Cap & Trade Parking Permits

Parking, like carbon and sulphur dioxide, is dramatically underpriced. And, just like CO2, the status quo is incredibly resistant to change, despite the many large environmental externalities. In Boston (and in Cambridge), residents can park for $0 (and $8) per year, while at the same time it costs as much as $3000 a year to rent off-street garage parking. One open air parking space in Boston sold for $250,000 a few years ago. That’s $2000 per square foot!

Every time these cities (and every city) talk about raising the price of residential permits, political firestorms ensue and we end up with no change. No change means as many as one-third of the cars parked on-street aren’t driven in any given week and residents happily drive within the city instead of walking, biking or taking transit because – well, they have a car! And can park it for free!

A friend has been thinking about this problem for years, trying to come up with a market mechanism that would fix the situation. And suddenly, my environmental brain crossed with my transportation policy brain and voila – cap & trade parking! What if:

Starting today, the city issues no more parking permits and those with parking permits were allowed to sell or trade them. Suddenly, the reality that those permits are worth a heck of a lot more than $8 a year is no longer contested. People who rarely drive will have to decide whether it is worth it to them to keep owning that car, or to sell the permit for wherever the market sets the price. Today in both Cambridge and Boston, parking permits allow parking only in certain specified zones. The parking permits would transfer along those same lines. In some neighborhoods, the permits would like fetch $500/year, in others, as much as $3000.

The city could decide to buy some of these permits themselves, and retire them, reducing the number of cars residing in Cambridge, or providing them at reduced cost to new-to-the-city low income families.

What would this plan accomplish? Two things:

It lets permits get to market rate without politicians having to cast votes. It lets every car-owning resident participate in this new market. It gives the city a way to cap and then reduce the number of parking permits issued in the city. Permit ownership could continue to have an annual price payable to the city. The price would cover street cleaning and road repair, as well as perhaps an annual incentive to residents who don’t own a car, or to buy residents turning 16 a bicycle for their birthday. In Cambridge, a $25 annual parking permit fee would result in about $1 million a year.

It would also reduce the number of cars parking in Cambridge, and therefore the amount of driving that gets done in Cambridge. It would or could turn Cambridge into a city of residents that would rather walk or bike for local trips (which is most of people’s trips) and provide the political demand for the bike, pedestrian, and transit infrastructure that supports this way of life.

What do you think? I need some economists to weigh in.

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Transportation, Innovation, & Policy

I will be on a panel with "Ministers and industry leaders" at an OECD forum in Leipzig. As preparation for the discussion, I was asked to answer the following questions about transportation, innovation, and policy.

How can innovation help tackle the key challenges of climate change, energy supply, demographic change, urbanisation, traffic growth, congestion, and changes in the global economy?

I'm tempted to say that it is ONLY through innovation that we will address these challenges. The status quo delivers business as usual, and this leads us to where we don't want to go. Yes, there are many solutions that exist today that will help, and new products, services, and infrastructure that have yet to be developed. We need to think of innovation broadly. Innovation is not just developing alternative fuels. Innovation is also deliver up business models, marketing approaches, and political calculus that can make these existing solutions widely accepted and acted upon.

What innovations are required to get to a sustainable future?

I think a lot about the transition. Many of us have ideas about what the end game should look like, but I think we need more focus on how we get from exactly where we are today, to that future. What is the transitional path? Or at the very least, what are the first few steps.

We need to provide people worldwide, in all their various markets, means that provide them better access and mobilty than they experience today at lower cost, greater convenience, and reduced carbon footprint than they do today.

People are rational. If we provide them that choice, most people will choose the cheaper, more convenient way -- and let us make sure that this choice reduces carbon and congestion.

For me, the heart of the solution is dramatically more options. Today, most people have very few transportation choices: walk or bike in dangerous conditions, take over-crowded and inconvenient public transport, or "take control" and buy your own car to take you point to point. These few options necessarily lead us up the chain to increased car ownership and all the related negative consequences. We have to offer many more options so that cars are not the only solution. And we need to provide these options that suit people at all life stages, and income.

What are the policy innovations needed to allow new technologies and practices to flourish?

1. Stop subsidizing car parking, congestion, and pollution -- both in relationship to individuals as well as in infrastructure cost/benefit analyses about where to make the next infrastructure investment.

2. Allow owners of private vehicles to accept money in exchange for renting out their own vehicle, driving other people in it, or accepting money from people ride-sharing. We need to recognize that sharing cars and maximizing the number of people using each vehicle and getting mobility satisfaction out of each car is vastly preferred over the current single owner status quo.

3. Create a government insurance fund, into which innovators can buy insurance with capped liabilities, can buy insurance for their innovations while experimenting with low volumes. Once the innovation is successful, volumes build and traditional insurers will want to take over.

