The Oil Drum | W: "It's Going to Be a Tough Summer" (and a late night open thread)

205 comments on W: "It's Going to Be a Tough Summer" (and a late night open thread)

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Leanan on April 24, 2006 - 12:01am

Interesting diary at dKos on carpooling:

Computer-matched car pooling -- the next "killer app" and good energy policy

Way back in the 1960's or 70's I read that almost any mass transit system looked good compared to people commuting one to a car, but if you could average four riders per car, almost nothing imaginable was as efficient, at least for fuel and probably for capital outlay as well. After all, the cars are already bought, the owners already know how to drive them, and the current road system is more than adequate if commuting traffic is cut by three fourths.

Hmmm. Is that true?

He suggests a computerized carpooling system, similar to one truck drivers already use.

Though what I found most interesting was that even on dKos, full of lefty treehuggers, most people said they wouldn't use such a system.

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ryvr on April 24, 2006 - 12:13am

It is not true. Running is far more efficient and is quite imaginable.

Peak oil will inevitably cause so much pain and dieoff that we have a moral responsibility to take the positive opportunities it offers which are to reorganize ourselves into small tribes living in harmony with the land. Carpooling is just a way to prolong this ugly mess.

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eric blair on April 24, 2006 - 11:09am

Running is far more efficient and is quite imaginable.

And a bicycle is even better than running.

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Richard on April 24, 2006 - 1:12am

Though what I found most interesting was that even on dKos, full of lefty treehuggers, most people said they wouldn't use such a system.

People always say that they don't want to carpool, or give up their SUV or their home 100 miles away from work. And ofcoarse, cycling is completely out of the question, because it is not practical in the good ol' US of A. It's just Un-American!

However, in the end, it is all just talk. I know for sure, because it happened already 30 years ago in Europe and in Japan.

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westexas on April 24, 2006 - 8:17am

Large portions of Plano, Texas (suburb of Dallas) had no gas this weekend. One station had been dry for four days. They are expecting (hoping?) that things will stabilize shortly.

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odograph on April 24, 2006 - 8:36am

Fox was reporting that Houston, home of Exxon?, had the highest prices in the country this past weekend ($4+). That must suck for the non-Exxon employees, but from out of state I've got to admit it seemed poetic justice.

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RedRiver on April 24, 2006 - 9:31am

This is nonsense.
I live in the Houston area, and bought gasoline this weekend at below $3/gal, and most of the gas stations I passed by had regular unleaded for less than $3/gal.

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odograph on April 24, 2006 - 9:42am

Yeah well, it was Fox "news."

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mcgowanjm on April 24, 2006 - 10:58am

And not ONE headline or even article
in my hometown newspaper on oil/gas
prices.

That tells me that we're no where near the
peak price.

Kunstler has the same opinion-

This morning's electronic edition of The New York Times displays not one home page headline about oil or gasoline prices, despite the trauma of the week just passed.

James

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odograph on April 24, 2006 - 11:35am

I was hitting google news a few times yesterday morning, and gas prices did not rise very far up their front page. There was an "oil prices" article in the business section.

Given that google placement is driven by clicks/links, I think that means it wasn't getting much online attention.

On the other hand, it was fun to flip cable news channels about mid-day yesterday, when they were all running concurrent gas price stories.

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mcgowanjm on April 24, 2006 - 12:06pm

Hello odograph.

Yes, the news is there. but I still have to
hunt for it.

It just doesn't have that "panic" feel to it.

You know, like when the cities turned off their skyscraper lights at night. That sort of thing.

And the focus seems to be on windfall profits
tax. Yea, that'll get more gas to the consumer.

James

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CarterganSweater on April 24, 2006 - 10:41am

I think there's a lot to be said for carpooling, and think people may change their tune as prices rise.

Take the outer limits of the Greater Toronto Area (GTA) as an example. Yes, that's the suburbs, but fortunately they are blessed with the GO Transit commuter train & bus system. If you're travelling on your own, it makes sense to leave the vehicle at home and take the train downtown. But if you are already paying to maintain a car it is cheaper to drive as soon as you can find just one other person who is going your way - this remains true even if gas triples in price.

For example, the current cost for two people to take the GO Train 50kms to downtown Toronto is $24.00 ($12.00 per person, return fare). So it's cheaper for two people to carpool the 100km round trip (provided, of course, one has free parking and an efficient car).

To illustrate, let's imagine that the price gas increases from $1.00/litre to $3.00/litre. Two people in a Toyota Yaris averaging 7l/100km would pay just $21 in gas - that's still $3 less than two train tickets. Bump that up to four people in a car and it's just $5.25 per person, per day: so even with $3 gas that's less than half the current public transit price.

The cities of the Greater Toronto Area and Hamilton, along with Transport Canada, have already started a carpool site at http://www.carpoolzone.smartcommute.ca

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