[Carfreeliving] Re: gas tax fund for New Orleans

Mon Sep 5 10:28:42 MDT 2005

Hi all-

I thought that this post from a woman from the New Orleans Metro Bicycle Coalition might interest you all, esp. since she speaks about the important distinction between living a car-free lifestyle and being broke and not having access to car. She raises some really good points, and things I have been thinking about for some time now. Much of what my rant earlier was about centers in things she brings up here. 

Best,
Emily

Date: Sat, 3 Sep 2005 12:23:52 -0700 (PDT)
From: audrey warren <audreykwarren at yahoo.com>
Subject: update from New Orleans

Hello All,

Just checking in.  We are pretty sure that everyone on
the New Orleans Metro Bicycle Coalition board got out
safely, myself included, but not without a deep
sadness in our hearts.  If anyone has any questions
about specific people and their whereabouts, they can
contact me directly at audreykwarren at yahoo.com.

There are a thousand different ways to look at what
has happened, but since this is an organization of
bike/ped advocates, I wanted to give a perspective
that is relevant to this group.  It's a long posting,
but I hope you will indulge me.  I've got a lot on my
mind.

There's a tricky question on the US census longform
that asks if your household has access to a car.  I
live by myself and haven't owned a car for years, but
I can't honestly say that I don't have access to a
car.  I have a friends and family who I can (and do)
call on anytime to borrow their car.  I have money to
take a taxi or rent a car whenever I need it. I have
chosen to live without a car, but have access to all
of the privileges that would go with ownership, just
none of the hassle.  It was never a question as to
whether I would get out of the city.  We had
reservations at a hotel in Dallas by Friday night.

Perhaps the largest issue that we have struggled with
in the formation of the New Orleans Metro Bicycle
Coalition is connecting with the population of folks
that depend on their bicycle as their only mode of
transportation, people who are honestly just barely
scraping by.  We all know that it is notoriously
difficult to get numbers on cyclists, much less get an
accurate sense of the demographics, but I would say
that easily more than half the bicyclists on the road
in New Orleans are riding not because of some ideology
or health goal, but because they are broke and even
bus fare is beyond their means.

The vast majority of the people who were left behind
had no way out.  When you are watching these images on
the television, I challenge you to see them as the
unseen, marginalized faces of bicycling - the folks
that ride everyday, but never find their way to our
membership lists, or speak at the Bike Summit, or
subscribe to The Ride.  Part of the horror of this
event is that we as a nation have turned our back on
the poor, and that in most urban areas, poverty and
race are inextricably linked.

For me, advocating for bicycle and pedestrian rights
is about social justice, and the 900 lb gorrilla in
the corner is that the complexion of our momement is
largely white, middle class.  I would like to hear a
conversation in the bike/ped advocacy movement that
really addresses these issues so that we as a
collective can work to put our own house in order. 

If you would like to help out with the tragedy, please
consider working in your own organizations to
strengthen your ties with communities of color, and
connect with people who are struggling with poverty
every day.  With all of the madness that is being
broadcast on the television, it is difficult to know
what to do, and I offer this as a meaningful way to
channel your desire to help.  Reaching out beyond our
historic base is not trivial - or easy - but we can't
claim that we're just an upstart grassroots movement
anymore without enough resources to do it right. If we
in New Orleans had made it a priority to address the
needs of those who can't afford a car, we would never
have seen the devesting images of those that were left
behind.

-audrey

------------------
Audrey Warren
New Orleans Metro Bicycle Coalition

From: Jason Henderson <jhenders at sbcglobal.net>
Subject: [Carfreeliving] gas tax fund for New Orleans 
CC: 
Date: Thu, 01 Sep 2005 17:30:05 -0700
To: Nancy Wilkinson <nancyw at sfsu.edu>, Carfreeliving at livablecity.org

Hi,

I grew up in New Orleans. I have known this was coming all my life. I 
sat through a few. I am in geography and interested in urbanism and 
transportation issues because of this.

The damge to New Orleans is not a surprise at all, and much of it should 
not be rebuilt. I am not talking about the French Quarter or Victorian 
sections, nor the development along the natural levees. What should not 
be rebuilt is the sprawl surrounding NOLA. This is a major reason the 
damage has been so immense. Global Warming, sea level rise, coastal 
erosion resulting from canals to access oil and gas, subsidence on an 
immense scale due to the weight of sprawl. Massive levees constructed to 
protect sprawl. Filling in once essential backswamps for sprawl [These 
backswamps used to "store" these surges and rising tides.] Hurricanes 
happen all the time. This was not an act of God or nature, it was public 
policy.
A sustainable New Orleans rebuilt could densify and manage half a 
million. Like San Francisco, New Orlenas had 800 thousand in the 1950s 
and had a much smaller footprint.

SO, on to the money. Funding for the ecologically sustainable rebuild of 
parts of NOLA (including densification of Baton Rouge without expanding 
physical footprint):

50 cent gas tax for direct and immediate aid
50 cent gas tax directly into rebuild fund

Since America's automobility addiction largely led to this, this seems 
fair, Maybe $2.00....

Also, consider a

50 cent gas tax for global warming mitigation fund
50 cent gas tax for sprawl mitigation fund (i.e urbanism fund)
50 cent gas tax for national high speed rail network
50 cent gas tax for national transit fund.

$3.50 gas tax total. Nationwide. ($2.00 additional for all
non-utlility suvs, which is 99% of them)

just a thought as the cost of this is pondered.
-jh

-- 
Jason Henderson 
San Francisco CA 
(415)-255-8136
jhenders at sbcglobal.net 

begin:vcard
fn:Jason Henderson
n:Henderson;Jason
adr;dom:;;;San Francisco ;CA
email;internet:jhenders at sbcglobal.net or Jhenders at sfsu.edu
tel;work:415-405-2483
tel;home:415-255-8136 (best number)
version:2.1
end:vcard

_______________________________________________
Carfreeliving mailing list
Carfreeliving at livablecity.org
http://livablecity.org/mailman/listinfo/carfreeliving_livablecity.org

Emily Drennen 
Executive Director, Walk San Francisco

415-431-9255 office/fax 
www.walksf.org
1095 Market Street #502, SF, CA 94103  

Advisory Council Member, Bay Area Air Quality Management District
Citizen's Advisory Committee Member, Metropolitian Transportation Agency
Past Chair, SF Bicycle Advisory Committee
__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Tired of spam?  Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around 
http://mail.yahoo.com 
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: /pipermail/carfreeliving_livablecity.org/attachments/20050905/d69501ef/attachment.htm