peak oil, climate change and you.
Cycle Aware Wellington is starting a campaign to improve the safety for cyclists using Thorndon Quay.
The petrol tax will celebrate it's 80th birthday on Sunday 27 October, 2007.
Information on what the petroltax has paid for will be made available over the coming weeks at
http://www.petroltax.org.nz/80Years.html
While Thorndon Quay is not a difficult road to navigate with traffic the main hazard along there is cars backing out of car parks not being able to see cyclists. The only solution is for all parking to change to parallel parking (as opposed to the current angle parking). But I generally can navigate this safely as there is not so many cars parked before 8am and after 5pm when I use it.
An article in today's NZ Herald reports bus passengers are being promised sweeping law changes offering them better odds of getting picked up on time, and by clean and safe vehicles.
The Transport and Oil Working Group of the Sustainable Energy Forum has just released Peak Oil: A Major Issue for New Zealand [PDF, 60 KB], which is designed as a quick guide for the public and the media on what the Peak Oil issue is about, how it affects New Zealand, and how New Zealand should respond.
Hi Everybody
I would like to take the opportunity to introduce the website carshare.co.nz. Carshare.co.nz enables you to organise shared transport with like minded travelers / commuters. Types of rides that you can organise include regular regional commuter carpools/carshare, Long distance one-off rides, and Long distance regular rides. Carshare.co.nz is free to use - so check it out today.
It's good to see this site up and running. If you're interested in the relationship between Peak Oil, climate change, and New Zealand's transport and energy policies, then I suggest you check out the Sustainable Energy Forum web site at http://www.sef.org.nz/. On our Papers page, there are several papers that make detailed proposals for changes to New Zealand's transport and energy policies in the light of Peak Oil - especially "Peak Oil: An Urgent Issue for New Zealand" and "New Zealand's Response to Peak Oil: Land Transport". We also have a very active email group, SEF News, and we produce the magazine EnergyWatch.
Sure it's at the low end of predictions, but it's still a floor for the price of oil going forward: an article in the UK Telegraph today reports that Shell has paid $2.4 billion for an oil sands company, valued on the basis that oil will stay above $50/barrel long term.
Plan B 2.0:
Rescuing a Planet Under Stress and a Civilization in Trouble, Lester R. Brown, 2006
In monetary terms, the cost of our dependence on private motor vehicle transport is:
A quiet residential street with a newly constructed two-way bikeway on the footpath. While cycling on the street is relatively safe (and a separate bike path arguably unnecessary), using the bike path puts cyclists at risk from cars entering/leaving driveways not checking both ways before crossing the path (a driver leaving a driveway and turning left normally only needs to look right to ensure the way is clear, so a cyclist travelling from the left is at increased risk of being hit).