In The Press

Work Begins on Nation's Largest Mass Transit Project

The largest mass transit project in the country is currently under construction with the help of federal stimulus dollars. The second passenger rail tunnel beneath the Hudson River will cost an estimated $8.7 billion dollars. The new tunnel will link New Jersey with New York and eventually will double capacity on the nation's busiest rail corridor, running from Washington to Boston, Massachusetts.

In Guangzhou, Chinese officials are building one of the world’s largest and most advanced subway systems. The question is whether the burrowing machines can outrace China’s growing love affair with the automobile — car sales have soared ninefold since 2000. Or are a hundred Los Angeleses destined to bloom?  

Slice of Stimulus Package Will Go to Faster Trains

Despite the record $8 billion investment in high-speed rail added at the last minute to the new economic stimulus package, it is doubtful the money will be enough to fund a true high-speed rail system.

E.PA. Moves Towards Regulating Greenhouse Gases

The Environmental Protection Agency has moved to declare that greenhouse gases are pollutants that pose a danger to the public’s health and welfare. That determination, once made final, would allow federal regulation of motor vehicle emissions of greenhouse gases.

I Dream of Denver

New York Times columnist David Brooks discusses what he believes a recently published Pew Research Center study reveals about where Americans would like to live and what sort of lifestyle they would like to have. In From Sea to Shining Sea, the City Still Rules, respondents offer a different interpretation of current trends. These people point to the desire of an increasing number of Americans for a more accesssible environment and a less suburban lifestyle.                                           

 

Contemplating Congestion Pricing in San Francisco Following the lead of other congested cities like London and Singapore, officials in San Francisco are considering a plan to ease traffic by charging drivers a fee upon entering notoriously clogged sections of the city. Taking Back the Streets Street reformers are questioning the conventional street-curb-sidewalk motif, challenging the dominance of cars, and devising ways to use street furniture, plants and even radical new vehicles to transform the experience of the street. Rider Paradox - Surge in Mass, Drop in Transit Transit systems across the country are raising fares and cutting service even when demand is up with record numbers of riders last year. The Bicycle Evangelist Representative Earl Blumenauer of Oregon is a passionate advocate of cycling as a remedy for everything from climate change to obesity and the founder of the Congressional Bicycle Caucus. But Mr. Blumenauer’s goals are larger than putting Americans on two wheels. He seeks to create what he calls a more sustainable society that includes a transportation infrastructure that looks beyond the car.

Growing Pains for a Deep-Sea   Home Built of Subway Cars One by one, a machine operator has been shoving hundreds of retired New York City subway cars off a barge, continuing the transformation of a barren stretch of ocean floor into a bountiful oasis.