hyc's Journal: I'm from the Government, and I'm here to help you

Does that ever work?

I just got a nice letter from my state's Senator, Senator Barbara Boxer, regarding the sorry state of affairs on the California freeways. I'm posting my reply here, along with her original letter:

Dear Senator Boxer:

Thank you so much for focusing your attention on this matter. It seems clear that there's only so much space available for building freeways, so the primary emphasis of this effort should be to reduce the number of cars that need to go on the existing roads. And that means the primary effort should be on improving mass public transportation, so that people can conveniently get where they need to go without using cars.

Certainly the flow of freight is significant, but anybody looking at a Los Angeles freeway today, vs. a decade ago, will see the main difference being the huge number of SUVs now on the road. These things are 50% larger than the vehicles dominating the roads a decade ago, and they're making life miserable for non-SUV-drivers: taking up more space in lanes, decreasing on-the-road visibility for smaller cars, and helping to increase gasoline consumption at sharply increased rates, which only helps to drive up the cost of operation for everybody. While many people buy these behemoths as a 21st century station-wagon, the vast majority on the road are single-occupant, which is ridiculously wasteful. Any disincentives that can be provided for driving so wastefully would help, in combination with strong positive incentives for using mass-transit.

Having traveled all around this country and all across Europe, I've used some marvelously efficient mass transit systems. As a Los Angeles resident I am constantly jealous of the San Francisco BART, which I use every time I visit the Bay Area. That system is excellent, it goes where most people need to go and it gets there efficiently.

It's ironic to know that a century ago Los Angeles had one of the best light rail systems in the world. What we have today is improving, but it is still a long way away from actually being convenient for the LA population. For example, a lot of people commuting into Los Angeles live in the Lancaster/Palmdale area, and there is no express rail line that can transport them between home and work. They get to suffer along the over-congested 5 freeway, wasting 4 hours out of every day of their lives.

I live in the San Fernando Valley and I used to commute to a job in Inglewood every day, a 30 mile drive. The only way I could make the commute time acceptable was to leave home at 5am to beat the morning traffic, and stay in the office till 8pm to let the evening traffic subside. That prevented me from spending several unproductive hours sitting in traffic, but it also took a huge chunk out of my life; by the time I got home all I could do was go to bed to get ready for the next day. This is hardly "living." Things are so bad now on freeways like the 405, the only time they're appreciably idle is between 1AM and 3AM. The other 22 hours of the day they are just Busy.

The other issue that this raises is - why do these people need to commute in the first place? Why can't more people work in closer proximity to where they live? It's obvious that these people commuting from Lancaster to LA do so because they have good jobs in LA but can't afford the cost of living there, and so have bought residences in Lancaster where property is slightly more affordable. But why aren't they able to bring their jobs to Lancaster with them?

Rather than just making commuting easier and more efficient (which I agree is a terrific goal) I'd like to also see ways to eliminate commuting altogether. I'm pretty lucky in this respect since I work in the software industry and seldom need to drive from my home to an office, I primarily work by telecommuting. But even for people who work in real-world brick&mortar businesses, why aren't they able to concentrate their businesses closer to where they live?

Anyway, thank you again for working on this issue. I look forward to hearing about the improvements that you are able to create.

Sincerely,
    Howard Chu

U.S. Senator Barbara Boxer wrote:

> I thought you would be interested in the following message.
>
> =============================================
>
> Dear Friend:
>
> The U.S. Census Bureau recently confirmed what most southern
> Californians know: daily commutes to and from work consume a
> significant part of workers' lives. The Census Bureau found
> that the average commuter spends 120 hours each year getting to
> work and another 120 hours getting home. This 240 hours each
> year, or ten full days, spent just getting to and from jobs is,
> in many ways, unproductive time not spent at work or with
> families.
>
> A prime reason for the long commute times is congestion -- too
> many cars on already packed freeways and streets. The Senate
> will soon consider legislation that could help shorten the
> amount of time that southern Californians spend on their daily
> commute to work. This legislation would set priorities for
> federal transportation policy and identify specific
> transportation projects for federal support and funding.
> I believe that one of the most important goals of the
> transportation reauthorization bill should be to help cut
> commute times for workers. To do this, we must improve our
> freeway systems and find ways to streamline traffic. Another
> goal should be to make public transportation both more
> efficient and more available to workers.
> We must also address the massive movement of freight through
> southern California. Forty percent of the goods imported by
> our entire nation arrives at the ports of Long Beach or Los
> Angeles, only to move east along our rails and roads. Making
> this flow of freight more efficient will greatly improve
> traffic flow.
>
> The federal transportation bill can help us ease the commutes
> of Californians, and I am working to improve the bill. If you
> have questions about this or any other matter, please let me
> know.
>
> Sincerely,
>
> Barbara Boxer
> United States Senator
>
> =============================================
>
> For more information on Senator Boxer's record and other
> information, please go to: http://www.boxer.senate.gov
>
> If you would like to make a comment regarding this or any other
> federal matter, please feel free to do so at: http://www.boxer.senate.gov/contact/webform.cfm

--
    -- Howard Chu
    Chief Architect, Symas Corp. Director, Highland Sun
    http://www.symas.com http://highlandsun.com/hyc
    Symas: Premier OpenSource Development and Support