Search Results

Climate Communications Checklist 1. SOLUTIONS first 2. Seize the OPPORTUNITIES 3. VALUES are the glue KC Golden, Climate Solutions: “Climate change is the defining challenge of our generation. It’s also the defining opportunity.” (Read more.) Gordon Campbell, Premier, British Columbia, Canada: “Stop procrastinating!” John McCain: “Americans solve problems. We don’t run from them. Cleaner air; greater energy efficiency; a more diverse and secure energy mix, and US leadership in the...

The US Northwest gets a raw deal when it comes to the economics of driving. We import from outside the region virtually every car we drive, not to mention nearly every gallon of fossil fuel we burn. So, the lion’s share of the money we spend on driving goes elsewhere. (Our newly updated energy counter illustrates this point with dramatic flair.) Interestingly, a new report from a Portland economist makes...

One of the benefits of working in an office full of geeks is that my colleagues, rather than my spouse, bear the brunt of my obsessions over policy minutiae. A little while ago, for example, we had a rollicking debate about whether Sightline’s long-standing opposition to the Home Interest Mortgage Deduction—herein abbreviated as “HIMD”—still makes sense.  (We’re wild and crazy here, I tell you!) Here’s the rundown. On equity grounds, the...

Everyone knows that cars are expensive, right? Still, it may come as a surprise to find out just how much money we spend getting from place to place. The cost of the car itself—typically the second biggest purchase many families make in their lives—is just the start. When you start adding in the cost of gasoline, and car insurance, and maintenance and repairs, and parking, and taxes to build new...

Worth reading: a New York Timesop-ed by London mayor Ken Livingstone on congestion pricing, one of our favorite topics. As you may recall, in 2003 London started charging drivers a fee to enter the most congested part of the center city. The early results: congestion fell by 20 percent, climate-warming vehicle emissions fell by 15 percent, and 70,000 fewer cars per day entered the congested center city. Since then, the...

Last week, Flexcar stationed one of its hundreds of hourly car-share vehicles outside our house. So, there’s now often a car sitting at the curb that we can use. Are we still car-less? By our definition, yes. For my family, “car-less” never meant anything beyond not owning a car. Some people have misunderstood, thinking we’ve made a pledge not to drive (and teasing us for “cheating” when we do drive). We’re...

Every once in a while there’s a truth that everybody knows, but that no one will acknowledge. And when someone finally says it aloud, it sounds shocking. Like this: …what we’re doing now isn’t working. Not for drivers, taxpayers or the environment. We can’t tax and build our way out of this. That’s Seattle Times columnist Danny Westneat in his column today, talking about what most people in Seattle already...

(This is the first post in a new series.) In the fall of 2000, in broad daylight, I pedaled straight into the tail of a stationary Jeep Cherokee. The SUV, parked in a cycling lane, complained noisily: its alarm wailed. I dusted off my bike shorts (and ego) and checked the damage. The truck was unscathed, of course. My knee was lightly bruised where it had hit the ground. My...

Sightline research director Clark Williams-Derry analyzes the Seattle viaduct debate and comes to a few simple conclusions: roads are expensive, rush hour is the worst problem, and the differences between short- and long-term consequences.

“Don’t you college boys know? People don’t like hitch-hikers no more.” That’s what the state trooper told us—my friend John and me—25 years ago. We were standing in the rain, on the edge of an Ohio highway, our thumbs half extended, bedraggled from a sleepless night and unseasonably cold temperatures. Twelve hours earlier we “college boys” certainly had not known, but we had caught on in the meantime. For lack...