Bacon's Rebellion

Reader Rob Jackson calls attention to an article in today’s Wall Street Journal about the experiment in Stockholm, Sweden, with congestion pricing. It seems that the Swedes, for all their skill in urban planning and their investments in mass transit, are suffering from traffic congestion. Better yet, they’re adopting a market-driven remedy. Socialist though they may be, Sweden’s politicians apparently have a firmer grasp of economics than Virginia’s.

The Greater Stockholm region has nearly two million people. The central city, built upon an archipelago of islands linked by bridges, is particularly prone to congestion. Under contract with IBM, the national government has set up 23 tolling points which, used in conjunction with transponder boxes, laser detectors and cameras, tracks the path of every car in the city. Each time a car with a transponder passes through a toll, the charge is automatically deducted from the driver’s bank account. Tolls vary at different times of the day according to the level of congestion, ranging from the equivalent of $1.38 to $2.76 per hour.

The goal was to alter motorist behavior — and that’s exactly what has happened. Rather than drive to and from work at the same time every day, some Stockholmites (Stockholmers?) are varying their commuting times. Some are taking different routes. Some are riding bicycles. And many are availing themselves of mass transit. As the WSJ explains:

Before the trial began, Stockholm spent about $180 million on improvements to public transportation. It bought about 200 new buses and added rush-hour trains, express bus routes and more park-and-ride lots. But the changes had little impact on the number of people who left their private cars at home. In spring 2006, however, during the trial, use of all forms of public transportation jumped 6% and ridership on inner-city bus routes rose 9%, compared with a year earlier.

Now that the six-month trial has ended, the city has scheduled a referendum to let voters decide whether to make the congestion-pricing scheme permanent. A June poll found that 52 percent of voters favored the plan.

So far, the idea of congestion pricing in Virginia hasn’t gotten past the talking stage. It strikes me as remarkable that our transportation policies are more socialistic than Sweden’s.

So much to blog about and so little time — I’m still catching up from vacation. Well, here goes…

Reader Tobias Jodter recommends to our attention an Aug. 27 article in the Washington Post describing the housing crisis in the suburbs. Writer Michael Grunwald gets straight to the point in the first paragraph:

In the past five years, housing prices in Fairfax County have grown 12 times as fast as household incomes. Today, the county’s median family would have to spend 54 percent of its income to afford the county’s median home; in 2000, the figure was 26 percent. The situation is so dire that Fairfax recently began offering housing subsidies to families earning $90,000 a year; soon, that figure may go as high as $110,000 a year.

Grunwald clearly understands that the problem isn’t simply a lack of affordable housing — it’s the location of the affordable housing.

The root of the problem is the striking mismatch between the demand for and the supply of affordable housing — or, more accurately, affordable housing near jobs. … when Fairfax housing officials gave me a tour recently, they told me many of their employees now drive a full hour from Warrenton in Fauquier County. The media officer interjected that she drives nearly two hours each way from Winchester in Frederick County. The driver said he lives in Winchester, too.

In other words, housing that is “affordable” to blue-collar and pink-collar families is not “accessible” to their jobs. What homeowners save in mortgage payments, they bleed in the cost (more than $.50 per mile) and time associated with commuting. Grunwald even understands the root causes of the problem:

Minimum lot requirements, minimum parking requirements, density restrictions and other controls go well beyond the traditional mission of the building code and end up artificially reducing the development of safe, affordable housing. The unfashionable but accurate term for these restrictions is “snob zoning.” Suburbanites use them to boost property values by keeping out riffraff — even the riffraff who teach their kids, police their streets and extinguish their fires.

Paraphrasing economist Christopher Thornberg, Grunwald concludes: “The best thing local officials can do to promote affordable housing is to get out of the way — stop requiring one-acre lots and two-car garages, and stop blocking low-income and high-density projects.”

First question: Wow, where did the Post find this guy? He’s good.

Second question: Will any of the Post‘s editorial writers absorb what Grunwald has to say?

In the latest edition of Bacon’s Rebellion, I profile Burrell Saunders, the lead architect behind Virginia Beach’s Town Center. This project has converted several blocks of suburban strip development in the Pembroke area into a pedestrian-friendly, mixed-use community with only modest assistance from the City of Virginia Beach. (See “Extreme Makeover.”)

A number of points arise from this column that bear upon ongoing conversations on this blog.

