TCI Regional Policy Design Stakeholder Submissions

To reduce emissions from transportation we need a strong focus on the land use/transportation connection. We need to focus growth in cities and towns and in walkable, mixed-use, mixed-income, transit-oriented centers and corridors. Funding transit alone will not be enough - it must be connected to compact, walkable development. Universal adoption of electric vehicles while not addressing sprawling development will mean continued long-distance driving and highway construction, while also risking the conversion of vast acreage of farms and forest to solar arrays just to supply longer distance vehicle travel. So land use must be a primary focus. As for investments to be made - they should include transit tied to land use, reduction in transit fares, affordable housing close to transit, jobs and services, and other infrastructure that supports transit-oriented communities.

The Coalition for Smarter Growth is a 22-year-old non-profit working in DC, Maryland and Virginia and the leading organization promoting walkable, transit-oriented communities (TOD) as the best way for the DC region to grow. We have convinced the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments to make TOD the core framework for regional growth in their Region Forward Plan and in their Visualize2045 long range transportation plan, however, spending practices by state and local government still include massive highway and arterial road expansion. Meanwhile the region must do more to advance public and private investment in TOD at Metrorail stations and other high capacity transit. We received the MWCOG Regional Partnership Award in 2017.

August 7, 2019

To: Governor Baker, Mayor Bowser, Governor Carney, Governor Hogan, Governor Lamont, Governor Murphy, Governor Northam, Governor Raimondo, Governor Scott, and Governor Wolf

Re: 2019 Transportation and Climate Initiative (TCI) Regional Policy Design Process

Sent via: https://www.transportationandclimate.org/main-menu/tci-regional-policy-design-stakeholder-input-form

The Sierra Club is sharing with you the attached 2,435 comments from our members and supporters in your states and the District of Columbia (DC) regarding the 2019 TCI Regional Policy Design Process. More than 700 of those members and supporters across the 9 states and DC have included personal messages, often encouraging swift action to modernize our transportation system, reduce climate pollution from burning motor fuels, and ensure equitable access to the benefits of clean transportation, particularly for those communities that have been overburdened and under-resourced by our current system. Many have also provided specific recommendations and requests for investments and clean transportation projects in their communities.

The Sierra Club continues to support your efforts through this process. We further recommend that you and your teams transparently and inclusively develop an understanding of which communities in the region are overburdened by pollution from motor fuels and under-resourced when it comes to access to clean, affordable, and rapid transportation, and to move forward by modeling and sharing the impacts for those communities of both a cap and invest policy for climate pollution from motor fuels consistent with meeting state climate protection targets and other complementary policies as discussed in the state and regional workshops and listening sessions. We also encourage more engagement by individual states and DC with such overburdened and under-resourced communities, by partnering with and supporting community representatives in the planning and hosting of workshops and listening sessions during the evening or on the weekend, accessible by public transportation, and with services for people with disabilities, limited English proficiency, and children and other care duties.

As demonstrated by the more than 300 participants at the in-person regional workshop on July 30th and these thousands of comments from Sierra Club members and supporters, a robust and inclusive clean and modern transportation policy design process this year is vitally important for the future prosperity of our communities.

Sincerely,

Mark Kresowik
Deputy Director, Eastern Region
Sierra Club

Transportation Electrification: Developing High Impact Policies for NJ's Most Environmentally Burdened Communities

This seems like a plan that has some potential to make change in Vermont. I hope that it moves forward.

Financing Green Infrastructure moving toward a low-carbon economy is key. Green Bonds and loans are becoming a major market. Unfortunately many municipalities and corporations know very little about these financial instruments and the emerging global standards. The initiative should add information sharing on this topic to its existing workshops, especially energy and transportation.

Attached is a rather dated article on De-risking Green Bond Deals written for Environmental Law in New York. This article is being updated with green Muni bonds in mind.

Phil Ludvigsen, Ph.D.

We should have a price high enough to both offset the damage that GHGs cause and undo some of the damage already done. This has to be done equitably, taking into account low income and rural populations.

Please design a regional low-carbon transportation policy proposal that would cap and reduce carbon emissions from the combustion of transportation fuels through a cap-and-invest program or other pricing mechanism… [and]… to complete the policy development process within one year, after which each jurisdiction will decide whether to adopt and implement the policy

Thank you for soliciting input and for working together and hard on this super-important issue. Aileen Nowlan at the Environmental Defense Fund can provide up-to-the-minute information on this topic and about hyper-local pollution measurement. Please contact her.

Putting a price on carbon has been the main suggestion of many leading economists as a means of reducing carbon emissions. The price should be high enough to have the desired effect of curbing carbon emissions. In addition, the price should be increased over time in order to encourage people to move to renewable energy sources. The bi-partisan nature of this initiative illustrates that this is a universal problem that affects us all throughout the world and we must all work together to resolve this crisis.