4. Consider creating low weight/low speed roads that have fewer safety restrictions on vehicles so that innovation and experimentation of vehicle types can flourish (and perhaps motorized and non-motorized transport can co-mingle safely).

5. Make sure that all government technology procurement in all sectors come with requirements for openness: open up data sets (as appropriate while protecting personal privacy) for public transport, traffic, etc., require that government procurements be based on open devices (open standards, multi-purposed), open networks, open standards, internet protocols, and open source. Government funded technology purchases, in all sectors, can then be leveraged and multi-purposed by innovators, providing them with low-cost access to a range of important inputs.

6. Make sure that transportation technology systems are integrated with the technology used in the rest of the economy. ie., electronic payment systems should use established methods; devices and spectrum allocations should not be for transportation use alone.

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More sunlight on cars: Open up the data!

The New York Times ran this OpEd I wrote (and pasted in below). I've appended additional thinking about implications for innovation.

Cambridge, Mass.
IN the wake of the Congressional hearings on the Toyota recalls, we have heard various proposals for countering unintended acceleration in automobiles.

Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood recently said the federal government may recommend that carmakers install “smart pedals” that give brakes priority when both brake and accelerator pedals are pressed simultaneously. Meanwhile, Toyota has said that, in contested acceleration accidents, it will give regulators access codes to data recorders — essentially, onboard black boxes being installed in some new cars.

But sometimes the solution to a safety problem is simply more transparency. Indeed, there is a relatively easy solution that would help identify problems before they affect thousands of cars, or kill and injure dozens of people: allow drivers and carmakers real-time access to the data that’s already being monitored.

Current federal law requires annual emissions and safety inspections for all cars. A mechanic plugs an electronic reader into what’s known as the onboard diagnostic unit, a computer that sits under your dashboard, monitoring data on acceleration, emissions, fuel levels and engine problems. The mechanic can then download the data to his own computer and analyze it.

Because carmakers believe such diagnostic data to be their property, much of it is accessible only by the manufacturer and authorized dealers and their mechanics. And even then, only a small amount of the data is available — most cars’ computers don’t store data, they only monitor it. Though newer Toyotas have data recorders that gather information in the moments before an air bag is deployed, the carmaker has been frustratingly vague about what kind of data is collected (other manufacturers have been more forthcoming).

But what if a car’s entire data stream was made available to drivers in real time? You could use, for instance, a hypothetical “analyze-my-drive” application for your smart phone to tell you when it was time to change the oil or why your “check engine” light was on. The application could tell you how many miles you were getting to the gallon, and how much yesterday’s commute cost you in time, fuel and emissions. It could even tell you, say, that your spouse’s trips to the grocery store were 20 percent more fuel-efficient than yours.

Carmakers could collect the data, too. Aberrant engine and driving behavior would leap out of the carmakers’ now-large data set, allowing them, if necessary, to conduct recalls much earlier. And, in exchange for your contribution of anonymous data, carmakers could send you driving benchmarks aggregated from your peers; then your app could tell you how your driving compares with the average of all drivers of the same car.

Having such readily accessible data streaming from your car might raise fears of a Big Brother scenario, in which carmakers would know where you are and how you are using (or misusing) your vehicle. But you would still decide whether you wanted to tap into the data, how you would use it and with whom you’d share it.

Allowing drivers and carmakers access to real-time performance data wouldn’t prevent every future mechanical failure. But it would allow carmakers and entrepreneurs to develop analytical tools to help catch developing problems in both individual cars and entire model lines. Cars would continue to break down and even cause accidents, but it wouldn’t take a Congressional hearing to figure out why.
*******

On the same day, the NYTimes reported that the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHSTA) is considering requiring that a black box be installed in all cars. This is an idea that could be either really good or really terrible.

Really good: An implementation that uses open standards, open data, and open devices. That same data and devices could be reused and innovated upon to produce fabulous apps for cars.

Really bad: It’ll be another closed proprietary system that ends up adding to the cost of the vehicle and eventually becomes ancient technology, much like after-market navigation devices and transponders.

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Lowering Barriers to Innovation in Cars

In 1890, there were 2000 car companies in and around Paris. I haven't been able to find the data for Detroit, but its a good guess to imagine that it was the same. Today, what do you think? Maybe 50 new cars being seriously tested for market consideration worldwide?

In a time when everyone is talking about the need for innovation and new vehicle types, it is basically impossible for a couple of clever guys (used in a gender-neutral way) to think up, test, sell, and improve upon their ideas. We have set the regulatory bar so high, that we've basically excluded innovation from any who doesn't have several hundred million dollars handy. The US Department of Energy recently gave Tesla Motors a $465 million loan that will be repayable only if they succeed. This is an expensive approach, for the government and for car manufacturers.