The biggest barrier to re-development of the district was the restrictive city zoning code. Once the city created a special code for the Town Center district, the project began moving.

Increased density does not necessarily result in increased congestion. I visited the Pembroke area from around 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. Friday. The main thoroughfares — Independence and Virginia Beach Boulevards are modestly congested but hardly onerous. Automobile traffic was remarkably light on the side streets.

It won’t take two generations to make significant changes in human settlement patterns. Transportation-efficient development in the right location can have an immediate impact, reducing the number of car trips on crowded arterial roads. Reforming land use in Virginia cannot be dismissed as a long-term solution — it is very much a here-and-now solution.

The August 28, 2006, edition of Bacon’s Rebellion is now online. You can view the whole kit and kaboodle here. Or just check out the following columns:

Extreme Makeover
Burrell Saunders has mastered a skill vital to Virginia’s future: transforming suburban decay into urban cool. His talents are on display at Virginia Beach’s Town Center.
by James A. Bacon

Sportsmanship Matters
In politics, as in baseball, there is a way to play the game.
by Doug Koelemay

Someone Has to Pay
Virginia’s transportation system needs more money, but not all fund-raising schemes are created equal. Some perpetuate the status quo while others encourage innovation.
by Patrick McSweeney

The Whale on the Beach
The era of massive over-consumption of the earth’s natural capital is coming to an end. The only prayer for sustaining our quality of life is to adopt more efficient human settlement patterns.
by EM Risse

Backgrounder:
Quantification of Land Resources and the Impact on Land Conservation Efforts
by EM Risse

Saving Money, Helping Kids
Tuition Assistance Grants of $10,000 would help disabled children to attend private schools with programs tailored to their special needs — and save public schools money in the bargain.
by Geoffrey Segal

When Bureaucrats Rule
Our legislators can enact all the laws they want, but their implementation is easily thwarted if they fun afoul of our state bureaucracy.
by Phillip Rodokanakis

The Real Race Problem
Which is worse: calling someone “macaca” or painting whites as racists in order to perpetuate the cult of victimhood and keep minorities on the liberal plantation?
by James Atticus Bowden

Nice & Curious Questions
Up, Up and Away: Ballooning in Virginia.
by Edwin S. Clay III and Patricia Bangs

There is a lot we could learn from the Europeans, especially about energy and the environment, the subject of our last column as well as today’s column at Bacon’s Rebellion.

One topic is vocabulary. We talk about “linking land use and transportation” and “balancing transport system capacity with settlement pattern travel demand.”

In the EU they are talking about “breaking the link between economic prosperity (aka, growth) and the growth of transport (infrastructure).

Today’s WaPo Metro Section (“Land-Use Studies Crucial, Kaine Says: State to Measure Impact of Projects“) give hope that Tim was listening three years ago.

Expanding and refining the words used might help shift the trajectory of dysfunction towards a sustainable course.

EMR

MainStream Media is going wild with hard news stories, soft personality features and “in-depth reporting” to mark the first anniversary of Katrina.

The recurring theme is: “The Gulf Coast – and New Orleans in particular – are not back to the way they were a year ago.”

Excuse me? Is that not just what everyone would hope? The Gulf Coast – and New Orleans in particular – were death traps waiting to happen a year ago. In many ways Katrina and Rita were only a hint of what might have happened if “The Big One” made a direct hit.

In the early 70s when almost no one was yet talking about Global Climate Change, serious scientists and researchers – climatologist, hydrologists, civil engineers and ecologists all told us that the Gulf Coast had a target painted on its back.

The State of Louisiana paid us hundreds of thousands of dollars to develop a long-term strategy to fundamentally change human settlement patterns on the Gulf Coast, around New Orleans and in the upland urban agglomerations such as Monroe and Shreveport.

The governance practitioners put those plans on the shelf and ignored the advice. They proceeded with Business-As-Usual and Politics-As-Usual. See “Down Memory Lane With Katrina,” 5 September 2005 at db4.dev.baconsrebellion.com

Now no one we have observed – not Brookings who is documenting the recovery effort, not the MainStream Media, not the well intended volunteers, not the well fed government contractors, not the everyday carpet baggers, on one – is paying any attention to the shape of future.

Collectively millions of hours and billions of dollars are being spent on the “recovery” effort, but nothing is being done to implement strategies to Fundamentally Change settlement patterns. It is imperative that human’s ecological footprint shrink at the regional and community scale.

