The Xof1 solar car is not allowed to drive on public roads.  So its creator, Marcelo da Luz, pulled it all the way as he walked the distance from Niagara Falls to Toronto.  His ceremonial end point was Queen’s Park.  After arrival, Adriana walked with him and the car back to his home in Toronto-Danforth.

Here’s my friend Anthony Perl, together with his co-author Richard Gilbert, talking about the need to quickly adapt transportation as oil runs low.  Sorry about the over-the-top background music.

Sign the petition for electric cars here.

Canada used to have two electric car manufacturers.  Dynasty, in Delta, British Columbia, and Zenn, based in Toronto, with a manufacturing facility in St. Jerome, Quebec.  Dynasty has closed its BC operations and is moving its manufacturing facilities overseas.  Zenn is considering following suit.  It’s no wonder.

We subsidize, at $1 billion annually, the manufacture of the biggest gas-guzzlers by profitable American corporations that repatriate their profits next door.  We subsidize big oil even more, at $1.4 billion annually.  For Canadian innovations that would dramatically reduce our greenhouse gas emissions profile, we make it difficult to even get a foot in the door.     Read more »

At the transportation talk I attended the night before last, one audience member pointed out that Israel expects to stop selling internal combustion engine vehicles by 2020.  Here‘s support for that statement, though the details are a little different.

Come to this non-partisan talk I’ve organized:

Tuesday, 2008 March 4, 7 pm
OISE room 5250
252 Bloor Street  West

The world we’re moving into will be radically different from the one  we move in today. So different that it’s hard to imagine. It’s even harder to  imagine the transition.

Global warming demands that we stop using oil.  The age of cheap plentiful oil is ending anyway. We’ve built up a society where  we drive everywhere, and most of what we buy, including almost all of our food,  is now brought from long distances. Hybrid cars and other incremental efficiency  measures have their place, but are not nearly enough to get us where we need to  go.

What will future transport look like and how can we make the  transition with the least disruption?

Anthony Perl and Richard  Gilbert have worked through the details of a carbon-free future for  transportation, including such innovations as wind-assisted shipping and  personal rapid transit. They’ve done the math to show that their vision is  workable, and they’ve plotted out a practical step-by-step process to get our  society to where it needs to be.

Based on their book Transport  Revolutions, Anthony will present where we are now, the challenges we face,  and what potential exists for the future. Richard will then lead a discussion of  the issues.

Dr. Anthony Perl is the Director of the Urban Studies  Program at Simon Fraser University. His work has focused on public policy,  transportation and the environment. Transport Revolutions is his fourth  book.

Dr. Richard Gilbert is an independent consultant, popular  and academic author, and teacher at various universities. He  served as a Toronto City Councillor for 15 years.

Sponsored by Post Carbon Toronto and the Coalition for a Green Economy