How Governor Cuomo Can Fix the Subway (and Show He’s Serious About the Climate Crisis, Too)
A perfect storm is brewing in New York. Not for transit riders — that storm is the opposite of perfect. Rather, this is a perfect storm of opportunity for Governor Cuomo to take the lead on two interrelated issues that are very important to the region. The Two Crises Unless you live under a rock, […]
Cheap Oil Makes It Hard to Convince Drivers to Dump the Pump
Today is National Dump the Pump Day. Sponsored by the American Public Transportation Association (APTA), the day encourages people to park the car and opt for transit instead. Commuters who ride transit instead of driving save $790 every month and reduce their personal carbon dioxide emissions by 4,800 pounds each year on average. Meanwhile, according to the American Automobile Association, more […]
Earth to the Region’s Leaders: Invest in Transit, Not Pipe Dreams
Following the Paris Agreement negotiations last year, leaders from around the globe will meet Friday in New York to memorialize a commitment to limit global temperature rise to 2°C by 2100. Since the Paris Agreement is a national-level commitment, subnational governments have created the Under 2 MOU, where they commit to making drastic greenhouse gas emission reductions. In […]
Earth to Governor Cuomo: Climate Change Heroes Don’t Encourage People to Drive
This Friday, April 22, will mark the 46th anniversary of the first Earth Day celebrations. On that day, the United States and China–who together emit a staggering 40 percent of global greenhouse gases–will sign and join the Paris Climate Agreement along with more 130 nations. It’s a critical step to reign in rising global temperatures within the 2°C mark–an increasingly elusive goal […]
When Cutting Emissions, Don’t Overlook Transportation
This week, New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio announced the launch of the NYC Retrofit Accelerator, a program to aide residential building owners and managers in upgrading their buildings’ energy and water efficiency. The initiative targets residential buildings and arrives a year after Mayor de Blasio introduced a plan to reduce city-owned buildings’ greenhouse gas emissions. Both initiatives […]
Why Denser Cities are More Resilient Cities
Dense development is smart. It provides residents with economic, social and health benefits and results in smaller Ecological Footprints per capita compared to sprawl. In 2014, over half of the world’s population resided in densely-developed urban areas. By 2050, that will rise to two-thirds. Within that period, if current greenhouse gas emissions remain on pace, Earth’s temperature will rise 7.2 degrees […]
Join Us for the People’s Climate March This Sunday
On Sunday, Tri-State Transportation Campaign will be joining more than 1,400 organizations and hundreds of thousands of people in solidarity for a new approach to climate change: the People’s Climate March. It will be an unprecedented mass acknowledgement of the inequity of climate change around the world. And, this will be our collective moment to […]
Threats to Transit in a Warming World: Heat, Floods, Hurricanes
The transportation sector’s contribution to climate change is well-documented. The latest EPA greenhouse gas inventory ascribes 26% of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions to cars, trucks, buses, trains, aircraft, construction vehicles and ships, a slightly higher percentage than in 1990. But there has been no comprehensive analysis of how expected climate change impacts will affect the […]
Presidential Views (or not) on Public Transportation
As the primary season continues, MTR decided to ask the question: To what extent does transportation factor into the political discourse of the U.S. presidential candidates? Though it’s unlikely that transportation and land use issues will end up determining the election, nearly all of the candidates list climate change or energy independence as key planks […]