Some houses are being rebuild on raised foundations, there are plans to build higher and better levies. There are no strategic plans for making the New Orleans New Urban Region or the rest of the Gulf Coast more bad weather proof or to create Balanced Communities in the Coastal or the Upland areas of the State.

The Gulf Coast is not back to the way it was? Thank goodness. But it has not moved toward a more sustainable settlement pattern at the regional and community scale either.

Did someone mention Ernesto?

EMR

Linda and I killed SYNERGY’s FAX line this week. We had discussed it for a long time and decided it was time to pull the plug.

The last five FAXes we received were ads for “bad-credit-no-problem” mortgages and “who-would-want-to-go-there?” vacation packages. The transmissions were addressed to “All Staff.” Each was in the same format as those we had repeatedly, per federal regulations, asked the supposed sender to remove (540) 351-1702 from their files and their automatic dialers.

Some, e.g., Jim Bacon, have never really liked FAX. While FAX was a vital technology during World War II, it became just a simple tool when compared with the big deals of communications – the Internet and Cell Phones – that exploded in the 90s and the 00s. FAX was a handy, inexpensive technology – that was its downfall. No entity could make a lot of money by doing the things necessary to make FAX continue to be effective – like shaming government agencies into enforcing the regulations intended to support the medium. FAX was allowed to become the pond of bottom-fishers.

The end of FAX is, perhaps, a small loss for civilization but because it is a simple, useful tool it is symbolic of a larger cloud on the horizon on which we will focus in our next column.

EMR

I enjoyed the responses to my posting of the data from Tidewater that less spending per student produces better test scores – and, presumably, better educated students.

It was fun to show the data because every election cycle the VEA, Democrats, Too Many Republicans, Liberals, MSM and simple-minded folk make the claim that “More money = Better schools, better education”. Like there is a cause and effect.

A corporation in Florida, FYI Corporation (www.fyicorporation.com) did analysis of Florida schools using a visual presentation called KEGS. The KEG is a box sub-divided into many boxes. The subordinate boxes are (one hopes) independent variables. You score your variables and then color the boxes. The result is striking descriptive analysis.

They looked at schools in Florida and their standardized tests. You can see which factors jump out at you in successful schools and losers. Then, you go down the level of schools and you can see how individual teachers with the same variables get markedly different results. You can see how classes with windows on the playground get different results.

Let’s be clear that this is descriptive, not causal, analysis. It suggests what might matter. Of course, it makes a difference what independent variables you pick and how you measure them – the buzz word ‘metrics’. Yet, it may capture some of the variables that really matter in improving test scores – as one key, standardized measure of educational improvement. That would help educators and policy-makers to try something other than throwing money.

I didn’t post the graphics because they may be proprietary, although I’m sure this corporation would love a call from any school district or the Commonwealth wanting to pay for analysis.

Also, this technique would very interesting in an analysis of roads – mile by mile or whatever distance matters most. Maybe it could be used for environmental analysis of water.

Der Teuful im Detail steckt.

OCRACOKE–For those of you who have never heard of Ocracoke Island — and there seem to be a surprising number of you — it is a 16-mile island in the Outer Banks of North Carolina in the shape of a rope with a knot tied at one end. The 14 miles of “rope” consist of national wildlife refuge and are forever off limits to development. This refuge contains the most magnificent beaches on the East Coast of the United States, spectacular wetlands and miles and miles of dunes.

Human habitation is limited to Ocracoke Village at the “knot” at the end of the island. During the winter, the village sports a population of 800. During the peak of the summer season, between visitors and temporary workers, the population increases to 5,000 to 6,000. The island, accessible only by ferry, is one of the most isolated spots in the Outer Banks. (Only the deserted fishing village of Portsmouth, on an island with no ferry service, is more remote, if my geographical knowledge serves me correctly.)

Ocracoke is a fascinating microcosm, a case study in human settlement patterns. Though remote, it is becoming increasingly popular, but the community seems to be maintaining its integrity. The original village arose around the Ocracoke lighthouse and a small, protected harbor. The houses are set on tiny lots in close proximity. There is no central sewage system, so density is limited by square-footage requirements for septic systems. Otherwise the main restrictions are limitations on building height, building setbacks and tight water supplies that limit the number of new meters.

