in the family from 1.24 to 1.37. This suggests that some children have been taken out of school to compensate for lost income, or that the burden on wives of the pullers have further increased as they must earn money as well as do all the family and household labor.

Sharifa Begum et al. did research on income and poverty aspects of cycle rickshaw drivers and concluded that

a. urban rickshaw pullers in Dhaka come from very poor economic backgrounds consistent with the characteristics of chronic poverty

b. rickshaw pulling provides a route for modest upward mobility for those chronic rural poor who come to the city for work.

c. rickshaw pullers are susceptible to systematic health risks; deteriorating health, combined with health shocks, can impose a significant burden on the urban poor, dragging down the pace of upward mobility during their lifetime.

d. rickshaw pulling represents an unsustainable livelihood, as the initial welfare gains taper off with length of involvement in the sector.

e. intergenerational mobility of rickshaw-puller households is constrained by very limited schooling and the poor range of occupational choices for children.

Before and after studies conducted on some roads proved that there was no travel time gain for fuel dependent vehicle was achieved due to rickshaw ban but instead over the years the travel times for buses did undergo significant deterioration with a 26.1% increase of travel times. Also for shorter trips, there was significant increase in travel time due to non availability of transport-mode.

It can be derived from various research reports that banning cycle rickshaws do not serve any purpose and instead efforts should be made to improve the life of such people by offering them security and benefits. Banning is not a solution as it does not improve the congestion of city, road safety and life of such drivers but instead restricts the accessibility, mobility and increases motorization and environmental damage.

How about the old & persons with disabilities?

There are nearly 207 million aged (65 or>65 years) people in Asia (constituting approx 6% of total population). With mandatory retirement age of 55-60 years , and with huge proportion of older people being poorest people all their life with no savings , aged people become dependent on families as governments in many countries don’t play an active role in providing benefits across various dimensions. From the transport sector, in many countries it does not provide any relief but acts as a catalyst in aggravating the problems. Consuming polluted air for major part of life and travelling in torturous transport services over the later part of the years inflates the problems. Inefficient public transport services with encroached non-motorized facilities by traffic leaves them with little options. Research indicates that very few old people access public transit services in developed countries but its opposite in Asia.

The old people who manage to use public transport facilities often find themselves in mercy of crowded fellow passengers for getting a seat. Deprived of accessibility and mobility over the years, people are left to fend themselves from high motorization externalities.

Some Asian governments provide little transport-finance incentives such as
1. The Government of India has provided a 50% discount for bus transportation for older people (in one state free transportation is allowed on city buses)
2. In Nepal, the elderly get a 25% discount on transportation courtesy Nepalese Municipal Authority.
3. For the elderly in Thailand, only half price is charged for third-class journeys from June to September

Reports suggest that only about 15% of the loco motor disabled in India are able to use public transport. The term “barrier free” movement is yet a vision in Asian cities (exceptions include some developed cities such as Hong Kong and some Japanese cities). Experience from Philippines suggests that only 2 percent of children with disabilities have access to elementary education with the major barrier being “absence of accessible transportation”.

The following is an excerpt from the Persons with Disabilities Act from Malaysia, Philippines and India -
Malaysia (2008) - Access to public transport facilities – “Persons with disabilities shall have the right to access to and use of public transport facilities, amenities and services open or provided to the public on equal basis with persons without disabilities”

Philippines - Batas Pambansa Bilang 344 (National Law), Accessibility Law in 1983: purpose of enhancing the mobility of persons with disabilities by requiring public utilities to install facilities to make transportation accessible. Enactment of Republic Act 7277 provides in Section 25 thereof for a barrier-free environment

India (1995) - the act emphasizes the need for access of children with disabilities to school. It further suggests
a. adapt rail compartments, buses, vessels and aircrafts in such a way as to permit easy access to such persons;
b. adapt toilets in rail compartments, vessels, aircrafts and waiting rooms in such a way as to permit the wheel chair users to use them conveniently.
c. installation of auditory signals at red lights in the public roads for the benefit of persons with visual handicap;
d. causing curb cuts and slopes to be made in pavements for the easy access of wheel chair users;
e. engraving on the surface of the zebra crossing for the blind or for persons with low vision;
f. engraving on the edges of railway platforms for the blind or for persons with low vision;
g. devising appropriate symbols of disability;
h. warning signals at appropriate places.

Though many cities provide subsidies in tickets, in-accessibility of public transport terminals and vehicles proves to be a major barrier. Even with the passage of such laws, transport in many cities is yet to become disabled friendly.

Recent news reports from Indonesia suggest that “Instead of requiring level footpaths and ramps, lawmakers voted unanimously this month to demand disabled people wear signs announcing their condition so motorists won't run them down as they cross the street.” Though the reports are yet to be confirmed by authors, but if this is true then it indicates further marginalization of persons with disabilities.

And the women?

Marginalization of women in transport can be understood from the fact that gender specific travel data is rarely collected at national and local levels and with such a mindset, rarely it may happen that the “women” were involved in the project design thus making the modes, mindset and infrastructure are rarely feminist sensitive. The transport challenge faced by women stretch across various dimensions such as safety, equity, accessibility and mobility. Transport opportunities often forces women to make restricted choices in employment as they have limited options in accessibility. For example, in one of surveys conducted in Dhaka, About 58% of women regarded the present bus service as overcrowded and accessibility difficult.

Sharifa et al. researched that many of rickshaw drivers in Dhaka who had switched jobs ( due to variety of reasons) had reduced monthly income. The wives of such drivers showed increase in incomes thus indicating more stress and hard work. Experience from Pakistan also indicates the similar story. Reports indicate that “uncivilized behavior” of some of the public transporters and unavailability of public transport are the main reasons for restricted trips.

One of the interesting findings of Metro Manila Urban Transportation Integration Study (1996) was that the trip production rates of women over the years (contrary to the logic where people expect increase) have decreased. In 1980, trip production rates were 2.17 (women) and 2.28 (men) which changed to 1.78 (women) and 2.40 (men). Perhaps due to growing inefficiencies in the transport system, the women were the victims with restricted mobility whereas mobility of men increased.

In one of the surveys in Delhi, it was found that women either travel by foot (54%) or use buses (39%) for work purpose. Important thing to note here is the incidence of women spending 2-3 hours in commuting (17%). This creates high impact as they not only need to undergo longer work hours but also work at home and manage the family chores. Sad part is that they are wasting more time travelling lesser distances then men because of the inefficient transport systems.

