the intersection of emergency preparedness, public health and environmental policy
Jen Chung at Gothamist and Al Baker of the Times have good coverage of the new, much-increased Department of Homeland Security grant to provide security for New York City subways, including the 16 underwater tunnels that link the boroughs to each other, and to the mainland (the Bronx, of course, is actually on the mainland). From Gothamist:
When a subcontracting firm - the “John Galt Corporation” - is named for the protagonist in an anti-union, anti-government-regulator novel (Ayn Rand’s The Fountainhead) it is to be hoped that at least one decision-maker would have thought it disturbing to put such a firm in charge of safety. (See David W. Dunlap’s “A Literary Footnote to a Fire: John Galt,” on the Times’s City Room Blog.
John Galt Corporation and Bovis Lend-Lease are accused of safety violations which led to the deaths of two firefighters. William K. Rashbaum and Charles V. Bagli, “Bank Tower Contractors Accused of 44 Violations,” The New York Times, February 20th, 2008. Rashbaum and Bagli report that the staff of the New York County District Attorney’s Office have been presentign evidence to a grand jury.
But not since the Eisenhower Administration. Now, 55 years later, Marjorie Bloomberg Tiven - the mayor’s sister and the city’s chief of diplomatic protocol, has persuaded the United Nations to do the right thing:
In January, the city’s Fire Department found 866 violations of the fire code. By October, less than 20 percent of the violations had been addressed. (Because of concerns about possible terrorist attacks, Ms. Tiven will not be more specific about the violations.)
The U.N. took 9 months to allow a fire inspection In an Oct. 30 letter, drafted by Ms. Tiven’s office and signed by the mayor, the city demanded that the United Nations provide proof of, among other things, a fire safety plan, additional smoke detectors, and resolution of the remainder of the 866 violations by early next year.
“If the United Nations does not adhere to these deadlines,” Mayor Bloomberg said, “the city will be forced to direct the cessation of all public school visits to the United Nations.”
“The mayor has been patient,” Ms. Tiven said, “but he can’t be patient forever. The city is going to do the right thing.”
This battle is being fought, and will be won, on the streets. And in New York City the hybrids are winning. New York’s Dept. of Transportation and other agencies are replacing their Ford Taurus and Contours with Prius and Civic Hybrids, not Hummers.
As of May of this year, 375 of approx. 13,000 yellow cabs had hybrid engines. The City has mandated that by 2012, 100% of the yellow taxi fleet must be hybrids. Link to NYC press release here. The new Ford Escape Hybrids get 30 MPG. The vehicle they will replace, the Ford Crown Victoria, gets 14 mpg. Taxi drivers in NYC absorb all the operating costs, including gas. So if they can spend less money on gas - they pocket the difference, and they make more money. $9,000, assuming 80,000 miles and $3.00 per gallon.
The next step will be the 38,540 livery vehicles licensed by the Taxi and Limousine Commission, often referred to as “black cars,” the predominant model being black Lincoln Town Cars, which also get about 12 miles per gallon.
There is no government mandate to switch, however, a combination of market forces and one government incentive seems to have sparked the beginning of a change in the right direction. Outside Goldman Sachs‘ offices on Pearl and Broad, across the street from Fraunces Tavern, at any given time, you can see two or three Prius “limos” among the Town Cars. The Priuses get 40 mpg. The Lincolns get 12. The fuel costs for a Lincoln are about $20,000 per year, three and a half times higher than $6,000 for a Prius. Which translates to $14,000 more for the drivers.
The drivers love them - they pocket the cash. The passengers love them - they are a much quieter ride, they are better for the environment, and as an added bonus, they are permitted to use the High Ooccupancy Vechicle / Low Emissions Vehicle aka (Clean Pass) lanes. In New York rush-hour traffic, this could cut some trips in half - and cut from half an hour to an hour off of a rush-hour trip to Newark or La Guardia.
They’re also good enough for the United States Army’s Special Operations Command, which includes the Special Forces, and would include the Delta Force, if it officially existed. For other large groups of vehicles - the Postal Service, the New York City Police Department, our ambulances - using hybrid engnes isn’t even part of the public discussion, yet. But it will be. Write your Rep in Congress. Senate - Click Here, House, Click Here.
An outfit called CNW Market Research, which advertises “Clarity Context Vision” like Fox News uses the term “Fair and Balanced,” published a “study” claiming that the Hummer H2 has less of an environmental impact than the Prius. You can look for the 450 + page report here.
CNW asserts that the per mile cost of the Hummer H2 is $3.027 and the Prius is $3.249.
Heidi Hauenstein and Laura Schewel of the Rocky Mountain Institute analyze the data and conclude that CNW’s mathematics was flawed. You can find the their report on the web pages of EV World. They say that IF CNW’s methodology is correct, the Prius has a significantly lower impact on the environment than the Hummer. And, by the way, they question CNW’s methodology.
