2012-03-19 – David Levinson, Transportist

David King sends me to Crooked Timber: The new enclosures as a threat to freedom cites a Guardian article: David Cameron unveils plan to sell off the roads:
Sovereign wealth funds to be allowed to lease motorways in England, says prime minister

“If the road companies met the targets they would receive a proportion of the vehicle excise duty, which currently all goes to the Treasury. This would be seen as a particularly radical step because it would be a form of hypothecation – allowing a stream of revenue to be directed at a particular project. The Treasury normally resists this because it likes to keep control of prioritising spending across government.”
“There will be no tolls on the existing road network. But if the road companies create new capacity – by adding lanes to existing roads or building new roads altogether – then they would be entitled to charge for their use.”
“The bankers NM Rothschild suggested in a report in 2010 that privatising the road network could raise £100bn. Government sources said the scheme proposed by Cameron would raise far less because he plans to lease out trunk roads and motorways, rather than embarking on a full-scale sell-off, as NM Rothschild suggested.
The Cameron scheme would see a regulator for roads established along the lines of Ofwat, which oversees water and sewerage providers. Government sources were joking that they would have to think of a better name than Ofroad.”

[This will be controversial.]

Steven Johnson Why The Bay Area Needs The Bay Lights [Transportation as art]

Created with over 25,000 energy efficient, white LED lights, it is 1½ miles wide and 500 feet high… The Bay Lights is a monumental tour de force seven times the scale of the Eiffel Tower’s 100th Anniversary lighting.

Pioneer Press Planning for [Sprawl in the] South Concord Corridor is in the works:

“A key part of the plan is building a frontage road for I-494 that connects the Hardman Avenue and Concord Street interchanges.

“This convenient frontage road access will open the area up to the market forces generated by the traffic on I-494 and will provide an improved environment for fostering retail, including restaurants,” the study reads.”

Via SR, Pretty cool use of US census data. From Hairycow

Atlantic Cities: Saving Detroit’s Public Transit By Privatizing It [A foot in the door to privatization.]

Authenticated electricity: Sony power outlets will charge you for charging:

“Sony is building a new kind of power outlet that raises a not entirely pleasant prospect—in the future, plugging a phone into a public wall socket might require authentication and take a chunk out of your bank account. But the technology will have many important uses, Sony says, from managing payments for recharging electrical vehicles to avoiding blackouts by intelligently regulating the use of power.”

MasterCard is pitching: Leave the Hassle at Home: Commuting can be Easier with ONE Card for ALL Stops:

“The vast majority of commuters we surveyed think so. In fact, 72% of respondents in U.S., 85% in Singapore and 86% in South Korea told us they wish there was one card for use across all local mass transit systems. They also estimated that with one payment card they could save close to one hour (55 minutes!) per work week. Well, the capability already exists in MasterCard PayPass and for many, it’s already in your wallet.”

[Yes, I agree, though the time savings is probably exaggerated.].

Baruch Feigenbaum @ Reason says: I-85 Managed Lanes are A Success. [They may or may not be, these data do not prove one way or another yet, since total flows dropped and speeds rose. More people faster would be conclusive (from a transportation perspective, environmentalists would disagree). Fewer people faster is ambiguous, and depends on Value of Time. In percentage terms, speeds rose (3.2% in the GP lanes, 4.6% in the managed lane) more than flows dropped (1.7%)].