What about the people living on streets? Research from Delhi indicate that at any given time, there are 10,000 homeless women in Delhi who live on streets as there are insufficient shelters (3) available for use by homeless women. Such women are not only exposed to the increased risk of illness and starvation associated with life on the street, but also heightened vulnerability to violence.

Does our transport system help them or victimize them further?

Clearly our transport system has become more and more injurious to health and inequitable. Over the years, we have tried to compartmentalize and segregate many of the problems of transport and tried to derive piecemeal / quick fix technical solutions without much success. Congestion costs as accessed by various researchers from various cities range from 1-8% of GDP. Current transport and city design severely restricts the accessibility and limits people earning capability.

Already the citizens are avoiding non motorized trips and shifting to motorized trips in order to escape the discrimination in accessibility and mobility. Several researchers have established that Asian cities which are conducive for walking and cycling with large number of trips with length less than 5 km are increasingly accessed by motorized modes. The cities are yet to invest huge amounts of money on pedestrian accessibility as they are yet to acknowledge pedestrians as road users. Thus it can be concluded that In spite of decades of investment on roads and infrastructure, cities are yet to realize solutions. The problems have magnified and so called solutions have become counterproductive.

There is a huge disconnect between policies, practices and proposed solutions. Past decades of inefficient policies have made us victims of our own solutions. Transport services in cities instead of providing relief; aggravate the problems and causes marginalization of vulnerable group. Increasingly people are getting dissatisfied and becoming “refugees” in their own cities. Thus top of pyramid solutions create more unrest and victims and the need is to plan and provide solutions for vulnerable people.

Transport Planning focused on such refugees would provide equitable solutions!

( note - this study quotes many websites, research papers and news articles. Please contact us in case you would like to have the full references)

MEDIA STUDY OF AHMEDABAD BRTS

2009-07-14T19:09:00.000-07:00

By Sudhir Gota

CAI-Asia Center through the SUMA program and in cooperation with ITDP has provided support to the development of the Ahmedabad BRTS. We have been tracking news articles and online documents related to the development of the Ahmedabad BRTS for some time. The collated information and its review (july 1st week) showed very interesting results.

“Ahmedabad BRTS” search in Google yields approximately 5620 results. Interesting to note here is that of those results, Ahmedabad BRTS is mentioned approximately 220 times by English News agencies.

One of the important lessons learned by experts and stakeholders by Delhi BRTS experience was the role of media and the need to have sustained positive media campaign. Public awareness needs to be started at the grass root levels from project inception stage considering various social issues influenced by the project and this needs to be carried out during the project implementation and the probably with greater intensity during the project operation for few years. It is to be noted that transport projects in developing nations suffer from “ribbon-cutting” syndrome. This syndrome refers to use of media by political class for scoring political points by unveiling massive concrete structures as magic bullet solutions. People used to such media publicity often link immediate relief provided by such solutions as success without thinking of long-term impacts. On the other hand “public transport improvement” projects lack such immediate improvement effect as it generally has impacts over the longer run considering its intrinsic link with behavior aspects. Considering such impacts a different media campaign approach is needed by authorities.

In order to investigate the role played by media in highlighting various public transport issues, CAI-Asia Center surveyed English news agency reports on Ahmedabad BRTS. It is to be noted that this survey is limited to English news agencies and not the entire spectrum of media reports which would be a major limitation of the study. Regional NEWS agencies played a bigger role then English media in Indian cities as the readership levels of regional language newspapers are higher. Nearly 221 English news reports from the year 2005 were collected and analyzed. Of those 221 news reports, 68 news reports were neglected as the Ahmedabad BRTS was not substantially discussed.

The news reports were evaluated using various parameters such as:

1. What were the various issues highlighted?
a. Non Motorized Transport
b. Infrastructure,
c. Economic and financial issues,
d. Bus related articles,
e. Political
f. Environment related articles
g. BRTS and Metro single article
h. Social impact issues
i. Land-use issues
j. Security issues
k. Road safety
l. General articles on BRTS (it captures BRTS awareness, institutional aspects, launching dates etc.)

2. Positive and Negative Reports – Whether news reports highlighted positive or negative issues. The point to be noted is first – if the news captures positive image or negative image. If the news generates negative image – what is the reason behind it? Is the report biased against the BRTS system as a whole or is reporting some implementation issues which is not perfect or in other words is the criticism “constructive” or outright “negative”.

The evaluation showed some surprising results:

1. What were the various issues highlighted?

a. It was surprising to note the high frequency of articles on physical infrastructure (18%). The media also highlighted the general issues in more detail such as “what are BRTS”, “international views”, “institutional aspects, launching dates etc. The media did well in raising BRTS awareness by giving several prominent ‘eye-catching’ articles. In the infrastructure – flyovers took the major share of articles indicating the traditional focus of media. Bus/rolling stock featured in many articles raising the expectations of people. Traffic management issues or construction caused congestion allowed media an opportunity to highlight these issues.

b. The “co-benefits” agenda was not highlighted by the news agencies. There were surprisingly no articles as such on quantum of air pollutant reductions, benefit of BRTS on climate change. There were two news articles that slightly mentioned CDM and BRTS but no substantial discussions. Issues on impact of BRTS on poor and vulnerable section were also not highlighted. There was a single article on BRTS being accessible to the visually impaired. There was also single article on women and few resettlement issues. The officials could have highlighted the impact of improved bus services on the “captive section”. Hawkers did not receive any attention. The non-motorized section also did not receive much media attention with only 4 pedestrian-cyclist oriented articles. Even with shaded exclusive cycle lanes with Ahmedabad being cycling city of India, not much media attention has been focused in this direction. Road safety was one issue which was again not highlighted (5 articles). General security of BRTS and its insulation against terrorist attack attracted two articles.

c. Land value increase due to liberation of floor-area ratio (FAR) also attracted some attention from media (2%). Media also engaged in allowing BRTS and proposed metro in single articles for catching viewer’s attention. The surprising fact was use of BRTS in political articles (3%) with both ruling and opposition packaging the news for their benefit.

2. Positive and Negative Reports – The news reports were majorly positive in nature (62%). The majority of negative reports were “constructive” in nature. The criticisms focused on physical infrastructure issues which are common in many projects in developing countries. The author found many criticisms constructive and devoid of bias (86% of total criticisms were constructive in nature). It is important to note that media in developing countries act as watchdog and it is their role to bring about the shortcomings to government and political officials. Only 7 articles out of 153 could be categorized as “not justifiable” criticism.

