Author: Adam Clare

In Winnipeg the Electric Past is the Future

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Broadway looking east, 1914.
Archives of Manitoba, Wpg/Streets/Broadway 11

The city of Winnipeg was once a leader in sustainable transit then along came the automobile and the city is now known for the worst intersection in Canada (it’s so bad they ban pedestrians from using it). Winnipeg was home to one the largest electric trolley network and the city was built along the transit lines with large bueatgul streets. Today, the city is dominated by cars. The future of transit in the city will return to its former glory days slowly but surely. Winnipeg is looking to electrify their public transit network and they can serve as a model city for other Canadian communities that want to return to friendly transit.

And though it wasn’t a priority, Winnipeg was an early adopter of emissions-free transit. “You didn’t think of the environment or anything like that back then,” Agnew says. Today, of course, things have changed. Winnipeg is just one of many cities planning a cleaner, lower emissions transportation network.

In a twist of fate, local company New Flyer Industries — which manufactured Winnipeg’s first diesel buses under the name Western Flyer in 1967 — secured a contract in 2022 to produce up to 166 battery-electric and hydrogen fuel cell buses for the city over the next four years. With electric bus technology will come a new era of electric transit infrastructure, including charging stations, hydrogen production capacity and a re-configuration of the transit network.

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Hawaiian Battery Better Than Coal

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Hawaii just became an even better place to live thanks to cleaner air. The state recently decommissioned their coal power plant and replaced it with a much nicer looking battery complex. The battery system had to be designed with potential disasters in mind due to the risks of earthquakes, volcanoes, and more. Despite the local challenges the battery system is working effectively and if Hawaii can replace coal with batteries than all the other states can do it too.

Hawaiian Electric’s modeling suggests it can reduce curtailment of renewables by an estimated 69% for the first five years thanks to Kapolei Energy Storage, allowing surplus clean electricity that would otherwise go to waste to get onto the grid.

The utility also requested ?“black-start capability.” If a disaster, like a cyclone or earthquake, knocks out the grid completely, Hawaiian Electric needs a power source to restart it. The Kapolei batteries are programmed to hold some energy in reserve for that purpose. Plus Power located the project near a substation connected to three other power plants so the battery ?“can be AAA to jump-start those other plants,” Keefe said.

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Adfree Cities for Happier and Healthier Cities

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blank billboard

Billboards are a plight on the environment that also negatively impact our mental health – so why do let them exist? In Sao Paulo they banned billboards a long time ago and their local economy wasn’t negatively impacted while the wellbeing of the people in the city increased. It seems so obvious that we should ban billboards, and that’s what Adfree Cities is all about. The UK-based organization is trying to empower locals to get their politicians to agree with a billboard ban. Let’s do it!

Billboards promote large corporations over local businesses

The majority of adverts we see on billboards and bus shelters are for big brands. This kind of advertising is expensive, and means that local businesses are not able to compete. Local businesses return more money back into the local economy, supporting high streets and local employment. But the messages which dominate our streets are billboards ads telling us to buy from Tesco and McDonalds.

But the biggest spenders on outdoor advertising in 2022 included corporations like Amazon, KFC, McDonald’s, Coca Cola, Sky and Samsung. Hardly your local mom-and-pop business.

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Active Transportation 10x More Cost Effective Than Passive Transportation

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Want a better city but are limited by money? You should invest in active transportation first and foremost. Yet another study has shown that providing spaces for pedestrians and cyclists are a way better investment to improve urban wellbeing than leaving space to metal boxes on wheels. This most recent study comes from New Zealand where they are striving to make cities sustainable and healthy. Some cities try to improve the health and wellbeing of people by asking car owners to “share the road” or “not to murder non-drivers” in safety ads. It turns out the better thing to do is provide physical space for people to enjoy life. Let’s hope a people-first approach is adopted everywhere.

That’s not all. “The study demonstrates that the ‘benefit-to-cost’ ratio of the investment made by two city councils together with the New Zealand Transport Agency is around ten to one,” he says. “The study provides hard evidence of the benefits of investing in walking and cycling infrastructure and educational programmes, which comfortably exceed the costs. This is particularly useful at a time when the government is finalising its policy statement on land transport.”

So what will our cities look like five years from now? Great question. But it seems planners and various officials would do well to consider the benefits of cycleways and walkways – including from a financial standpoint.

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Mobile Pollution Boxes Need to Pay to Enter Manhattan

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small car

Cars take up a lot of space in urban centres and deprive non-car owners of previous real estate and a clean environment. Yet, for years we have let car drivers occupy our cities with their large metal boxes which impeded the freedom and mobility of others. Back in 2003 London put in place the first congestion charge for their downtown and since then many cities around the world have followed. However, in car brain North America the idea never took off. Until now. New York City will be implementing a congestion charge for Manhattan starting this spring.

Experts see the measure as a first step in the right direction. They believe the toll will help fund the city’s ailing subways and buses, and make the streets of Manhattan a friendlier place. It is also seen as an opportunity to put an end to the car culture in a city — perhaps the only one in the United States — that is perfectly accessible by public transportation, with the exception of isolated peripheral areas. Indeed, for this reason, some have said that the measure is not ambitious enough, arguing that it should apply to the five counties of New York.

“You have to start somewhere, and this is a great start,” says Howard Yarus, of the District 7 transportation committee. The group he represents proposed a plan in 2019 to eliminate free street parking, an unthinkable change for the urban landscape. “Until now, if I took my car, which pollutes the environment, to go downtown I didn’t pay anything, not even when parking. But if I went by public transportation, it cost me $2.90 [for a subway or bus ticket]. As a public policy, that seems terrible to me.”

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