There don’t appear to be any zoning regulations that restrict “incompatible” land uses. The historic village is a charming mix of single-family houses, shops and restaurants. Many of the locals make their living as artisans and/or artists, and they live and work in the same premises. Lots of white picket fences. Quaint lanes of sand and crushed oyster shell. The trees, though wind-swept and scrubby, offer thick foliage. These, combined with the native island vegetation, have a stark and distinctive beauty.

Cars abound — the touristas all arrive on car-bearing ferries. But in the central village, where destinations are located close to one another, the primary means of locomotion is bicycle and foot. I have been surprised to espy only a handful of golf carts/electric buggies. There may be a business opportunity for someone to fill the void.

The local promoters are given to calling Ocracoke the “Martha’s Vineyard” of the South. Indeed, it does resemble Martha’s Vineyard before it was thoroughly yuppified and the original dwellings gave way to $3 million McMansions. I hope that fate never befalls this magical island….

Today’s Daily Press (August 21, 2006) has a cool graphic on the front of the Local News section. It shows how much money each locality spent per student (total as well as local and other state/federal spending) and SOLs in English, Math and Science (cumulatives calculated by the state).

The localities include over a half million Virginians – Hampton, Newport News, York, Poquoson, Williamsburg, James City County, Gloucester, Mathews, Suffolk, Isle of Wight, and Surry.

The lowest spending locality ($7,200 per student) , Poquoson (my town), has the highest scores (91 English, 95 Math, 93 Science) . The highest spending lccality ($12,000 per student), Surry, has the lowest scores (72 English, 74 Math, 80 Science).

The second lowest spender, York (where my wife is a school counselor in a school that passed the SOLs every year), is second highest in scores.

Hmm. Looks like more money doesn’t bring better results on tests. If the VEA is really about education, then they should advocate LESS spending per student!

Barton Hinkle has demonstrated once again that he has a keener grasp of the issues than any other newspaper pundit commenting on Virginia transportation. Rather than recycling the same worn-out dogmas, he brings new perspectives to the debate. In yesterday’s edition, he turned outright wonkish: delving into the methodology of how one properly calculates the cost of operating the cost of automobile travel.

At dispute was the question: Which costs more, traveling one mile by car or by train? In a previous column, Hinkle had quoted the Heritage Foundation to the effect that it costs an average of $.21 per mile to operate a car — including the cost of road construction and maintenance. Rail advocates objected, citing AAA figures of $.62 per mile.

I have no idea whose estimate is better, although, I’ll admit, the Heritage number sounds low to me. The point is that Hinkle is asking the right questions. What are the average costs, both private and public, of transporting a person by car and by rail? Currently, lawmakers in Virginia favor pumping billions of state transportation dollars into mass transit without any evidence whatsoever (at least none that has been proffered to the public) that mass transit can move more people for less cost than building roads.

I’m not against mass transit — I’m just against investing in mass transit blindly. The Commonwealth needs to establish objective yardsticks for measuring the cost effectiveness of road vs. rail. Those costs, as Hinkle rightly points out, need to include “externalities” such as pollution and energy security. And they need to recognize, in the context of analyzing specific project alternatives, that average numbers are meaningless. What matters is the cost effectiveness of a specific project under specific circumstances. Finally, I would add, any evaluation needs to consider the extent to which any project is capable of paying its own way, whether through tolls, fares or tax-increment bond financing.

Virginia needs a rigorous methodology grounded in economics and finance to guide its investments in transportation capacity. Without one, the money we spend is steered by politics and power. Hinkle is steering the discussion in a useful direction.

The sky is the canvas. God is the artist. And every evening he paints a new masterpiece. We sit at the water’s edge, beholding the vault of heaven above us. Thunderheads billow on the horizon, blossoming like camellias. Contrails streak across the sky. The setting sun lights up the clouds like dying embers. The master has daubed layer upon layer: grays upon blues, golds upon whites, crimsons upon pinks. We marvel at the glory of the creator… and wonder, what have we been missing?

BEAUFORT, N.C.–Eastern North Carolina doesn’t get the respect or recognition it deserves. There are a dozen or more delightful little communities dotting the coast of the Pamlico and Albemarle sounds. Beaufort has a beautiful historic district laid out in a classic grid-street layout, with charming clapboard houses dating back to the ante-bellum era. It doesn’t have the spectacular mansions seen in the Battery in Charleston (which I’ve seen) or even Savannah (which I’ve seen only in “The Garden of Midnight and Evil”) but it’s relaxed, informal and not excessively impressed with itself. Sailing yachts and power boats pull up to the dock along the boardwalk giving the land-lubbers like myself something to drool over, fantasizing at the idea of living on a boat, off the grid, foot-loose and fancy free.

