[OKC] FW: [NFlyerA] Suburbs look more distant all the time

[Shauna Struby]

This is an excellent post from Evan Stair, of the Northern Flyer Alliance. I asked his permission, which he graciously granted, to share his wisdom about this very important issue which has increasingly urgent ramifications for all of us.

 

Shauna, OKC

 

Part of the Northern Flyer Alliance vision is to make what is stated in the article below more accessible to citizens in our region. Amtrak is not the entire solution. Amtrak is fundamentally an intercity passenger rail carrier (I prefer the term interstate). In regions such as the Northeast or California, as mentioned in this article, the "suburbs" represent the small towns of our region. The difference here being that our suburbs are much more distant from the inner city core. I speak of communities such as Perry, Arkansas City, or even Gainesville that could be cut off from the nation without some form of energy efficient mass transportation. Innovative ways to keep rural and small town America alive will require vision and unity of ideas. Our nation can no longer afford to perpetuate polarized political ideologies. These policies have played a role in creating the mess in which we find ourselves. They mean about as much today as allegiance to a professional sports team or American Idol contestant.

As the article mentions, if the price of gasoline stays high and continues to rise, our living-landscape will begin to resemble that of Europe. I do not personally believe that the entire solution to our worsening transportation crisis will be an exclusive solution.  New fuel sources to power energy intensive modes of personal transportation will play a role, as will increased reliance on mass transportation. The myth of exclusive sustainable personal transportation is hard to break, but it must be broken if we are to compete on a world economic stage. Personal transportation is not inherently evil. However, as with all healthy pursuits, selection of personal transportation should require moderation. Unfortunately, we have left ourselves without alternatives, especially in this portion of the country. It is our duty now to elect representation that will provide the optional selection.

We cannot drill our way out of this problem. We cannot pave our way to prosperity. We cannot solve problems by just talking about a new Manhattan Project initiative directed at energy and transportation.  We have to act.

In fact, personal transportation, our highways, and our aviation industry will still play a vital role in our great society. The difference will be in placing more thought into transportation choice; and in a broader sense, infrastructure investment and policy by visionary, not our present reactionary, transportation agencies. That my friends is the new definition of transportation freedom.

Finally, there is no greater threat to our society today than our transportation crisis. Transportation touches every aspect of our existence from where we work to the schools and churches we attend to the clothes we wear to the food we eat. The quality, price, and availability of these products and services depend upon a fluid transportation network. 

Evan Stair
Executive Director
PassengerRailOK.org
Oklahoma Director
Northern Flyer Alliance



******Suburbs look more distant all the time********

http://www.azstarnet.com/sn/business/244777.php

In his hunt for a new home, Demetrius Stroud crunched the numbers to find out that, with gas prices climbing, moving near an Amtrak station is the best thing for his wallet.Stroud was looking in Elk Grove., Calif. — about 85 miles away from his job in the San Francisco Bay Area — because homes there are more affordable. But with gas at $4.50 and a car that gets about 22 miles per gallon, Stroud would be pumping $560 a month into his tank. So instead he made an offer on a home near the train station in Davis, which will shave $160 off his commuting costs. "I wouldn't even be able to consider doing it without that Amtrak possibility," said Stroud, 45, who also telecommutes one day a week to his job in software quality assurance. 

Stroud's choice represents a fundamental shift in the way more Americans are approaching home buying in this era of ballooning gas prices. 

Real estate agents, transportation officials and industry surveys indicate that home buyers are placing more importance on cutting gas bills and commute times than they have since the oil shocks of the 1970s. And there are some early indications that homes near urban centers, and subway, train and bus stops are often selling faster and at better prices than those in the distant suburbs. 

On Wednesday, a survey of 900 Coldwell Banker agents showed a remarkable 96 percent said rising gas prices were a concern to their clients, and 78 percent said higher fuel costs are increasing their desire for city living. Don Denton, manager of Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage in the Capitol Hill area of Washington, D.C., said prices are holding in the area and the neighborhood appears to be expanding. "We have seen a steady increase in interest in our area over the last several years, and it is comparable to how the reaction to the 1970s gas crisis sparked an interest… inside the entire Beltway," he said.

A grueling commute by car into the city is the main reason Mark Bulkeley wants to move closer to his job in Tysons Corner, Va., near downtown D.C. He is selling his home in Haymarket, Va., which is 30 miles from work, and has signed a contract on a home in Great Falls, Va., that's just six miles from the office. Bulkeley, 36, a wholesale electricity trader, already has a hybrid Honda Civic, but he still calculates a savings of about $100 a month on gas once he moves closer to the city. "When we decided that we were going to make a move, we basically put a dot in the middle of the map where my office is and said, 'We are not going to live farther than essentially a 20-minute circle around that,' " Bulkeley said.

Gas prices, which have shot up $1.07 this year, are magnifying demographic trends that show more younger buyers and empty-nest seniors are moving back to urban centers. If gas prices continue their ascent, this could have profound consequences over time on the future development of American cities and suburbs and modes of transportation. Homes in areas that require long commutes and don't provide enough public transportation alternatives are falling in value more quickly than more central locations, a May study by CEOs for Cities, a network of U.S. urban leaders, found.

In Florida, real estate professor Bill Weaver sees this as possibly the beginnings a shift to a more European approach to finding homes. 

For the past three decades, travel has been relatively cheap in the U.S., so more Americans sought homes in the suburbs or in the country because they wanted the space and quiet and didn't mind — or care about — the cost of commuting, Weaver said. That approach led to sprawl in and around cities from Los Angeles to Orlando, Fla., in contrast to the smaller and more densely populated cities in Europe. 

"Transportation costs in Europe have been so high for so long that they already take transportation into account when they buy a home," he said. 

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