The analysis shows that media has played a responsible role till now in highlighting the issues related to BRTS, educating the people and providing constructive criticisms. But the benefits of BRTS like its impact on environment, NMT and climate have not been highlighted properly. The authorities need to emphasize the impact of BRTS on quality of life and package it as an urban solution rather than being a system with buses and infrastructure.

SAFE Annual Convention 2009

2009-06-21T23:07:00.000-07:00

by Alvin Mejia

As our plane landed at the beautiful Hyderabad International Airport, I was awakened by the realization that I had finally reached India. It was my first time to visit. Shortly after getting into a taxi, I knew I was going in for a ride. I felt a good mix of uneasiness and excitement, as our taxi dodged trucks, avoided motorcycles and passed through tight spaces in a race-like fashion. There I was, sitting nervously inside the taxi, as I realize the importance of the convention that I was going to attend the day after– the SAFE (Society for Automotive Fitness and Environment, a Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers’ Initiative) 2009 Annual Convention which would focus on vehicle inspection and certification (I&C).

I started thinking whether our taxi was worthy to hit the road. Yes, it was quite a new car (maybe a two-year Maruti Suzuki car), but I noticed the wheels of the taxi weren't aligned. The driver couldn't get past 80 km/hour because the wheels would start wiggling. This gave me some relief since I knew our speed would be limited to 80, but then again, I was also entertaining some bad scenarios as the wiggling continues. Thankfully, everything went well.

Vehicle I&C plays an important role in mitigating the negative impacts of vehicles that dominate our roads, particularly accidents and air pollution loads. Approximately 3 million accidents are reported to occur in Indian roads every year. Around 60,000 deaths occur annually or approximately one fatality every 10 minutes.[1] Also, automobile emissions have contributed significantly to air pollution loads in Indian cities. Ms. R. Shobha of the Andra Pradesh CPCB Office said that vehicles 50% of PM10 and PM2.5 in the area of Andra Pradesh.

The honorable guests who graced the event with their addresses also emphasized the importance of inculcating a culture of safety and disciple in the drivers. According to SIAM, 77% of the road accidents in India are due to driving errors, while defective vehicles are responsible for more than 6% and pedestrians & cyclists contributing to 4% and 3% respectively.[2] The Chief Guest Mr. A K Parida, the Principal Secretary of the Government of Andhra Pradesh made a very good point regarding the need of the public to have a “sense of awareness” that we do not only need to inspect whether our vehicles are roadworthy, but ourselves as well.

The main discussions during the convention centered on the enforcement and innovation in terms of automotive safety, the best practices in inspection and certification and the adoption of best practices in enforcement of I&C systems. Overall, the convention was quite a success, having approximately 250 participants from different organizations that are involved in the Indian transport arena.

I guess as our vehicles become safer, more efficient and more environmentally-friendly, there's a need for us, the drivers, the commuters and the common public, to be more aware of the issues that affect us. At the end of the day, safety is in our hands.

Caption: Images from the 2009 SAFE Convention

[1]Ravinder Kumar Sharma. 2009. A presentation on Road Safety Management disseminated at the 2009 Annual Safe Convention
[2]http://www.wheelsunplugged.com/ViewNews.aspx?newsid=3595

Side Trip: A Visit to the Computerized Driving Licensing Center and Test Track of the Transport Department, RTO Uppal, Government of Andra Pradesh

A day before the 2009 Annual SAFE Convention was held, the hosts organized a field trip to the driving licensing center and test track of the Andra Pradesh Transport Department. Much has been done in the area in terms of streamlining, computerization and ensuring the quality of the processes that are involved in obtaining drivers’ licenses. For more information, please visit http://www.aptransport.org

Caption: Mr. B. Venkateswarlu, Jt. Transport Commissioner and Secretary, Regional Transport Authority, Hyderabad leading the tour.

Caption: Inside the electronic driving test room

Caption: At the driving test tracks

For photos of the convention and the field trip, please visit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/cai-asia/sets/72157620175918361/

Use light colored clothes at night. You would want motorists to see you - wouldn't you?

2009-05-30T00:00:00.000-07:00

Sudhir Gota

Innovative thinkers in Transport sector have not yet established the relationship between the color of clothes, walking and its impact on fatality. But, there are some who have found the answer to reduce pedestrian fatality.

Pune Traffic police in India advices pedestrians and cyclists to follow particular instructions -

1. Use light colored clothes at night. You would want motorists to see you - wouldn't you?

2. If there is no footpath, walk facing the oncoming traffic.

3. The only right of way is the one the other Driver/Rider gives you, especially the one who is Bigger/Heavier.

Check out Pune Traffic Police website (http://www.punepolice.com/TRAFFIC.html#some)

I have always wondered why such kind of advice is given to pedestrians and cyclists without even thinking about the infrastructure for them.

What ails us?

What’s wrong with our system which implements laws such as jaywalking but cannot even provide accessible crossings or footpaths?

My questions were partly answered previous week when we hosted one of the leading proponents of good transport – Prof Madhav Badami in Manila.

During our interactions, Prof was adamant that “Windshield view” of the policymakers and media people was the main cause. His actual quote was - “Most who WALK don’t have a SAY, Those who have a SAY, don’t WALK “

During the brownbag in ADB, he built a case for restoring pedestrian accessibility. Harping on the “Restoring” issue, he argued that Asian cities which had the natural advantage for walking have lost it due to illogical policies and thus facing all sorts of problems. Lamenting on the current trend of use of quick fix (flyovers) and/or ornamental solutions (providing expensive, inappropriate options when not required) he questioned - Is it that we do not know; we can’t do; OR we simply don’t give a damn…..

Prof indicated that the current problems are iatrogenic in nature and if we don’t act now, it would be too late. Prof in order to illustrate his case took the audience on an India Photo tour and narrated his experience while taking the photos. The audience was appalled on seeing the bad state of pedestrian infrastructure and the interconnectivity of walking with public transport. Prof showed how high cost intensive metro’s neglect walking facilities while promoting park and ride.

Source : Prof Badami

Prof used the terms “seamless connectivity” and “refuse distance” many times to indicate the importance of changing the mindsets from only footpaths to many other aspects of pedestrian facilities.

Inspired by his speech, a gentleman from ADB’s finance division questioned back – is there no hope?

I knew the answer – there is lot of hope in Asia. We are not yet motorized to the extent of developed countries. We need to only shift and scale-up the investment to stop migration of people and in modes… and to do this as Bert Fabian puts it – “everything is in the mindset”.

We need to change mindset of people and cities would follow.