Tomorrow, we drive an hour and hop on the ferry to Ocracoke Island in the Outer Banks. Ocracoke is so remote — so far from population centers and accessible only by ferry — that it remains largely unspoiled. But the village is absolutely charming, not overrun with chain restaurants, t-shirt shops, putt-putt golf courses and all the other hyper-commercialized dreck that has ruined Nag’s Head and Virginia Beach. The beaches on Ocracoke Island are the most beautiful on the East Coast and among the most beautiful in the world: broad, white sands, brushed by the waters of the Gulf Stream, unspoiled by development of any kind. You don’t need a car for anything — except to get there and to reach the beach. Otherwise you walk or ride bicycles. It’s one of my favorite places on earth.

If there’s Wi-Fi access on Ocracoke, I’ll report back in. If not, well… I’ll be soaking up rays on the beach, kayaking through the wetlands or dining on bourbon pecan chicken at the Back Porch restaurant. Adieu!

(Photo credit: Eddie Myers Real Estate.)

For all of our problems — and God knows, we dwell on them here at Bacon’s Rebellion — it gives us great cheer to see that Forbes magazine, in its first-ever ranking of the business climates of the 50 states, ranked Virginia number one.

The Old Dominion has the best regulatory environment in the country. Business costs are very low, particularly taxes and energy costs. Also noteworthy, according to Forbes, are Virginia’s AAA bond rating, low workers compensation costs and excellent system of higher education. Encouraging, too, is the fact that the state scored in the bottom half of only three of Forbes’ 30 metrics. As a Forbes writer reportedly told Gov. Timothy M. Kaine: “Not only are you guys first, there’s not even a close second.”

Read Forbes’ profile of Virginia here. And see the state rankings here. Texas ranked second, North Carolina third and Maryland 11th. (For what it’s worth, Delaware ranked 8th, Florida 9th and Georgia 10th. Can the southern Atlantic seaboard claim to be the most dynamic region in the country?)

As a Richmond resident, I was delighted to see the attention that Forbes gave to MeadWestvaco’s decision to relocate its corporate headquarters from Connecticut to my home town. Richmond is indeed a great place to do business and richly deserves the recognition. But I found it curious that Forbes could write about Virginia’s business climate without once alluding to the technology-driven economy in Northern Virginia, which has been out-performing its high-tech peers in job creation for several years now. If Forbes editors pay attention to their own survey, perhaps they will dedicate more resources to covering Northern Virginia’s increasingly dynamic business community.

Road to Ruin is taking a closer look at Prince William County. In a previous article, writer Peter Galuszka profiled the county’s aggressive road-building program. This time, he came back to see how well Prince William is coordinating its $1.5 billion, 15-year transportation plan with its land use policies. (See “Will the Real Prince William County Please Stand Up?”)

It wasn’t easy sorting through the conflicting claims. Sean Connaughton, chairman of the board of supervisors, made a vigorous case that the county has been proactive and forward thinking. But Stewart Schwartz with the Coalition for Smarter Growth, showed Peter some examples of awful slash-and-clear development. My sense as an outsider who occasionally drives through the county is that Prince William is doing a pretty good job connecting land use and transportation in the east, especially in the revitalization of the U.S. 1 corridor. The situation is harder to untangle in the western end of the county around Manassas.

Under Connaughton, the board has been steering the county towards more compact, higher-density, pedestrian-friendly and transit-friendly development than the county had seen before. The problem is that a huge backlog of traditional, sprawl-style development is in the pipeline. The result to date has been a mixture of the good, the bad and the ugly. As the backlog gets worked down, I would expect to see a more transportation-efficient mix of projects. It may not meet the standards of smart growth advocates, but it’s better than what came before.

Does that mean Prince William County has turned the corner to a sustainable pattern of development — or that it’s just sliding downhill at a slower speed? We probably won’t know for years. As Connaughton says, you don’t bring about meaningful change with a snap of the fingers. It’s too bad that Connaughton won’t be around long enough — he’s taking that maritime administration job with the Bush administration — to bask in the praise or catch the blame.