[AGL] peak oil documentary

[Wayne Johnson]

Well, since lettuce was transported over 3000 miles (Salinas, CA to NYC) in ice-refrigerated rail cars a hundred years ago, using steam locomotives, I doubt the salad industry is going to go under although it is a catchy phrase.  Might, in fact, see the return of RRs as a major shipper of "long-haul" goods rather than trucks.  Saw some figures on this years ago, may no longer be as viable.  RR can, on the other hand, burn coal rather than use diesel.  Of course, there is also..for steam...the "water problem" which was a major contributor to the demise of the great steam locos.

Otherwise, "living smaller" is going to become a necessity not a trendy option.  Micro/home electrical systems are quite likely to become very desirable.  Sub-blurbs, while admittedly social and architectural horrors are, nevertheless, reasonably compact and that has the advantage of being useful for certain kinds of mass transit systems.  The problem is that the "distribution" of "jobs" is as widely distributed as the distribution of "residences."  Imagine a 100 x 100 checkerboard with every other "square" being capable of connecting to any other square.  That approximates our current street network....excepting major arterials.  Rail service and trolley service, when they existed for public transit are "nodal collectors" in a fairly simple linear network.  They carry "point to point" and/or "distribute to nodes" along the line.  Airlines, on the other hand, excepting "layovers" are point to point.  Highways are mostly "open" or "diffuse" collectors.  Get on and off anywhere.  Very, very flexible, most flexible in fact....but leads to a very spread-out, diffuse systems and the growth of the blurbs.  If you could get 50% of the population to limit their job locations to single digit number, than mass transit begins to be competitive.  (As in Long Island RR commuters.)  

And today, so many other "market factors" intervene....prices, local schools, taxes, access to entertainment, etc. etc. etc. all contributing to the dismally even distribution of blururbia across the landscape.  The basic reason mass transit accounts for so little of the daily population movement in most communities is its innate lack of flexibility....excepting, of course, bus systems which no community wants to purchase, operate or maintaing.  Buses are considered by many to be "lower class" and "dangerous"...so much better to be coccooned in steel and plastic, listening to muzak in the SUV.

enough.

wgJ
  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Connie Clark 
  To: BJ's List Ghetto 2 ; Ghetto List 
  Sent: Wednesday, November 16, 2005 12:29 AM
  Subject: [AGL] peak oil documentary


  Great film everyone should see: The End of Suburbia: Oil Depletion and the Collapse of the American Dream

  Was made in 2004.  Have we already talked about this documentary?  

  Matthew Simmons, chair of the largest energy investment bank in the world spoke to us after the showing - took questions.  He reiterated that the only option for us is to start living smaller, more local.  Cut back on our use of energy.

  Writer, James Kuenstler was quite entertaining in the film:

  "America took all of its post-war wealth and invested it in a living arrangement that has no future."

  "the days where the ingredients of a Caesar salad travel 3000 miles to your table are over..."

  more about the film:
  http://www.endofsuburbia.com/previews.htm

  coincidentally, I worked way out in the suburbs for the job today and saw a very telling hand-printed sign posted on a pole at the freeway intersection.  it read:

  for sale
  5 bdr 2 ba 
  will finance
  <phone #>

  Connie







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