There is a lower-cost way forward, with precedents in the food industry. Here's what I think should be done.

To promote innovation In the existing vehicle stock:

1. Create an open in-vehicle technology platform/device that can be installed in existing vehicles, which brings car-specific data to the internet (with open APIs) for developers/innovators. This will facilitate changes in ownership, access, driving behavior, connectivity to other relevant data in the environment. [This idea is in hand and doesn't need government regulatory intervention.]

To promote innovation of new vehicles and new mobility choices:

2. Create a government insurance plan for small transportation businesses, to be paid into by these start-ups, that provides insurance, likely with reasonable per incident caps, that enables them to try innovative things that don't match the insurance industry status quo. Carsharing, carpooling, pick-up shuttles, PAYD insurance, innovative vehicle designs have all be held back by the insurance problem. By capping at some specific "small business" volume, innovation can be enabled and the real liability risks can be learned from these small groups. Ideas that succeed (and increase in volume beyond small business) will have the track record to move into the private sector insurance industry.

3. Remove government oversight of safety standards for low sale-volume vehicles. There is insignificant public health risk from small volume vehicle accidents. As an analogy, the health standards we apply to the corner deli are different from what we apply to Nabisco. In the vehicle space, there is only one rule that applies. And like the corner deli, locals won't frequent one that serves old or unhygenically prepared food.

4. Consider creation of low speed, low weight class of roads on which any vehicle and mode of transportation is at low risk for mortal accidents, and on which these small volume new vehicles could travel very safely. "The probability of death from an impact speed of 50 mi/h (80 km/h) is 15 times the probability of death from an impact speed of 25 mi/h (40 km/h)....only 5 percent of pedestrians died when struck by a vehicle traveling at 20 mi/h (32 km/h); however, the proportion of fatalities increased to 45 percent at 30 mi/h (48 km/h) and to 85 percent at 40 mi/h (64 km/h)." Source data.

On this last point, I'm imaging that many urban areas (and perhaps some roads or some lanes in suburban/rural areas) could have this classification. If this new classification were just by speed, allowing a diversity of vehicles could travel on those roads, we would get one kind of innovation. If we pushed the restriction further to include weight restrictions, these low speed/low weight roads would have a totally new and different characteristic that would favor pedestrians, bicycles, and small vehicles. Right now, many people tell me they don't ride their bikes (or let their kids ride) because of the weight/speed problem of other traffic.

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Advice for Cities & Towns on Green Transport

I sometimes get asked for the quick hits that a local government can undertake that is within their jurisdiction. Here is what I send them:

1. Parking maximums for buildings (all kinds) rather than parking minimums. If the developer is ready to build without parking, their ear is closest to the market, let them do so. This will reduce the cost of housing by as much as 25%, increasing affordable housing within the city. Every parking space built is a magnet for a car, which will then be driving on city streets, increasing our congestion problems. Yes, I know all about residents desire to protect the existing free on-street parking for themselves. See number 2 below.

2. Make residential parking permit rates much higher, and consider monthly fees rather than annual ones. This will make more parking available for those residents that need to park, by getting off the road cars that are rarely used (this is why we need this to happen monthly, so there is incentive to get rid of your car quickly when you no longer use it often.) In northern climates, it is easy to see the enormous number of vehicles that are little used by walking down a street one week after a snowfall and seeing the number of cars that haven't moved in a week.

3. Charge residents for curb cuts just like on-street parking. Their individual curb cut is removing a space available for others on the street. Curb cuts shouldn't be free for residents or businesses.

4. Give a rebate to residents who don't own cars -- they cost the city less money! less demand for ploughing, road maintenance, police and traffic enforcement, reduced emissions, etc.

5. Do bicycle traffic education for every middle school student (and in driver's ed).

6. Offer $200 rebate to kids on their 16th birthday, good only toward a bike purchase (and registration with the local police).

7. Improve bike and pedestrian connections everywhere. Start with routes to school, around the public library, and convenience/food stores.

8. Paint bicycle lanes on as many oversized roads as you can simply by giving the minimum width to cars (usually 10 ft) and allocate remaining space to bikes. Stop your lines short of the intersections and just do the straight-aways. This lets you get 80% of the job done quickly and cheaply, without fiddling with the complex part.

9. Require that businesses that offer parking to employees to "register their commutes" so that there is a database for potential commute ridematching. You can't require agreeing to share a ride, but you can require registration.

10. Consider building municipal parking lots, and make parking in those lots cheaper for residents than on-street parking permits. [This makes parking less convenient, and people will be more likely to leave their house to bike, walk, or T for short errands rather than hop in their car.]

