No Light Rail in Vancouver!

Suburbs Emit Less Greenhouse Gases

Jul 13

2007

It is amazing how many assumptions people make without checking the facts. They assume transit consumes less energy than cars (not true for most U.S. transit systems). They assume suburbs are more heavily subsidized than cities (the vast majority of subsidies go to the cities). They assume that highways are unfairly subsidized (actually, subsidies to transit are greater than to highways even though highways move a hundred times as many passenger miles).

The latest set of assumptions center around greenhouse gases. I’ve already addressed the assumptions that transit emits less greenhouse gases than cars and that high rises emit less than single-family homes.

Of course, people also assume that suburbs emit more greenhouse gases than denser cities. Now we have evidence that this assumption is wrong too. The Australian Conservation Foundation has taken the trouble to calculate per-capita greenhouse gas emissions for every postal code in that country. Wendell Cox has tallied the results for neighborhoods and suburbs in Sydney.

It turns out the lowest emissions come from very low-density exurbs, followed by low-density suburbs. The highest emissions come from denser neighborhoods in the city itself. A local skeptic of smart growth has written some commentary about these results.

Unfortunately, too many people — often supported by planners — want to impose policies on the general public based on untested assumptions. If we are really going to try to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, I hope we do it by focusing on actual emissions and not by engaging in all sorts of misguided social engineering that punishes people for living in ways that some elitists think they should not live.

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Reprinted from The Antiplanner