Eco
Transit
With all these green commuting ideas,
who needs a car?
Join a car sharing program
Zipcar.com is all the rage right now,
with numerous locations throughout the country, including San Francisco,
Menlo Park and Palo Alto. The idea is pretty simple: Zipcar has a fleet
of cars waiting at multiple locations. You sign up on their website; they
send you a card embedded with a chip; you reserve a car online for a certain
amount of time. Upon arrival at the parking garage, you then swipe the
card at a sensor on the door, get in, drive around, do your errands and
return the car to the exact same spot once you’re done. You are
charged an hourly rate, plus yearly membership. And to keep things green,
the bill is sent to your online account. The APTA (American Public Transportation
Association) says you can reduce household carbon emissions by 10 percent
if you get rid of one car, 30 percent for two cars.
 Ride a bus
The Santa Clara Valley Transit Authority (VTA) has numerous fuel-efficient
buses, and is even looking into the feasibility of a zero-emission fuel-cell
bus (ZEB), whose only by-product is water vapor. VTA bus ridership was
up 4.6 percent in the month of February compared to February 2008. Then
there’s Wi-Drive by Bauer’s Intelligent Transportation, a
luxurious, eco-friendly, 52-passenger biodiesel commuter bus bedecked
with Wi-Fi, LCD screens, iPod hookups, snacks, coffee and more. The bus
travels various Silicon Valley and San Francisco routes in the morning
and evening. The rates are reasonable (around $4-$8 each way), plus it’s
like flying first class to work everyday! www.bauerswi-drive.org
Ride the light rail
A staggering 3.4 million trips were taken on VTA light rail and buses
in February. That’s a hefty eco-friendly population. Traveling around
San Jose, Campbell, Milpitas and Mountain View on the light rail is simple
and efficient, and the eco pass lets businesses provide unlimited use
of the light rail in exchange for a tax deduction. Light rail use was
up 4.1 percent in February compared to the same month in 2008. According
to the APTA, a typical public transit rider consumes half the amount of
oil than that of someone who drives a car.
Take a taxi
According to APTA, an individual can save $8,000 a year by taking public
transportation and getting rid of one car. That’s a nice incentive,
but can you really rely on a taxi for the occasional trip to Costco or
to make an appointment across town? With the VTA eco pass, yes, you can.
It not only allows you unlimited rides on the light rail, but offers a
free taxi ride in case of scheduling emergencies. And if you really want
to green things up, request a hybrid Prius taxi through the San Jose and
Palo Alto Yellow Cab company.
 Ride a bike
There are plenty of bikes out there, but we like the Bianchi San Jose,
because... well, just guess! San Jose and its surrounding cities are some
of the most bike-friendly cities in the country, with tons of paths and
space for those choosing to ride to work. Go to www.publictransportation.org
and calculate what you could be saving without a car. And don’t
forget, if you commute to work by bicycle, you’re eligible for a
$20-a-month, tax-free stipend from your employer, who can then deduct
that money from their federal taxes.
Bici Bike, 5715 Cottle Rd., San Jose (408) 225-0599; Slough Bike Shop,
260 Race St., San Jose (408) 293-1616; Shaw’s Lightweight Cycles,
45 Washington St., Santa Clara (408) 246-7881
Ride a horse
Kicking it (or galloping it, rather) really old school might not be such
a bad idea. There are tons of places in Silicon Valley to saddle up [See
our Sports & Adventure feature on page 68]. Too bad there aren’t
any dirt highways so we could all be commuting atop a trusty steed while
wearing cowboy hats.
Buy a fuel-efficient car
Head over to Menlo Park and pick out a Tesla Roadster to speed around
Silicon Valley in eco-rockstar style. Make no mistake, though, these all-electric
vehicles aren’t for the faint of heart (or speed!). The Roadster
goes from zero to 60 mph in 3.7 seconds, and can travel about 220 miles
on one charge. Not only that, these sweet rides qualify for the full $7,500
US federal tax credit on battery-powered cars, plus state incentives,
sales tax waivers and rebates. Shocking, we know. Reserve one now for
a refundable $9,900. Delivery of these vehicles begins in July.
Tesla Motors, 1050 Bing St., San Carlos (650) 413-4000; Tesla Store,
300 El Camino Real, Menlo Park (650) 413-6250 www.teslamotors.com
Carpool
Cool sites like PickupPal.com let you coordinate with other drivers in
your area to form car pools. Log on, find someone going from San Jose
to Cupertino, and you’re all set. Routes are even posted via Google
Maps, so you can  see exactlywhich way you’re headed. You can view
profiles of drivers and even send messages back and forth before hopping
aboard. Additionally, San Jose-based Altrans offers alternative transportation
solutions for businesses, schools and colleges.