11. Remove on-street parking for every space created in municipal lots. Do better things with those spaces -- bus priority lanes, bike lanes, wider sidewalks.

12. Consider making play streets in some neighborhoods, by closing them to through traffic with wooden barriers (that are signed with relevant times) during afterschool hours. In New York City I saw this in practice with neighbors opening and closing the street.

13. Consider closing scenic roadways on Sundays when there is reduced traffic (and alternate routes) and making them accessible only to people and non-motorized vehicles.

Thirteen is purportedly an unlucky number. Please add your low cost ideas to the comments.

Robin

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Time for Cooperative Capitalism

Crisis describes our times. The perilous state of the American and global economies, environments, and personal finances have me convinced that we’ve got to start working and thinking more cooperatively.

Last June I began to give public voice to these ideas and approach that has been taking shape in my mind for a long time -- Ann Arbor (June 11 ppt) and at the Personal Democracy Forum in NY (June 24).

For many years I’ve been attracted to the beautiful efficiency and widespread benefits of shared resources (cars, rides, networks). And over the last few years, I’ve been espousing the need for business and government to think more expansively about the web 2.0 phenomenon – where end users create content and value by building on a common platform (eBay, wikipedia, flickr, Facebook being some famous examples). We need to envision collaborative financing (lending circles), collaborative infrastructure (mesh networks), and collaborative consumption (car-sharing). It is time to push this idea and approach as far as it can go. A way to think about this approach is “cooperative capitalism.”

Here is the formula:
1. Identify excess capacity.
2. Build a platform for others to share/engage with this excess capacity.
3. Appreciate unanticipated benefits

My favorite example at a city level is Bogota’s Ciclovia:

1. The Penalosa brothers (Mayor Enrique and Gil, Head of Parks & Recreation) noted that on Sundays traffic throughout the city was very light.

2. Every Sunday from 9am to 2pm, more than 72 miles of roads are closed to car traffic and open to pedestrians and bicyclists. Tens of thousands of residents get out and use the ‘new trails and paths’ every week. Cost to the city for this highly prized and transforming resource? Just the cost putting up and taking down the barriers.

3. Unanticipated benefits include a healthier population, a stronger community, and increased bicycle use every day of the week.

My favorite opportunity at a city & national level (see my TED talk for a big vision explanation):

1. The wireless devices being used for open road tolling (and in the future for congestion pricing and road pricing) cost about $28, are single purposed, closed, and in active use for about 30 seconds a month. That is a lot of excess wireless capacity!

2. Create an open source mesh (ad hoc peer to peer) communications platform that would turn the device in the cars into nodes (routing and repeating data bits). The software could also be used in all wireless devices (laptops, cellphones, pdas, traffic lights, smart utility meters, etc.), creating a mobile internet (collaborative infrastructure). Each person will have paid for his/her own device (collaborative infrastructure financing).

3. While spending what was required to do the task of open road tolling or congestion pricing and buying in a manner that used an open standard, and an open device, we have now made this investment leverageable for any number of innovative uses, created a robust and resilient nationwide network for local data transmission, and laid the foundation for the next economic engine for the US and world economies. I have a lot to say on this topic, best not here. Email me if you want to see the white paper.

We can glean from the above example some generalization principles that the US government should apply to the relevant procurements: require open standards, open APIs, give preference to responders that leverage existing infrastructure, investments, organizations – in other words – value and encourage cooperation among companies rather than reward closed proprietary systems that shut out such opportunities.

Examples at the corporate level would include Zipcar of course, which enables all the idle capacity of cars to be put to good use through its technology platform that makes sharing cars fast, easy, convenient, and cost-effective. Last year I visited Siemens New York office where the bulk of floor space has been turned over to cubicles that are not owned by any one person, but rather used as needed by its nomadic workforce that shows up in New York only periodically – dramatically reducing the amount of office space needed if each one of its employees had their own office. The unexpected benefits of open platforms abound -- users can innovate, or point the way for innovation (see Innocentive.com for a new way of thinking).

And at an individual and household level, what can we lend and what can we borrow? What can we buy used, and what can we make sure we put back into the marketplace? Think of eBay as collaborative consumption.

This way of thinking isn’t bad for the economy. Remember that our starting point is that everyone is going to spend as much as they have to spend. We – families, companies, governments -- all have so much we want to accomplish with such limited financial resources that the most logical, rational, profitable, and self-interested thing to do is to spend it as efficiently as we can: maximizing the benefit of each dollar spent, while minimizing the resource consumption. Since we know we are going to spend every cent, let’s get the most possible value out of that spending.

Think of our times. Cooperative capitalism is not just an interesting approach, it is an imperative.