Dr. Peter Gleick of the Pacific Institute also weighed in on the debate. (Click Here) He states “the report’s conclusions rely on faulty methods of analysis, untenable assumptions, selective use and presentation of data, and a complete lack of peer review. Even the most cursory look reveals serious bias and flaws: the average Hummer H1 is assumed to travel 379,000 miles and last for 35 years, while the average Prius is assumed to last only 109,000 miles over less than 12 years. … “Dust to Dust” has already distorted the public debate.”
So here’s what I think.
Using those assumptions, My back-of-envelope reckoning concludes that the Hummer will burn 12,500 gallons and the Prius 2,500 as they are driven those 100,000 miles. That’s a difference of 10,000 gallons of gas. At $3.00 per gallon, fuel will cost $37,500 to drive the Hummer and $7,500 to drive the Prius. That’s $30,000 bucks. And if the average price of gas is $4.00 over the life of the vehicle, it’s $40,000.
Ignoring the purchase cost, and assuming $3.00 per gallon, the fuel cost is 38 cents per mile for the Hummer, and 8 cents per mile for the Prius. Factoring the costs to purchase the vehicle, and the cost of oil changes every 3000 miles, (34 oil changes at $25 each) the costs to drive a Hummer H2 are $92,460 while the costs to drive a Prius are $30,525. This works out to 92 cents per mile for the H2 and 31 cents per mile for the Prius.
So the bottom line is I don’t care what CNW says, altho it would be nice if their arguments were logical, coherent, and based on fact. Regardless, my next new car will be an aerodynamic hybrid.
From Commissioner Joseph Bruno’s announcement:
What if New York City were hit by a Category 3 Hurricane?
In New York City, over eight million people live on land that has 578 miles of waterfront. By 2030, the population is expected to reach nine million. At the same time, global climate change has put New York City at an increased risk for a severe coastal storm. In recent years, storms have become more intense, occur more frequently, and continue farther north than they have historically. The city would face many challenges during and after such a storm; one of the most difficult is the possibility that hundreds of thousands of people could lose their homes.
With financial support from the Rockefeller Foundation and in consultation with Architecture for Humanity-New York, the New York City Office of Emergency Management is sponsoring an open competition to generate solutions for post-disaster provisional housing. “What if New York City…” is a call for innovation and an opportunity for designers and policy-makers to collaborate on one of the biggest challenges facing densely settled urban areas after a disaster: how do we keep people safely and comfortably housed while reconstruction proceeds?
A jury of experts in the fields of architecture, design, urbanism, and government will choose ten entrants who will be awarded $10,000 each and technical support to develop their proposals into workable solutions. These solutions will provide support for New York’s most vulnerable communities and be a precedent for dense urban areas all over the world.
This design competition will rely on a fictional but realistic New York City neighborhood devastated by a hypothetical Category 3 hurricane.
Searching the Responder Knowledge Base, and even logging in as a guest (some of the restricted material won’t show up), for every piece of equipment - or category of equipment - the RKB will list the relevant grants. Or - find a grant program - and you can generate a list of allowable equipment purchases under that grant. Here’s an example:
This page, “Responder Knowledge Base - Grants and Assistance Programs Detaila - FY07 Urban Areas Security Initiative (UASI) program,” provides that states are the eligible grant-seekers - although not the only ultimate recipients of funds:
The program assists Urban Areas in building and sustaining capabilities to prevent, protect against, respond to, and recover from threats or acts of terrorism.
The FY 2007 UASI program provides the opportunity to enhance regional preparedness efforts. Urban Areas must employ regional approaches to overall preparedness and are encouraged to adopt regional response structures whenever appropriate to meet the goals identified in the Urban Area Homeland Security Strategy and common, measurable objectives. Security and preparedness officials at all levels should seek opportunities to leverage funding from multiple sources whenever possible and not restrict their activities to Federal funding alone. UASI funding will be provided to identified Urban Area authorities through the SAAs. In some instances Urban Area boundaries cross State borders. States must ensure that the identified Urban Areas take an inclusive regional approach to the development and implementation of the FY 2007 UASI program and involve the contiguous jurisdictions, mutual aid partners, port authorities, rail and transit authorities, State agencies, Citizen Corps Council(s), and MMRS(s) in their program activities.
Probably about 25 more than necessary, one would think.
Two NYC Transit Authority track workers have been killed, and one critically injured, within the last month, in two incidents. Basic reporting here via NY1.
What track workers have are flashlights, reflective vests and helmets.
What they don’t have includes:
Twenty-five have been killed since 1980, according to Newsday
A good 2003 piece from the New York Committee on Occupational Safety and Health (NYCOSH)
Gothamist’s coverage, with a lovely photograph.
I’m quite certain that I heard a WNYC report this morning that there had been reports that in one of the incidents - a supervisor had attempted to engage an electrical safety system - to turn off the third rail which had failed. Thus far, am not able to find a reference. JS
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