CAN-N has a blogsite

2009-05-26T21:14:00.001-07:00

Clean Air Network-Nepal (CAN-N) has just created a blogsite where stakeholders can now share views and thoughts on clean air and climate issues.

http://cleanairnepal.blogspot.com/

CAN-N is the country network of CAI-Asia in Nepal.

PUBLIC SPACE AND TRANSPORT – THE MARIKINA EXPERIENCE!!

2009-05-17T18:08:00.000-07:00

Sudhir Gota

Teresa, our air quality researcher from Hong Kong believes that Metro Manila had only one thing in common with Hong Kong and it is air pollution!!

In order to prove that Metro Manila had lot to offer in terms of transport and land use and to show the best part of Metro Manila, we (Alvin our air quality researcher and me) decided to take her to Marikina. Alvin has seen the transformation of Marikina from close quarters, from being only a “bedroom community” city to city with lot of public space.

Teresa had only one question for us i.e. - Why Marikina? What’s in Marikina that is not in Ortigas? I suggested that she better wait and watch and give her comments in Marikina.

In order to hype the visit, Alvin decided to give history and geography lesson to us. He started explaining about Marikina - Marikina, the ‘shoe-capital’ of Philippines prospered on account of its shoe industry. The concept of its growth was the balance of basic-service industries with the service employment and basic employment balancing the growth. The balance was broken in 1980’s, when the subsidiary business districts of Metro Manila expanded thus pushing the middle class people to the peripheries thus engulfing Marikina. On account of low cost of living in Marikina, people started using it as a base for working in other parts of metro Manila. Only a minority of trips had both origin and destination in Marikina. It became a “bedroom community” and the city started decaying. The local government then started initiating steps in order to make the city livable. They took several initiatives such as removal of encroachment, provision of bike lanes and sidewalk, improvement of public space etc to stop the urban decay.

I couldn’t stop myself from jumping into the discussion (I have this bad tendency of always not allowing others to speak their mind when I am inspired!!) and explained why - Marikina city has lot to offer to transport researchers. I argued that many people simply don’t realize the importance of having good public space”. In fact, my love affair with public space started with a comment from one of my colleagues “Bert Fabian” when he suggested that “A good city is the one which has more public space than the street and parking space.” For him, the public space includes footpaths, bikelanes, parks, play grounds etc. What do you think?

Would you like to visit a garden, park, playground etc. in the heart of city next to your home, meet friends and relatives for relieving your stress or would rather go and sit in a mall?

I have another bad habit of comparing two things – cost in local currency with Indian rupees and city with Bangalore. Thus, as always, I brought in Bangalore into discussion of Marikina and suggested the evils of motorization and commercialization which transformed Bangalore city from “Garden city” to “Black city” ( people yet don’t realize that nearly 2 or 3 people die on roads in Bangalore daily). My colleagues were not impressed as they have heard this before number of times!!

We were about to reach Marikina and I was happy that I could prove that “city-design can influence the people behavior”. But there was a twist in the tale, as soon as we reached Marikina; we were in for a shock!

Teresa pointed out towards the main corridor which was congested with traffic and signals not working and pointed out – is it Marikina? Did we come to see this? She pointed out towards the smoke belchers – the jeepneys and the tricycles and told that the road is more polluted than Makati – one of the CBD’s of Metro Manila.

I agreed as she made a valid point. The congested road was virtually splitting the city and distorting the beauty. Yes, the heavy traffic was creating the “Berlin wall” syndrome. The people were standing next to the road watching traffic and children waving at people and neighbors at other end of the road afraid of stepping onto the street. While driving, Alvin was feeling sorry for them as they were inhaling his car’s tail-pipe emissions. He suggested that they need to transform this road and reduce the intensity of traffic by improving the public transport.

I was trying to understand the pattern of traffic – landuse-environment. We parked our vehicles in the free parking area. I could immediately see the challenges. The city still needs to work out this free parking aspect. You can never have free parking of motorized vehicles and less traffic. Teresa stated appreciating the beauty of Marikina and immediately saw the free parking spaces of bikes taken over by motor bikes. This again is a challenge for all of us. History has shown that with little incentives such as cheap fuel and free parking, the motorbikes can dominate the human powered bikes and we should ensure its reversal by policy changes. All modes have some role to play in urban transport but the role and extent is never understood properly by the governments which often lead us to chaos.

Marikina though realized the importance of cycling long back when its Mayor Marides C. Fernando launched the bike program by suggesting that “The Bicycle Program is designed to decongest the traffic on the road, increase our mobility and to provide the low income people their transport mode that will allow them to have a healthier lifestyle” . It was awarded in 2008 in the category of “Climate change and health in cities” by WHO. Alvin indicated that the award is because of its “Public Space” policies as people are healthier.

He pointed out that in Marikina people liked to live outside their homes. I have no doubt about this as he visits his home regularly only in the early mornings…

“Public Space” policy is the beauty of Marikina. Marikina was possibly one of the first cities in Asia to prove that mode share of cycles can increase provided the non motorized policies are in place. Marikina has approx 53 km of bike lanes spread over an area of 33 square kilometers. The beauty is that approximately 19 km of bike lanes run parallel to streams. Marikina has also supported the bikers by providing bicycle loan facilities and innovative renting scheme.

Yes, the success can be measured - “increase in Non motorized transport share from 4% in 1999 to 10% in 2006”. This is critical as majority of trips either starts or ends outside Marikina. Now the situation is that majority of households have access to bikes!! . One could see innumerable places where people can meet, walk, play etc.

We entered into the CBD of Marikina. Innovative use of Road-witching concept can be explored in detail if somebody traverses through this area. The innovative road landscape allows share-use of roads with people and vehicles co-existing. One more important lesson for me was the use of lanes of 2.5-3m for motorized traffic and it was working good. I learnt my tricks of highway design based on the fundamentals of 3.5m lanes. This was a surprise for me!

The challenge is in the issue of jeepneys. Teresa was sad to see people hanging out of Jeepneys. With 35% of total trips by jeepneys (nearly 1400 jeepneys are registered in Marikina), overcrowding is common. The public transport holds the key for Marikina. Future of Marikina depends on it.

We started walking along the “riverwalk”. We came across many people enjoying the beauty of sunset in the park. When Teresa mistook living carabao (buffalo) for artificial sculpture, we knew that our walking time is up and we need to have quick dinner. Our colleague Jaja (administrative officer) joined us for dinner. She doesn’t want big malls in Marikina. Guess why?