*****

Blog posts are supposed to be short and to the point – that is satisfied by the above. For a little more background on why the current financial crises leads me to move from thinking that these are just interesting ideas, to a much stronger concept of “imperative,” read on.

We are living in a world of very precarious revenue sources at all levels of the economy – household, corporate, and governmental. Americans are at their lowest savings rate since the 1930s. In August, the GAO estimated the 2008 Federal deficit to be $410b, 3% of the GDP. The addition of the $700 billion bailout has the potential to double this to 6%. On October 1, our national debt passed $10 trillion dollars (that’s a 1 followed by an unlucky 13 zeroes).

And yet, despite our incredibly tight – and shrinking – budgets, we face spending imperatives of unparalleled proportions. In the US, the explosive highway and infrastructure building of the 1940s-1970s, are now meeting the end of their 30-50 year anticipated life spans. We have much rebuilding to do, just to stay even, and we have much new building needed to accommodate our growing population and 21st century transportation and communication needs.

We have an energy and climate crisis, that demand we rethink, retool, and build anew our power plants, our factories, our office, our stores, our homes, and our travel patterns. We have a broken healthcare system that without a fix will swallow the budgets of business and government, and then, despite those expenditures, leave many uninsured.

And of course, we Americans live in a world of 6.3 billion people, rising rapidly to 9 billion. And we all know this world cannot sustain the current use patterns many ‘enjoy’ if applied to everyone.

A friend of mine, Juan Enriquez, just gave his 20 minute analysis and prescription last week at PopTech, on the need for the next administration to start a program of austerity. He gives a compelling argument and has some nice visuals. And last week, Bruce Nussbaum blogged for Businessweek an opinion piece called “Zipcar Capitalism, a new economic model?,” an approach the author says he will bring with him to the World Economic Forum this week in Dubai. Both of these argument are running down the same path I am.

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Openness is Environmental; who’d a thunk it?

So here is the gist of the argument:

Open architecture, open standards, open protocols, and open networks enable the multi-purposing of devices, and encourage and facilitate organic improvement in device and application functionality requires. E-waste is reduced when devices serve multiple purposes, and when useful life can be extended through on-going adaptation and upgrades with software or addition of hardware components.

Closed proprietary systems, on the other hand, do the exact opposite. They are made for discrete purposes, with planned obsolescence, and innovation is limited to insider willingness and insider imagination.

To see some exquisite artistic renderings of consumption, including electronic consumption, check out Chris Jordan's work, from which the photo above is an unworthy clip. There is an important tool -- an Executive Order -- the US government can use, that would have an enormous impact on reducing electronic waste.

According to an EPA study of solid waste: "The production of electric and electronic devices is a very resource-intensive activity. The environmental burden due to the production of electrical and electronic products ("ecological baggage") exceeds by far the one due to the production of other household materials. When these devices become obsolete and are discarded without recycling they leave behind lead, cadmium, mercury and other hazardous wastes.

In USA In 2005, we generated 2.6 million tons of e-waste in the US, or 1.4% of total discards. Of this amount, only 12.5% of the consumer electronic products in the municipal waste stream were "recovered," This compares to the overall recovery rate of all categories of municipal waste was 32.1% in 2005.” (1)

Even while "68 percent of consumers stockpile used or unwanted computer equipment in their homes." E-waste shows a higher growth rate than any other category of municipal waste in the EPA's report.

Of course, I have to tie this in to my favorite subject: transportation! Long-term policy goals for the US department of transportation include IT for safety, mobility, and convenience applications. These applications will rely on electronic hardware for wireless communications connecting the 240 million vehicles on the road today with network access points across America.

Given the scale and scope of the US transportation system, pervasive throughout America, touching every American family, electronic devices that leverage open architectures, open standards, open protocols, and open networks -- enabling the multipurposing of electronic and wireless investments – can dramatically reduce the amount of e-waste and would be the environmentally preferred solution for safety, mobility, and convenience applications that are intended for large fleets (over five thousand units).

The Presidential Executive Order -- “Strengthening Federal Environmental, Energy, and Transportation Management,” signed by President Bush on January 24, 2007, instructs Federal agencies to “conduct their environmental, transportation, and energy-related activities under the law in support of their respective missions in an environmentally, economically and fiscally sound, integrated, continuously improving, efficient, and sustainable manner.”

Encouraging open architecture, open standards, open protocols, and open networks is important for this country’s future, one that includes limited resources – elemental as well as monetary ones. We need to get the most out of every device, every investment, and every dollar. Openness helps us accomplish that.

