Cash for Transit
Jonathan proposes reinstating the vehicle license fee that Governor Schwarzenegger eliminated back in 2003. The repeal was highly successful in 1) getting Schwarzenegger elected governor and 2) contributing to the destruction of the state's fiscal health. But even reinstating the fee is unlikely to help transit. With the state's huge budget shortfall, that money would likely be used to fill up the black hole that is the state budget, and the legislature would surely r...
CONTINUE READINGHappy Birthday, Legal Planet!
Legal Planet has been up and running for a year now.* In that time, we've had almost 240,000 viewings, 839 comments, and over 860 posts . If we could just manage to have someone to reveal "LegalPlanetgate,"** we could become instantly world famous and ramp up our audience share even more! ------------- *Actually, this is an approximation because we had a predecessor blog (Environmental Law and Policy) for a few months and because we didn't immediately go public...
CONTINUE READINGPetitions, agency expertise and dispersed information in environmental law
“Agency expertise” is a familiar phrase to anyone who has had any significant experience in environmental law. Courts defer to agencies in part because of the perception that agencies have more expertise in technical matters than the courts or the plaintiffs who might be challenging agency decisions. One of the criticisms of various forms of public participation in regulatory process – such as citizen suits or petition provisions that allow the public to reques...
CONTINUE READINGFinancing Lower Fares for Low-Income Bus Riders
Ethan, it's obvious where the money is: just repeal the cut in the Vehicle License Fee. No, I'm not running for anything. And that's a very good thing......
CONTINUE READINGIncreasing bus ridership by making it cheaper
Jonathan presents an interesting idea for stimulating bus ridership in Los Angeles among "choice" riders (aka affluent commuters who could drive if they wanted to). For years, San Franciscans have enjoyed real-time data on bus and train arrivals (via nextmuni.com). It makes a huge difference when trying to catch a bus by minimizing unpleasant wait times, and anything you can do to make public transit faster will attract more choice riders. For some reason, the Los Ange...
CONTINUE READINGGet On The Bus — Even in Los Angeles
A few days ago, Ann cited the newspaper story highlighting the supposed "miracle" of a 26-year-old white woman taking the bus in Los Angeles. But the funny thing is that it would be actually pretty easy to increase bus ridership in LA if the MTA was just a little smart about it. I start from one unproven but plausible presumption. Otherwise automobile-dependent people do not hate taking the bus: they hate waiting for it. Waiting time is tedious, uncomfortable and ...
CONTINUE READINGNew bill in Congress by Rockefeller (S. 3072) would delay regulation of GHGs under the Clean Air Act
As Cara and I have already discussed in detail, the Environmental Protection Agency has committed to delay the rollout of regulation of stationary sources of greenhouse gas emissions under the Clean Air Act, and to regulate only the very largest sources. This backtracking from EPA has been a response to efforts by Senator Lisa Murkowski and others to strip EPA of its regulatory authority in this area, and also has been an attempt to satisfy more moderate senators from m...
CONTINUE READINGConservation deal just a sugar fix?
Cross-posted at CPRBlog When government decides that private economic activity needs to be restricted in order to preserve some part of nature, there are two basic ways to get that result -- by demanding cooperation through regulation or by buying it through economic incentives or outright purchase. The second approach is often politically easier, but environmentalists have long been skeptical of relying too heavily on it. Two major concerns have repeatedly been exp...
CONTINUE READINGThe Anti-Science Lobby Strikes Again
Apparently, the anti-evolution forces have joined up with the climate denialists. The NY Times reports that state governments are already taking action to ensure that their students remains as ignorant about climate science as evolution. The Times explains: In Louisiana, a law passed in 2008 says the state board of education may assist teachers in promoting “critical thinking” on all of those subjects. Last year, the Texas Board of Education adopted language re...
CONTINUE READINGOrganic wine is more desirable to consumers, but only if they don’t know it’s organic
Interesting new research shows that organically-produced wines are generally ranked higher in quality and command a higher price than non-organic wines. But the researchers also found that most organic wines aren't actually labeled as "organic," and that those wines with such a label command lower prices than comparable non-organic wines. The study by UCLA Institute of the Environment/Anderson School of Management professor Magali Delmas and UCSB researcher Laura E. ...
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