“It’s not that they don’t provide the good shopping experience or big discounts, but because it sticks out like a sore thumb in the beauty of the city.” Also she wants the parks and rivers to be maintained well. But the issue is how would the city government fund this? Alvin suggests that the entry fees for parks would be like road pricing. It would reduce the demand and I also agree on that. I was eying the removal of free parking facilities. The fund can go for benefit of parks and they can restructure the land-tax to make the rich pay more for the government in benefit of clean city.

We all agreed that the challenge for Marikina would be the land-use policies. Currently there are no concrete towers in middle of city or high rise buildings. If in future they transform the public land into commercial and concrete space the beauty would be lost. Teresa reserved her judgment and wanted to see the full city and we promised to come back again for detailed review.

After the dinner, Jaja made an interesting observation on crime rate in Marikina. She pointed out that the crime rate in Marikina has come down significantly. Alvin attributes this to the public space policy. Is it so? What do you think?

For me, it was interesting to note the change in people’s behavior by changing the policies of public space. The challenge in future is enormous as parks and open space currently constitute only 16% of road space and public spaces are fast shrinking (nearly 50% reduction of space from 2007).

Bert Fabian’s quote “Changing cities changing minds” is true and Marikina is a prime example of this. But the city needs to do more. The challenge is great!!!

Traffic Jam or Mobility – What does CEBU city wants?

2009-05-10T16:58:00.000-07:00

By Sudhir Gota

Enrique Peñalosa, Former Mayor of Bagota is an accomplished public official, economist, administrator and champion of sustainable transportation. I was fortunate to hear him many a times and always he comes up with a statement which forces a person to come out of shell. During the Cebu City BRT Studies Coordination Conference, he asked the audience a question - Traffic Jam or Mobility – What would Cebu City wants and what would BRTS solve?

For many of us, traffic Jam and mobility are two faces of the same coin but not for him. According to him, BRTS would solve the mobility problem of Cebu citizens but may not solve the congestion problem. BRTS would improve public transport but may not guarantee 100% congestion mitigation as car owners may not shift to BRTS if they are allotted lot of space. He suggests that the question of Congestion can be solved only by traffic restriction.

The recipe for the success is to combine the public transportation improvements with car restrictions. So far the Asian cities have failed to realize this aspect. It may be difficult to count the number of cities which has combined these two aspects…

Cebu BRTS which is currently being planned in Philippines can make or break the BRTS development in Philippines. My colleague Bert Fabian says that Cebu BRTS is very important for Philippines and it has to succeed at all cost!! I have never seen him so anxious. What can be the reason for his anxiety? When asked for the reason, he counter-questions “out of 75 BRTS systems which are being planned, executed or running in Asia, how many can succeed like Latin American cities? How many are success stories that are being told across the world as Curitiba and Bogotá? “. I don’t have any answers for this. Do you?

Peñalosa has an interesting take on this. According to him If Bogotá can succeed than any Asian city should succeed. Then the question is why there is not even a single success story as Latin American cities? The answer according to John Ernst (ITDP) can be the invisible problems I.e. institutionalization which we often fail to notice and which creates impedance for the evolvements of the system later.

The Cebu BRTS officer “Paul Villarete” is currently losing sleep over this question. He says that engineering problems can be solved but difficult ones are the questions about institualization and operator issues. He is worried as to if the road agencies allow BRTS to operate?

National government agencies like DOTC are lending all the support for BRTS cause, but the challenges are great. He acknowledges that Cebu is in the best position in Philippines due to strong local support. The agencies have already started the social and media drive to garner the support for this initiative and are hoping that Car owners would understand that there are no other solutions possible.

Some of the aspects which Penalosa emphasized during his speech were

1. We are building new cities in Asia… we can make the change or suffer later. It’s in our choice as what kind of city we want to our children.
2. The half baked systems are being named BRTS for variety of reasons and this is creating a bad name for BRTS. He says that good BRTS is not cheap but, yes, it is cheaper than cheapest metro. A Good BRTS may cost 10 Million USD/ km.
3. What is a good city? According to him – a good city is a city where people want to live out of homes and in public spaces. Footpaths are the the indicator to measure cities.
4. How does democratic county city distribute space between pedestrian, bikes, Public transport and car. It’s a political decision and not a decision of transport expert
5. Great sidewalks are essential, both parallel and perpendicular... trips start from home and not from station and this aspect is often neglected.

Inspired by his speech, I decided to decode the Transport system of Cebu and analyze its Transportation system. I had walked on two earlier days, so this time I decided to investigate with a car (apologies for generating emissions in Cebu!! ). On a fine Sunday morning, I started my investigation with my driver “Andres B Lumapar”.

Andres has been driving in Cebu cities from past twenty years and it is no more a joy for him. He curses the traffic as the root cause of all his problems and suggests that city should widen the roads. I decided to transform him during my investigation. We started with the possible BRTS corridor which is main road linking Talisay to Mandaue centers.

My initial reaction on seeing the corridor was that it could cater for 4000-5000 passengers per hour per direction easily during the starting years. Andres was suggesting that the traffic was low today on account of Sunday early hours. I asked him why and he replied fewer cars on the road. This was the moment I was waiting for and I jumped into my lecture of transport demand management and started giving him the tips on sustainable transportation intermittently during the journey.

I decided to do my road inventory survey while moving in the car as I used to do in my previous life. The average stream speed was nearing 28 km as the corridor had lot of junctions. The biggest challengePaul Villarete and his team would have in this corridor would be the social issues.

The next visit was to the South Coastal Road. This road has lot of induced traffic. This road can provide wealth of information on “induced traffic” for the researchers. The developments have started sprouting across the corridor. The greenery, free corridor and the Sea were making Andres to push the limits and in no time we were touching the 60 kmph mark. The corridor traffic is currently less but would increase as the developments take shape across the influence region.

I got hyper active after seeing the transport and decided to investigate the entire city (initially I had planned for 3 hours of car emissions). Andres was happy as the meter was busy. I was keeping one eye on meter and another on the road and feeling my purse for the money with my hand. We decided to look first at the city development. As I was reading the map, Andres suggested the idea of physically seeing the city growth from the “Tops”. In case if you are wondering what is “Tops”, it is a location which offers panoramic view of the city from the mountains. It was about 10 Km from our current location and we reached there at no time.

The panoramic view allowed me to look at various subsidiary business districts. The city Cebu is rapidly expanding. The new bridge which linked the main island with “lapo-lapo” in early 2000 increased the accessibility and has guided the development in this direction. I was hoping that the proposed reclamation project ensures some stability in the movement of people as according to Andres, average cebu person travels nearly 9-10 km to access the jobs. If this is true then I think that cebu urgently needs to look at the development plans as it is “high” when compared to other asian cities of the same size.