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Technology Recommendations for Congestion Pricing

For historical reasons, wireless systems for use in the transportation sector have taken a separate path for technology development. This divergence no longer makes sense. Every other sector in the economy is finding secure, reliable, and economical systems that use internet-protocol and are highly compatible. Continued insistence on separate radio frequencies, closed networks, and obscure proprietary standards mean that technology investments in transportation don't take advantage of low-cost high-volume components developed for the consumer market or advances in communications hardware and routing software.


Rest-of-the-World Trends: Open networks, Device Convergence, Open Standards, Extensible/Interoperable, Consumer products/parts (high volume, low cost), Redundant networks base, Robustness/Redundancy

Verus

Intelligent Transportation Systems: Closed network, DSRC (Dedicated Short Range Communications), Single-purpose devices, Proprietary, inflexible, lock in, high cost, path dependency, can’t leverage others’investment, centralized command & control (single points of failure)

Below are our recommendations in priority order. Wireless infrastructure investments for congestion pricing, open-road tolling, and road pricing should be:

• Open networks (the data transmission required for user-fees is very small, meaning that a huge amount of excess capacity in these networks is available and should be made available to the public given that this infrastructure is being paid for with taxpayer dollars).

• Open standards (making these networks open is only interesting and useful to others if open standards are used).

• A mesh network be employed.

• An open source mesh network be employed.

• An extensible/interoperable network should be deployed (creating opportunities for user-driven innovation, add-ons -- think Google open API model)
  

What would this system look like? What are the benefits of a system so configured?

Imagine a mesh "white box" in every car that travels through the city. The device would cost between $30-$50 in the volumes needed and be built using low-cost, widely available standard hardware components and open source software. (EZ passes hardwares cost $28). Each car would become a node in a dynamic mesh network, routing and repeating packets of data. People who purchase and install the devices in their cars can be given the first $100-$150 in congestion fees for free. System security requirements would be no different than any other wireless infrastructure, and preserving ample bandwidth for the purpose of collecting fees can be assured. Implementers would need only be responsible for providing key backhaul nodes (e.g., at critical intersections, exits, etc.) while end-users would drive the node density necessary to expand the network. The implications:

• The amount of capital required to implement, maintain, and extend a congestion pricing system is reduced in several ways:
• Congestion pricing hardware, and the majority of the wireless infrastructure, is financed and installed by end users.
• Less infrastructure installed means less to maintain
  
• This dramatically reduces the debt burden required and the cost of financing it.
• Because the devices are self-configuring, there are reduced engineering costs.
  
• Reduced installation costs (simply plug them into the vehicles).
• The system can come online and be operational in less time than a system of tags and beacons, and therefore the free premium given to drivers would be a net revenue wash.
• Very low on-going communications costs because the system relies primarily on free peer-to-peer data transmission.

• System redundancy is inherent in such a network. There would be no single point of failure and no need for redundant systems to be designed and included.

• Car location and charging could be based on GPS position or triangulation of vehicles relative to other vehicle and gateways (where the data enters the internet) similar to systems used by Loki and TomTom. [A discussion of protecting locational privacy is discussed in another paper.]

• An in-vehicle mesh-based system allows infinite flexibility in the congestion pricing system.

• The initial pricing cordon chosen by the city can be changed over time without additional on-street hardware investment (At considerable expense, London expanded its cordon from the CBD to a larger section of London after 4 years).
• A dynamic real-time congestion pricing could be implemented covering all city streets, eliminating undesirable edge effects created by a cordon, charging based on actual congestion, increasing public perception of system fairness (charges based on real congestion, not arbitrary geography)

• Enforcement would not be based on cameras and license plate photography, but rather on-the-ground enforcement officials determining whether individual cars in their proximity have an active device. High fines/tickets can be given to those vehicles without the device that are within the congestion pricing zone.

• "Tourist" vehicles passing through the congestion pricing zone can pick up a device at gas stations, highway rest areas, and convenience stores. The cost of the device would be required as a deposit (in cash or by credit card) with an additional amount paid for anticipated fees. On exiting the congestion pricing zone, these devices can be returned with the deposit and unused funds returned to the driver. Those who choose this system would not be eligible for locational privacy, nor the free service premium given to those individuals who buy the device outright.

• Facilitates layering of additional services and applications on a de-prioritized basis vis-a-vis congestion pricing/network data, creating additional potential revenue sources and value to users (e.g., internet access, social networking software, geolocational advertising, real-time traffic/congestion data for drivers).
  

• Can be utilized to send emergency communications messages to all cars, cars in specific areas, etc.
  

