Our Commutes - Not Made in the USA

For much of my life, especially in the early 80s, buying American was regarded as the ‘patriotic’ thing to do; the thing to do to keep my neighbors employed. I wonder then about the wisdom of continuing to rely upon a resource that we largely have to import – oil, especially when one in five barrels of the oil that we so rely upon comes from countries that the State Department considers to be dangerous or unstable. We might concerned that the primary oil sources of Mexico, the 2nd leading source of our imported oil, will be depleted before the end of this decade.

We may consider buying American, but we’re certainly not driving American. Gasoline, which basically means cars, makes up 45% of our oil consumption. It could be said that our freeways are the arteries along which this gasoline flows, but it is not likely to continue to flow unimpeded. The US military has said that there could be serious oil shortages within the next five years.

I have to wonder then, why are we so adamant about not adopting and investing in mass transit systems, much as we did not so long ago in our interstate highways system, electrical infrastructure and phone systems? Are we so overly fond of our daily commutes, with their congestion and road rage, difficulties in finding parking, and increasing need to multi-task while we drive in order to gain back some of the time we spend on our commutes?

Even our current attempts to relieve congestion are at the cost of massive highway projects that, ironically, in the short term lead to increased congestion while those highways are under construction. And in the long term, it’s only a matter of time before those massive projects allow urban sprawl to creep farther afield and, come right back to our experiencing even more congestion.

My own city, Waukesha, is currently trying to decide what route an over $50 million dollar bypass project should take along the west side of the city. Any of the routes will essentially redefine the area. And I wonder: how many years before the city has crept out beyond those routes and more highway construction will again be needed to reduce congestion? Do any of us really believe that the projects being considered in our communities will lead to a final end to congestion? If we think about it, what do we really expect the areas around our cities to look like 10-15 years from now if we don’t take a different approach?

My own daily ordeal runs along what, from 1890 until shortly before I was born, was both the first and last route run by an electric streetcar in Milwaukee – Wells St on one end and at the other end, what are now separate cities largely only in name: Wauwatosa, Elm Grove, Brookfield, and Waukesha. Back when we were electrifying our rural areas and before we began construction of our interstate system, I could have taken an interurban train.

My own area does have a downtown trolley loop. There is a plan to build roughly a 3-mile long electric streetcar system that would connect the downtown area with much of the mid-town and eastern shore areas, but the funding for that system is still largely up in the air. The Kenosha-Racine-Milwaukee (KRM) commuter rail system recently received the funding it needs to improve the rail bed and traffic signals along the existing rail along which it would run. And, as most of us know, the high speed train system that would connect Chicago, Milwaukee, and Madison has been awarded the funding it would need to be built, but given the opposition to it, may never be built, even though doing so would create over 9,500 permanent jobs, here in Wisconsin.

I find myself wondering: can we demonstrate the foresight and commitment to build the infrastructure required to meet the challenges of our era? Our parent’s and grandparents’ generations did. Will we? Or will we, in just a few short years find ourselves facing oil shortages, increasingly high gasoline costs – and still be years away from having built the infrastructure required to give us alternatives?

References
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2010/apr/11/peak-oil-production-supply
http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/2010/04/oil_quench.html
http://www.eia.doe.gov/pub/oil_gas/petroleum/data_publications/company_level_imports/current/import.html
http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/100726/top-7-us-oil-importers
http://www.eia.doe.gov/pub/oil_gas/petroleum/analysis_publications/oil_market_basics/demand_text.htm
http://www.trainweb.org/twerhs/tmerl.html
http://www.jsonline.com/news/waukesha/44788327.html
http://urbanmilwaukee.com/2009/04/19/milwaukee-streetcar-round-up/
http://urbanmilwaukee.com/2010/05/06/milwaukee-streetcar-takes-key-step-forward/
http://www.transitnow.org/project-status.html
http://dailyreporter.com/blog/2010/09/09/communities-pick-up-transportation-project-awards/
http://www.wispirg.org/issues/transportation/connecting-wisconsin-with-high-speed-rail