Transportation

Our dependence on automobiles is embedded within the social and physical fabrics of the American way of life. Being able to go for a Sunday drive and to own a personal vehicle has historically been a sign of prosperity, independence, and the American dream. The physical make-up of our country is governed by the automobile. The sense of limitlessness provided by the personal vehicle has trapped America in the constrains of limited gasoline. Transportation is an integral part of our lives that has a colossal effect on sustainability.

 

Why is it important?

There are many different kinds of transportation, each with its own benefits and downfalls regarding sustainability. The transportation industry is constantly evolving and innovating. Because of the nature of the industry and the variety of types of transportation, our discussion on transportation and sustainability will focus on the typical means of transportation for the average American: the personal automobile.

The epidemic of the personal automobile is a focus of sustainability advocates because of the negative environmental impacts from production and use of automobiles. First off, the production of automobiles is very resource intensive, requiring a great deal of electricity and water just to make the parts that assemble the automobile. When the electricity used in production is sourced from a fossil fuel power plant the automobile is indirectly emitting environmentally harmful pollutants even before the wheels hit the road. The emissions from automobiles continue throughout its lifetime. Vehicles emit a third of all US air pollution from carbon monoxide and ozone. The combustion of fossil fuels in automobiles emits volatile organic compounds (VOCs), carbon dioxide, nitrogen oxygen oxides, sulfur oxides, and particulate matter. All of these chemicals have negative environmental effects. VOCs, carbon dioxide, and particulate matter accelerate global warming while nitrogen oxides and sulfur oxides contribute to ecosystem altering acid rain.

In addition to the environmental impacts of automobiles, a reliance on personal automobiles can potentially put the owner in economic risk. Though crude oil prices are historically low, oil prices are extremely volatile, meaning that they are hard to predict and can change rapidly. When an individual has to solely rely on a personal automobile for transportation they are in financial risk of potentially high oil prices in the future.

The goal of alternative and more sustainable forms of transportation, which I will elaborate on below, is to decrease or eliminate the negative effects of using a personal automobile for primary transportation.

 

How to:

There are many ways that you can decrease your dependence on personal automobiles in order to curb fossil fuel emissions, and as an UVa student your various alternatives are readily accessible with ease.

The most effective way to decrease the fossil fuel emissions caused by personal transportation is to simply bypass a vehicle and use your own two feet. Many UVa students do not realize how fortunate we are to have an extremely walk-able campus. Pedestrian infrastructure, like sidewalks, crosswalks, crosswalk signals and indicators, around UVa are efficient and allow for a safe pedestrian environment. The average individual walks a ¼ mile in 5 minutes, this means that UVa students can walk virtually anywhere across Grounds in less than 30 minutes. We are endowed with one of the most beautiful college campuses in the country, if not the world, so take a few moments and enjoy walking through Grounds to get from point A to point B. Luckily, most necessities are within close walking distance to Grounds eliminating the essential need for a personal vehicle but even if your destination is too far to walk to there are other sustainable options for the journey.

Biking is the next sustainable form of transportation. It may seem obvious that biking allows individuals to travel longer distances faster, yet this form of transportation is seemingly underutilized. The City of Charlottesville has made strides to ensure that bike riding around the city is viable and safe for both bike riders and car drivers. There are designated bike lanes on most of the main roads around UVa and throughout the main transportation corridors of Charlottesville. Still, people are apprehensive about biking even with the plentiful amount of infrastructure and the numerous benefits. Here is a small list of the benefits of bike riding compared to using a personal vehicle:

• Improves your overall health and wellbeing
• Economically efficient: requires less expensive maintenance, cheaper to purchase, causes less damage to roadways, does not require gasoline
• Does not produce pollution and does not cause toxic runoff
• Has a smaller manufacturing footprint

There are some circumstances where biking, or even walking, may not be a practicable or feasible means of transportation. In these circumstances you may be tempted to jump into a car to get to your destination, but there are other more sustainable forms of transportation available.

For local destinations that are too far for you to walk or bike, UVa students have access to two great local bus services that cover a wide range of the Charlottesville area: the University Transit Service (UTS) and the Charlottesville Area Transit (CAT). Both of these transit services are completely free for UVa students. The CAT is free for students with their University ID. In addition to the CAT, the City of Charlottesville provides residents with the Free Trolley, which follows a continuous loop down Main Street to the Downtown Mall and then back to Grounds. Both the UTS and CAT have convenient and easy to use apps that indicate where stops are and when the buses are projected to arrive. Using public transit is more sustainable than driving a personal automobile. Most newer buses produce less pollution than cars per passenger mile. Public transit is basically a large, local carpool, which always reduces pollution per passenger mile.

Some instances require UVa students to travel outside the bounds of public transit, biking, or walking. Rather than driving alone in a personal automobile, carpooling is a sustainable option for long-distance travelling. Students may decide not to carpool since finding a carpool can be challenging and stressful, but there are two great resources to finding a carpool: HoosRiding and HoosDriving. Both of these resources are Facebook forums for UVa students looking to carpool to various places over weekends and breaks. Carpool through HoosRiding and HoosDriving enables you to travel sustainable while meeting new people and potentially making some pocket change.

 

Think before you drive.