The next 7 hours were spent on Cebu streets with a quick lunch at an Indian restaurant. We visually saw the entire city roads. I was happy to gain wisdom on Cebu transportation and Andres with heavy travel bill. In order to complete my lecture series to him, I made quick analysis of CO2 emissions (we travelled for 282 km during the day and his vehicle had an efficiency of 13 km/l, which means approx 52 Kgs of CO2) and explained to him the importance of tail-pipe emissions, need for good maintenance and importance of respecting the traffic laws. Andres after sustaining my verbal onslaught for the entire day understood the complexities of transport and was pointing towards smoke belchers at the end of the day. He promised that in future he would keep an eye on the transport behavior and would respect pedestrians and bikers.

I am sharing few of my thoughts – though the trip was expensive and taxing but was worth it...
1. Freight sector needs planning as port lies in middle of city. Maybe they can target freight master plan.
2. City has much potential to make it livable. People like to live outside.
3. It’s not polluted as Manila though the smoke belchers exist
4. The signals looked like they were synchronized (cycle length tended to be on higher side) but surprisingly no Rotaries. This was interesting as I could see only one Rotary in my entire trip. Can anybody analyze this as to why Cebu never planned for rotaries?
5. Jeepneys which are IPT have numbers based on routes
6. Driving behavior was not as good as Manila
7. Lot of visible bikes in city
8. Greenery is good and streets have been landscaped with tress and shrubs.
9. Cebu if it constructs more flyovers in future, it can compete with Delhi on having highest number of flyovers per vehicles. WE saw approx 12 flyovers in the entire day!!

The best photo of my life is above (taken in Cordova municipality of Lapo-Lapo district). I reserve my comments as I have never seen anything like this all my life and hope would never see this in future, what do you think????

Biking with the Fireflies

2009-04-22T03:15:00.000-07:00

by Mike Co, CAI-Asia Center

Sudhir, transport researcher for the CAI-Asia Center, says it well: "If there are many cyclists, cars respect you."

He, along with three other staff from the CAI-Asia Center, participated in the 11th Tour of the Fireflies, an annual cycling event organized by the Firefly Brigade to raise public awareness on the need for non-motorized forms of transport (www.fireflybrigade.org).

(photo by LoloyD)

Glynda Bathan immediately noticed the festive atmosphere when she arrived at 6:30am in Tiendesitas, the starting point of the bike tour. "The scene was quite inspiring," she says. "Different people from all walks of life, with different cycling abilities, gathering to support one cause." Glynda had stowed her bike in her husband's home province of Ilocos Norte so she wasn't able to join this year. "I consider myself to be a rural cyclist anyway," she jokes. However, she did manage to capture the excitement of the moment with her camera.

From L-R: Jaja Panopio, Teresa Fung, Sudhir, and Bert Fabian (photo by Glynda Bathan)

Team CAI-Asia wore the Ligtas Hangin (save the air) campaign t-shirt and, more importantly, helmets. Many cyclists wore colorful and creative costumes.

Gianina "Jaja" Panopio, the Center's administrative officer, summarized her reason for joining. "Experience," she says. "I haven't tried biking in a long time. And it's for a good cause. Why not try?"

Teresa Fung, environmental specialist, agrees. Teresa is part of an exchange program funded by Fredkorpset. A Ph.D. candidate from Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Teresa will be working with CAI-Asia Center team in Manila for ten months. "I want to do some exercise," she says. "After arriving in manila, I never got to exercise. I also wanted to protest air pollution."

"And to get public attention!" Sudhir adds. "We keep arguing that bicycles are the way to go. Bike lanes should get more exposure. If a lot of people participate it will generate a lot of interest. People will realize that cycling is good."

Bert Fabian, Transport Program Manager, shares Sudhir's enthusiasm. "It fosters community building," he says. Bert is no stranger to cycling. He has been a regular participant of the Tour of the Fireflies since 2005.

They were off to a good start. Officers from the Department of Environment and Natural Resources, the Metropolitan Manila Development Authority, and the Philippine National Police made sure that the cyclists were safe by directing vehicle traffic away from the designated lanes.

But by mid-day, the humidity and summer heat forced Jaja to bow out of the tour at one of the rest stops, after biking for 24kms. She proceeded to the Tiendesitas "finish line" were she waited for her CAI-Asia colleagues to complete the circuit. It's important to remember that the Tour of the Fireflies isn't a race; no awards or penalities are given, and participation is its own reward. An estimated 6,000 cyclists participated this year, not only in Metro Manila but simultaneously in Baguio, Bacolod, Cagayan de Oro, and Puerto Princesa. The Metro Manila route alone covered 43kms, which included EDSA, the city's main thoroughfare. Generally, bicycles and other forms of non-motorized transport are not allowed in EDSA. The event helped dramatize that lack of bikeways in the metro.

Bert used his own 24-speed bike, while the three other CAI-Asia cyclists had to borrow from friends: Teresa's single-gear bicycle was too heavy, Jaja's was also too big, but Sudhir's bicycle was okay ... it's his body that was out of shape. "I haven't biked in 15 years!" he confesses.

Bert, Sudhir, and Teresa managed to complete the course by 12:30pm. Teresa suggests that next year the organizers should provide shorter segments for beginning and less advanced cyclists, maybe at 10km intervals. Sudhir thinks that there should be more rest stops. But everyone agrees that the experience was unforgettable!

For more pictures of the event, see

Low Carbon Cities

2009-03-05T18:04:00.000-08:00

Low Carbon Cities
by Alvin Mejia

Recently I had a chance to be part of an international workshop organized by Nagoya University, the Global Carbon Project and the National Institute for Environmental Studies on Low Carbon Cities – Understanding and Analyzing Urban Energy and Carbon. It gave way to fruitful discussions on energy use, energy modeling and urban development within the context of climate change.

The Workshop

One of the most thought provoking questions that were asked during the workshop is – “What is a low carbon city?” The term itself is a catchy phrase that connotes a very positive image, but how can we say that a city is a low carbon city? What are the parameters? Who should set them? What are acceptable reduction targets?
A comment during the workshop stuck into me – “…maybe we should be looking into sustainable cities rather than low carbon cities…” I guess there’s a whole lot to think about that comment. At the end of day, we should look back to where we have started. The whole world is working towards mitigating climate change and its adverse effects but sustainable development is the goal behind it all.
Sometimes “low carbon” and “sustainable” are equated since they both connote positive meanings, but the distinction between them would become very significant when it comes to decision points which involve complex development measures (an example would be the use of biofuels). There are always pros and cons in implementing different development measures, but the bigger picture should always be considered.