There are considerable positive "externalities" that this system would give to the city that adopts it:

• Because the network is open to all, within the congestion pricing zone, Manhattan would effectively be one dynamic wireless hotspot
  
• A ubiquitous wireless network throughout the city, open to all, will generate an untolled/untold amount of innovation and economic development.
• Over time one can anticipate other devices joining the mesh created by the vehicles. Each one of these devices leverages the existing investment of all the previous devices, contributes to the mesh, and gets the full advantages of zero cost peer-to-peer communication within the city. These new devices might be those purchased by other city departments (homeland security, police, emergency vehicles, education, health, social services), or by city residents (mesh-enabled laptops, cell phones, PDAs). The result is a scalable, resilient communications system. Different user classes and/or prioritization schemata can be utilized to ensure critical communications have access to this robust and redundant communications infrastructure.
• An open tech system avoids path dependencies and ensures maximum extensibility during a time of rapid technological innovation and evolution.
  

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Ride Sharing Advice for Cities & Others

Benefits

• Very fuel-efficient means of motorized transport (very high passenger miles to the gallon)


• Reduces congestion (time, excess fuel costs and emissions, reduced highway and road infrastructure)


• Reduces parking demand


• Leverages the existing investment in rolling stock(cars) paid for by people themselves, and existing road and parking infrastructure


• Solution to the very difficult problem of providing affordable high quality HOV/transit services in low density geographies.


• Can be implemented immediately.

Define ridesharing at state (and federal) level

A definition protects ridesharing, and makes sure that it is not confused with other transportation services that carry specific insurance, licensing, or zoning requirements. Here is one possibility that seems to capture the essential issues, adapted from SECTION 3. 10–4–707.5 (2), Colorado Revised Statutes

“Ridesharing” means the vehicular transportation of passengers traveling together with a commonality of route or destination (e.g. work, shopping, health, educational, religious, athletic, sports facilities, leisure, or any destinations) if the vehicle used in such transportation is not operated for profit by an entity primarily engaged in the transportation business and if no charge is made therefore other than that reasonably calculated to recover the direct and indirect costs of the “ridesharing” including, but not limited to, a reasonable incentive to encourage accommodation of the needs of the elderly or disabled. However, nothing in this subsection (2) shall be construed as excluding from this definition an arrangement by an employer engaged in the transportation business who provides "ridesharing arrangements" for its employees. The term includes ridesharing arrangements commonly known as carpools and vanpools.

Ensure no ambiguity in state car insurance requirements

• Make sure that state car insurance policies cover everyone in the car if trip meets ridesharing definition (already happening with most insurance policies but definition at federal level of ridesharing would make this reality more easily defensible if challenged).
• Protect companies that broker ridesharing from liability stemming from what happens on the ride between riders (driver and passengers).

Enable ridesharing to accommodate giving rides to elderly and disabled

• Allow for additional modest fees to incent driver (owner of vehicle) to offer ridesharing with the elderly or disabled up to $x per person/ride (could be included in the definition) and make sure that such fees are allowable under definition of ridesharing and do not abrogate “ridesharing” definitions in insurance policies.
• Protect these drivers from liability if elderly or disabled injured in ways not covered by their personal car insurance.

Make sure that tax incentives offered for commuter benefits include ridesharing

“Change Section 132(f) of the Federal tax code to include carpooling/ridesharing. This section enables employers to underwrite the cost of their employees' transit or vanpool commutes, up to $110 - and offset qualified parking expenses up to $215 - per employee, per month. These benefits are not considered taxable income for the employee, and employers may write off these costs as a transportation expense.

Alternatively, employer may allow employees to set aside pre-tax dollars to purchase transit passes, pay vanpool fares, and to cover qualified parking costs. Pre-tax set-asides are subject to the same monthly limits.”

• Make benefits for going in high occupancy vehicles (HOV) equal to that of traveling in single occupancy vehicles (SOV). i.e. the parking benefits should not exceed those allocated for transit, vanpool, or ride sharing. In fact, incentives should be reversed. [Better would be make parking ineligible for this program.]
• Best would be to make all ridesharng – not just for commutes -- costs to be tax deductible (with documention).
• Ridesharing expenses have traditionally not been included because of perceived lack of ability to monitor and provide proof that the ride was shared. Change laws tso that those who can provide third-party documentation that ride was shared and expenses incurred can also participate in the program, just like any other tax deduction requiring a receipt.

Support one ride-sharing program online

This is difficult for me to say, as a provider of an online ridesharing service (www.GoLoco.org), but I believe it is true. In order for ride sharing to be successful, it needs a critical mass of postings within a specific geographic area. Institutions, universities, “green” websites, cities, and states that promote “carpooling” and don’t tell you where to go are just not very helpful to prospective carpoolers. And promoting a large number of sites will just result in any one site not having very much traffic, again, a disservice to people who actually are trying to share rides.

So what can be done to preserve competition, allow for the best services to rise to the top, and still make sure that only one database/service is being promoted on any given website?