Altrans, 926 Rock Ave., Ste. 10, San Jose (408) 258-7267 www.altrans.net
Buy an Electric Scooter
Hop on an all-electric G3000 LX scooter from Current Moves in San Jose
and zing around town at 28mph for more than 50 miles per charge. Sorry,
no adapters available to charge them through a Hummer H2 cigarette lighter.
Current Moves, 416 W. San Carlos St., San Jose (408) 931-6666
www.currentmoves.com
 Offset your carbon footprint
Companies such as San Francisco-based Terrapass and LiveNeutral offer
people and businesses ways to calculate their carbon footprints and offset
those by donating money to fund green projects. For instance, if our graphic
designer, Jon Sontag, purchased a $48 certificate from LiveNeutral, he
would completely offset his 2008 carbon footprint for his Ford Focus.
Go ahead, Sontag. What are you waiting for?
Ride something crazy
There’s no shortage of insane forms of transportation out there.
A lot of them, however, are actually quite eco friendly, and someday will
most likely not seem so out there. GM and Segway recently unveiled a potential
urban vehicle at the New York Auto Show. Part of what’s being called
Project P.U.M.A. (Personal Urban Mobility and Accessibility), the intention
is to create an all-electric two-seat vehicle with two wheels for people
to cruise around cities at 35 mph with up to 35 miles per charge. Not
too shabby. Or there’s Santa Clara based JPods (www.jpods.com),
a company developing a solar-powered overhead rail system consisting of
small, computer-driven pods designed to transport people or cargo. While
the present of eco-friendly transport is looking bright, the future, it
seems, is even brighter. |
 All
Aboard Suntrain
New book lays groundwork for a solar-powered
railway.
Talk about timing. With President Obama calling
for investments in renewable energy, Bay Area transportation expert Christopher
Swan has devised a full-service passenger train system that is not only
completely solar-powered, but just might be the ticket to solving our
most pressing transportation, energy, and environmental problems. Known
as Suntrain, it is the subject of Mr. Swan’s Big Idea (Sopo Press,
2009), a new book by San Jose State University professor David Vasquez.
He chatted with us about what he calls “a railway for the Obama
era.”
The Wave: What’s the key element
to Suntrain?
David Vasquez: Basically, Suntrain is an electric train that uses hydrogen
as a battery by converting it into electric energy. It would run on 100-percent
renewable energy, energy that is generated either right from the train
tracks or the train stations, so there’s no need for any centralized
power grid or oil refinery – and, unlike other electric trains,
such as the TGV trains in France (which basically draw nuclear power),
there are no emissions. It is also a uniquely clean system. Most trains
today run using one of three options: they have overhead wires to get
the electricity, they have third rails (like subway systems), or they
have diesel engines. Suntrain has none of those. With so much solar energy
to be had, especially in the United States and California, it’s
a slam dunk, in terms of the viability of using solar.
TW: Is this just a Northern California
transit system, or would it go to other parts of the country?
DV: For this to be a big idea, it has to spread everywhere – not
only to other parts of the country, but other parts of the world. The
main idea is that trains should be the workhorse of transportation, and
cars should be a niche. That’s another key to Suntrain: for the
system to be viable, it needs to compete with automobiles. Automobiles
are a huge part of our worldwide environmental problem. There is nothing
specifically wrong with cars – there’s just too many of them.
In my slideshow, I talk about how much of a problem cars really are, and
how much money it’s costing us. People think we don’t have
money to pursue alternatives, but once we look at how much we’re
actually spending on cars – not just at the gas pump, but as a society,
and all the indirect costs of automobiles – then we can start to
realize that passenger trains really do a lot of great things, and a next-generation
passenger train could really be a game changer as far as the environmental
battle goes.
TW: What will take to make this idea a
reality?
DV: There are several ways, including private investment, leadership and
using the internet to mobilize support. A lot of people have been impressed
with recent events like the election of Barack Obama. That seemed unlikely,
too, and the internet played a major role in that.
We think Suntrain can form the foundation of the
green revolution. Nothing else permeates so many levels of society, and
touches so many people in so many ways. We also think it could be a huge
boost for the solar energy infrastructure in general. That’s why
I call it Mr. Swan’s big idea, because it’s more than just
about trains.
For more information on Suntrain, including a slideshow preview of how the system would work, visit www.suntrainusa.com. |