Bikes in Nagoya

It was my first visit to Nagoya and I found myself admiring the attitude of people towards biking and using public transportation. Everyone bikes. The only problem is that pedestrians may face the danger of being hit by a speeding bicycle from behind since the walkways and bikeways are not segregated. Nonetheless, it was a good experience seeing everyone – young and old – use (and can use) bikes as a main transport mode.

My Xe Om experience

2009-03-01T18:06:00.000-08:00

by May Ajero

I broke a promise twice last week.

I have always been firm that I will never be seen riding a motorbike ever. But one fine Thursday in Hanoi, I finally had the courage to try Xe Om to get back to my hotel fast.

Xe om, which literally means motorbike-hug, is very popular in Viet Nam. Motorbike taxis are also quite popular in Thailand and in the Philippines (rural areas).

Anyway, it was one of the most nerve-wrecking and thrilling road experience I've ever had. But trying it allowed me to understand why my friend Karen (a Filipina exchange professional under the Fredskorpset program) swears by it. Its both fast and cheap. It's the best way to avoid taxis with cheating meters. I hate to admit it but a motorbike ride is fun especially the part where the bike glides smoothly in traffic and you have small wafts of air brushing your face.

Here are some tips so you can better enjoy the xe om experience.

1. Negotiate beforehand the amount to pay and show the correct address (hotel card) to the xe om driver. Very often, they dont speak good English and you on the other hand might mispronounce the street names.

2. Be generous. While the average is 15,000VND to 20,000VND per trip, offer 30,000VND. I read that Xe Om drivers are actually out-of-job and could always use the extra dollar.

3. Avoid having too much to carry with your hands. You'll find it difficult to "hug" the driver if you do.

4. Pray hard the entire trip but pray harder as you approach an intersection. This is the most prone areas for collisions of motorbikes. In both trips, our bike almost collided with other bikes. (The intersection is also where I would stop breathing for a few seconds)

While I was lucky that my two Xe Om trips were generally good, I now have a new promise.. there shall be no third time.

Private sector plays an important role in reducing vehicle pollution

2009-03-01T15:38:00.000-08:00

"Everybody breathes the same air. Air pollution affects us all and everyone including the private sector, has a responsibility to reduce their contribution to air pollution." This was Clean Air Initiative for Asian Cities (CAI-Asia) Center's message to the more than 30 participants in the Clean Transport Session organized by the Manila Water Corporation and the Asia Pacific Roundtable for Cleaner Production on 19 February 2009. Participants, who were fleet managers from Manila Water and their suppliers, were briefed about the basics of air pollution, transport and climate change by May Ajero, Air Quality Program Manager of CAI-Asia Center, introduced to the TNT/UNEP Clean Fleet Management Toolkit and practical measures to reduce air pollution from vehicles by Atty. Glynda Bathan, CAI-Asia Center's Policy and Partnership Manager.

In 2008, the oil industry raised concerns that cheap smuggled oil, which could be of poor quality, was being sold in the Philippines. Imported second hand engines being used in jeepneys and buses have been found to cause vehicles to smokebelch. For this reason, among the practical measures highlighted at the training was for private sector not to purchase smuggled oil and to take steps to ensure that second hand engines or vehicles they purchase are not smoke belching. One company informed CAI-Asia Center staff that while purchasing second hand vehicles may be cheap in the short run, maintaining them costs a lot in the long-run.

Some of the other questions from participants revolved around these practical ways to reduce vehicle emissions: ecodriving, vehicle maintenance, and use of biofuels. One company requested for a follow-up meeting to discuss how it could use the Toolkit to reduce emissions from the vehicle fleet in their realty operations.

Go by Bus or by Car: That is the Question - By Glynda Bathan

2009-02-16T22:26:00.000-08:00

I decided to travel to the office by bus today and as a consequence I arrived one hour late for work. At 7:30, I was out of the house and in a bus expecting to reach the office at 9. Instead, I arrived close to 10am. While on the bus (and obviously late), I asked myself "Did I make the right decision by taking the bus instead of the car?" and "If two choices were given me: go by bus or by car, would I choose the bus for my daily commute again?"

On the one hand, taking the bus versus driving my car to work provides many benefits:

Somebody else does the driving (you feel almost "chauffeured") so say goodbye to driving stress
It's a cheap way to travel; only P35 (USD0.74) from Fairview to Ortigas, which is about 20 kilometers, in an aircon bus
No more worries about where to park
Save on parking fees and fuel
It feels good to know I am contributing less air pollutants and carbon emissions by riding mass transit
It's a good place to watch and observe people. I sat beside a girl who was putting on her make up and snipping her nails with a nail cutter!
If the bus driver drives smoothly, I can plan my day and write my "to do" list

But my goodness, why does the bus ride in Metro Manila take too long?! Of course, I can leave the house much earlier to allow for traffic. But, no, that's just not right. Spending two hours in traffic means 40 hours a month, 480 hours a year, and 9600 hours in 20 years spent in traffic! That's about 400 days of precious time I could spend on more important things. And that's just one way - from the house to the office! Taking the car could save me 30 minutes to an hour per way if I avoid traffic on the main roads.

Lest we lose the bus riding public to private cars, improvements must be made to the bus service. Let's avoid that people who decide to take the bus regret their decision. Let's find ways to cut short the bus riding time. Why not implement a Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) system similar to the Transmilenio in Bogota, Colombia? Let's work with the bus companies, say through a Green Bus Initiative, to get them to provide non-smoky buses, good service, and a safe and pleasant bus-riding experience to the public.

Sure, I'll still choose to ride a non-smoke belching bus in Metro Manila. I'll be wiser next time and combine a bus ride to get to EDSA with an MRT ride along EDSA. Thank goodness for the "women only" coaches in the MRT --- now that's a good customer friendly idea! We need similar ideas to save the bus system!

2009-02-12T04:51:00.000-08:00

TO OWN, OR NOT TO OWN “A VEHICLE” - By Sudhir Gota

To own, or not to own a vehicle is a classic catch-22 situation. Many want to buy a vehicle to gain freedom in movement. The public and non motorized transport doesn’t offer him any incentives, are not comfortable and socially acceptable, are more polluted…..