• Choose one provider based on some known standards: (ability to make end users happy; trust mechanisms, ability to transfer money, website ease of use, audit trail of shared rides, protection of privacy, ease of communications between travelers, successful matches, etc.) and give them the contract/right to be listed for 1-2 years.
• Be willing to change who you support based on transparent metrics. If another company is doing a better job, switch who you promote.
• Require that the database/service you do market is “scrapable” by other ride-sharing companies. i.e. rides posted into that database would be accessible by all ride-sharing companies and available for matches within their own databases.

This system gives the maximum benefit to people who want to share rides. They can choose services that suit their particular needs, or that have successful marketed themselves, and get access to the rides posted on the state or city-supported service.

Set-aside carpool parking locations

Ideally, we want the carpool parking spaces to be the most desirable ones (even more desirable than car-sharing parking spaces). Anyone who carpools – regardless of company used to match the service – should be able to park in these spaces. I envision this sort of like credit card companies. “Reserved, Carpools. Accepted: GoLoco, etc.” To get onto the sign, perhaps the company has to meet some standard. To park at the sign, drivers would have to put a print-out of their matched trip on their dashboard with date, time, etc. readable from someone outside the car. I don’t believe an attendant actually has to monitor who parks here on a regular basis, but the ability to “audit” and fine people who shouldn’t park there is now overt and possible.

Is this a double standard? Online the city, company needs to choose one company, but on the street, several are supported? This allows for competitors to play, and if the city hasn’t chosen the best provider, the best provider can succeed and rise to the top.


In some locations – park and ride lots for example – these signs might say “carpool parking only, until 9:30am.” This way, if no one is carpooling, these spaces are available after peak demand.

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Car Sharing Advice for Cities

(this post was originally written in 2006 for ecoplan.org)
How can and should a government support the development of Car Sharing Organizations (CSOs)? As I write this, I note that many things revolve around the major cost items of running the business.



1. Car insurance. Insurance is very difficult to obtain in this nascent industry since the insurers have no experience with the risk basis, and it is a major cost to the CSO. It took years of accumulating data to finally get our insurance rates down in line with reality. If the government (city? state?) could establish some kind of pool for just the catastrophic incidents, this is an important way in which insurance risk can be tiered, making insurance affordable.

2. Parking. Parking ranks right up there as one of the largest variable costs. CSOs compete with individual's costs of maintaining and parking their own vehicles. If private parking is available on-street (cheaply), this makes the CSO service relatively more expensive than owning your own car and parking it on-street for free or close to free. Likewise, the convenience of on-street parking can make car-sharing (or private ownership) that much more (less) appealing than the alternative parked deep in large garages. This can swing both ways in supporting or creating an additional hurdle depending on where (and price) of the residential housing stock.

My best advice here is: Offer up some parking spaces (municipal lots or on-street) for one year agreements to whichever car-sharing company wishes to bid on them. In the early years, you will likely have only one company bidding, and their bid will be close to zero $/month. As the business gets more established, and as competition enters the market, the value for specific parking spaces to specific companies will rise: the city will enjoy the additional revenue, and more than one company can compete in specific locations (especially if you can offer up more than one space in a location). This seems like the most fair way to both nurture a budding industry, as well as accommodate success and competition.

3. Marketing. This is very very dear to both starting and existing companies. The city has lots of resources to get the word out to residents at very low cost. Providing this ability, whether the area has one or many competing companies is critical, and keeps the costs of providing the service down. For example, on bus, subway adverts, or information mailed out to residents that renew vehicle registrations, etc. Again, please make sure to offer this service if there is only one company, and quickly accommodate the addition of other competitors as they arise.

4. Taxing, Zoning, Plating, Parking Permits. Zipcar operates in many cities, counties, and states across the US and now Canada (Toronto). Obstacles have included: residentially zoned neighborhoods where the inclusion of a car-share parking space could be construed as "business" and thus not allowable; a business tax applied on each and every parking location as if it were a separate "business establishment"; per transaction taxes meant for car rental that make the economics of hourly rental impossible (i.e. $10/rental tax ... if you rent for just a few hours that makes it economically unreasonable); are these vehicles plated commercial or residential? In Boston, commercial plates pay a higher rate at the toll booths, and get to park in loading zones. We would like to pay residential rates at the tolls and not be allowed to parking in loading zones... In any event, you can imagine how these can cause issues, some of which are easier to resolve than others.

5. Geographic carve-outs. If my memory from 3 years ago serves me, London offered up its support for carsharing on a borough by borough basis (?). I think this is problematic because, like most businesses, carsharing does best when it can scale. Also, users very much stand to gain from competition (improved quality of service) and a large network (i.e. a member can pick up a car from both work or home, without having to join two companies). Again, this is an easy issue to correct going forward."

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