The pathetic image associated with public transport was highlighted most famously by Margaret Thatcher who once remarked that “anybody over the age of 30 who used a bus could consider themselves a failure”
At the first onset of affordability the person goes for the kill. The journey which often starts with a small vehicle or second-hand vehicle grows to a bigger one to match his reputation…

Have we ever tried to analyze the moral dilemma of owning and using a vehicle? Why is the public transport image so bad? Why do we hesitate to use a Public Transport? Why cannot be the Public Transport comfortable and affordable (or free) at the same time to all cross-section of society? Why a person is willing to shell out more for Transport and reduce his budget for other aspects such as food?

The key to all the questions are with the government. With good policies backed by budget many of the issues can be solved. Let’s consider some examples…

Everybody knows that Singapore and Hong Kong have good Public Transport facilities. What is with Singapore and Hong Kong that Delhi and Beijing don’t have? The answer is the access to stations. By 1993, 50% of Hong Kong population lived within 500m of MTR catchment area and By 1994 Singapore had 50% of population living within 1 km of MTR catchment area. How many of us have that access and that comfort? Why don’t we have that?

Singapore has nearly 175 vehicles for 1000 people which is less than many of the smaller cities in Asia. It would be interesting to note that many such cities have high concentrations of bike but fewer concentrations of cars than Singapore. Out of 175 vehicles for 1000 people, 105 vehicles are cars. Then why do we hear about “Bangkok and Bangalore” Syndrome? Why the congestion in Singapore is less when compared to other cities?

The Cars are very expensive to use in Singapore and not in Bangalore and Bangkok where the government pays to make driving cheap thus neglecting the public transport. Many private automobile users cry foul when government tries to push some reforms like BRTS i.e. Delhi/Jakarta…. which gives more priority to public transport over private transport. The Media many a times offers lip-service to the cause of public transport users thus confusing the government. This results in governments spending more time and energy going around problems than in trying to solve them.

If a city has a great public transport than the moot question would be TO USE, OR NOT TO USE “A VEHICLE” and this would be a great bargain….

A Case for Free Comfortable Public Transport? - By Bert Fabian and Sudhir Gota

2009-02-10T01:43:00.000-08:00

Free public transport??

The following is the conversation between two transport professionals who promote sustainable and equitable transport -- Bert Fabian, a native of Manila and Sudhir Gota who hails from Bangalore in India and used to work full time building roads -- travelling from their Ortigas (business district) office to see old Manila using the MRT3 and LRT1 at 7:30pm, Friday, 6th of February 2009.

Sudhir standing at the platform waiting for the train – Let’s see if the trains arrive every 5mins… Oh no! Bert, look at the overcrowding in the train. Do you think we can get inside? I thought we’re moving against the flow of traffic? Traffic jams should be on the other side, right? Strange, isn’t it?

Bert standing next to Sudhir – Just push yourself inside the train, man! I agree it’s strange. It doesn’t used to be like this before. Now all the trains, at all times, in all directions are crowded! That means, MRT3 is now in crash capacity! Land use consumption patterns must have also drastically changed. Manila urgently needs more coaches for MRT3 and of course, buses running at grade. We urgently need good public transport!

Sudhir trying to push himself in the train – No, I cannot get inside. Let’s catch the next one. Why should I pay to travel in such a crowded train where I cannot even stand without pushing against other people? Better, let’s take a taxi and sit comfortably in a car and hope we don’t get into traffic jams. It’s better to sit inside a traffic jam than ride this train.

Bert – The question is not whether we can afford to travel in a taxi or by car. The question is why people are being treated like animals travelling in an overcrowded train? Where is the human dignity in this? I know they could have easily increased the number of trains during peak hours. What do you think of providing free public transport, Sudhir? I know these are gaining popularity in some places, I heard Portland, Oregon and I think some Scandinavian and Scottish cities toying with the idea.

Sudhir – Public transport, free? From where will they get the money? Many public transport associations are loosing money all over Asia. People travelling in cars are also struck in traffic jams? How ‘bout spending more on infrastructure and building more roads? This is what governments always want to do. I hope you‘ve seen the latest research from Kent Hymel – Does traffic congestion reduce employment growth? Study says, if we put more money on roads, we can get back the money because of increase in employment and economic growth.

Bert – The question is if we provide comfortable free public transport, don’t you think we can get the same results without harming the environment and climate? The need is not more roads for cars but for mobility and accessibility to all. Ok. In answer to your question, do you realize that the environmental benefits are reaped by the rich people travelling in cars which occurred due to people travelling in public transport? Suppose I travel in a car of say 4 years old, diesel SUV for 20 km everyday for 330 days in a year, how much CO2 and particulates (PM) you think I would emit? On the other hand, assume I travel in an overcrowded bus with 60 people, or train if you like, I would emit far more less CO2 and PM, right? If I travel in a bus, I make only around 7% of the emissions by a person travelling in a car. Don’t you think the polluter (cars) should pay for my journey? Do you know that the walk we took from the office to MRT station exposed us to high emissions generated by drivers driving in air conditioned vehicles? Many research studies have proven that the most vulnerable are the people who walk, cycle and wait at bus stops.

Sudhir – Right, right, I’m beginning to understand the logic. But there are few holes in your argument. Why do you consider 60 people bus all the times? There can be less number of people during the journey. Also if I am travelling in a hybrid car I would emit far less….

Bert – Excellent point. Consider only 20 people are in the bus all the time. Still I am emitting only 20% approximately. I am not against cars, totally. What I would like to see is less usage, stricter guidelines, and really equitable transport. As Lee (Schipper) suggests “we need to attack all the components”. Improve fuel quality, tighten emission standards, improve technology, increase costs of parking, etc. etc. Pedestrians and public transport users should be accorded special benefit, like wider & comfortable pedestrian walkways, free comfortable public transport, and … When we can spend billions on subsidizing fuel, I think we can always change fuel taxation to fund for better, efficient public transport, maybe even consider it free! Let us not argue about owning cars or not. If everybody gets a car tomorrow and gets to use anyway he or she likes, can you imagine what the city would look like?

Sudhir – Free public transport may or may not increase ridership, but the mantra is that a person travelling in public transport is doing public good, thus he should be given preference. He should be allowed to ride comfortably while the city pays for his ticket. So yes, I think it’s a valid reason. Public transport should be free and comfortable.

Bert – The idea may not look exciting at the start and some people may mock us for this. But I think this should be given serious thought. When we put all the facts and the environmentally good factors, all the pieces of puzzle would fit together. Remember Gandhi’s quote – “First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win!!!! For now, hold your wallet and push yourself inside the train…

After four trains, both we’re able to squeeze in…