Policy & Funding

This article called FIA Calls On Organisations and Companie To Assess Their Safety Footprint At The Vision Zero Conference talks about the FIA’s conference in Stockholm and the work they are completing as an organization. The article shares what information and resources the organizations offer groups that are working through Vision Zero. One thing they did was create an index which allows companies and organizations globally to have a frame of reference for their goal specific to their situation. The articles, at times, seems to be an advertisement for the FIA’s index, all while giving very reasonable explanations of how it can be implemented and why it should be.

This article focuses on recent federal spending on projects caused by Congress passing the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA) in November 2021. Money was given to the Infrastructure Project Assistance Grants Program (Mega) to allocate to projects that apply for federal aid. The author argues that the application used by Mega maintained a status quo of helping already established areas just get more money. The application relied on good information and organization. This money also only went to highly complex infrastructure projects. This article also mentions in the end that administration has already recognized the need for a more streamlined application in order to help more communities.

This article discusses the City of Montreal’s plan to introduce 200 kilometers worth of biking infrastructure to the city. This project will take the span of five years, and is the most complete bicyclist-pedestrian infrastructure plan ever produced and approved by the City of Montreal. The project is called The ‘Vision Vélo 2023-2027’ and will cost the city over 30 million dollars to implement. The City of Montreal expects to counter this investment with the economic growth it expects in the upcoming and following years to its opening. It is an inter-neighborhood network of bike paths which means that it will be vastly accessible to homeowners in Montreal, and will easily connect them to other trail networks and city transport, like the express train. Bike advocates in the area have been pushing for secured-bike paths, especially in Northern Montreal, for decades. Before this plan, there was no safe biking infrastructure in North Montreal. Jean-François Rhéault, president of a biking advocacy group in Montreal, says that, “the number of people that have been injured on St-Denis was like 300 in the last eight years. When we build safer roads, we save lives.” St Denis Street, an infamous and busy street in Montreal, has seen many store foreclosures since the pandemic. This plan will help revitalize areas like St Denis, and create more economic cooperation for biking plans like this in the future.

This article outlines the critical failures of the still-in-development California High Speed Rail system, namely the catastrophic political compromises that doomed the project from the start and the failures of the California High Speed Rail Authority in this project. This rail project was initially estimated to cost the taxpayers of California $33 billion—an august sum, no doubt, yet one Californians believed was more than justifiable, and as such they approved the project via a 2008 referendum. However, numerous critical failures doomed the project, such as the California High Speed Rail Authority's treatment of their development partner, SNCF (the French national railroad), a fatal game of "political horse-trading" with influential Central Valley politicians, and a failure to get the state government's support when the going got tough. Now, Californians face an eye-watering $113 billion estimated price tag to finish this gargantuan endeavor, and quite literally nobody knows where this money could possibly come from. However, after already sinking billions upon billions of dollars into this flawed project, the state of California has fallen victim to the sunk-cost fallacy, continuing to build the project-that-cannot-be-finished by dumping an additional $1.8 million per day into the railway.

The authors discuss a newly proposed bill for New York City that would allow for civilians to earn a reward for reporting illegally parked cars that block certain things, like bike lanes but they argue that the new bill could have adverse effects. There is a pattern of violence against traffic enforcement agents, and they fear that that violence would spread to more citizens. There is no argument that more tickets will be generated with this program since a similar one, which calls out idling cars, has been very effective in generating them, but the current tickets might be too harsh for those receiving them. Mostly wealthier white people report such vehicles, and the $175 ticket is nearly too much for the residents making minimum wage. The authors end by saying that we shouldn’t just do it the easy way, we should do it the equitable way that serves the community instead of hurting it.

In this article, Mr. Capps outlines the Lithuanian model for building renovations as an incredibly effective way to combat energy use and, by extension, carbon emissions. Lithuania, as a former Soviet state, has a multitude of old, Soviet buildings in need of renovation - 66% of the country's housing, in fact, has Soviet roots. To effectively combat this, Lithuania has developed a grant-loan fusion for building upgrades, seeing government funds incentivize building owners to undertake costly renovations. Furthermore, Lithuania has a government policy stating that only a simple majority of homeowners is needed to agree on renovating a shared building (in most other countries in the European Union, full consent is needed, making renovations very difficult). The effects of the renovations are noticeable; take for example an apartment building on Cosmonauts Street in Marijampolė, whose renovation lowered yearly energy use by 80%, from 140 kilowatt hours per square meter to 28. In the wake of Russia's increasing hostility and the European repudiation of Russia's gas supply, this kind of approach is a necessity in modern Europe. 

David Zipper in this article compares the development over the past few decades of Japan's transportation system with America's transportation system to see why and how Japan was able to drastically reduce their automotive fatalities whilst the United States has actually seen an increase in automotive-related fatalities since 2015. Zipper outlines the Japanese investment in bullet trains, which started with the world's first bullet train, the Shinkansen, constructed in 1964 and continues to the present: exempli gratia, the 15 trains per hour from Tokyo to Osaka, the two largest population hubs of Japan. Zipper then details Japan's unique approach to street parking rules, which state that there is no street parking. And furthermore, to own a car one must have proof of a parking spot in a garage or parking facility, thus keeping the streets free from obstructive automobiles. And lastly, Zipper talks about the kei car, a type of tiny car very prevalent on Japanese streets, as having a positive effect on traffic safety. Due to all of these policy initiatives, Japan was able to lower their car fatality rate to 2.24 deaths per 100,000 residents, down six-fold from the 1960s and a stark contrast to the United States' 12.7 deaths per 100,000. 

In this article, the author details the passing of the Inflation Reduction Act through the Senate. The bill expresses the harmful impacts that climate change has had upon all communities, with increased instances of flooding, wildfires and droughts. The climate provisions in the bill provide $369 billion dollars in tax credits and funding for reducing air pollution and greenhouse gas emissions. Many of the programs inserted into the bill are aimed towards lower income communities and towards rebuilding on the effects of climate change. There is a large amount of money disbursed to sectors willing to reduce their climate impact, along with tax credits for households who switch to environmentally friendly practices. The Inflation Reduction Act has created a revolutionary opportunity to lessen the impact that humanity has had on the climate. 

A national list of over 200 universities, deemed Bicyclist Friendly Universities, allows students applying to colleges all around the country to see what campuses will promote biking infrastructure. Bill Nesper, executive director of the League of American Bicyclists, has seen many university students and staff utilizing bikes as a mode of transportation. This helps foster a healthier, safer, and more connected campus life. For example, New York University has thrice the amount of parking spaces for bikes than for cars. The school also offers bike share programs. Schools that implement a number of safety initiatives for bikers make it high on the list while schools that fail to maintain their biking infrastructure move down the list. This influential list has caused many colleges to take note of how they can improve their biking infrastructure throughout the campus. The categories are ranked by metal status, so platinum, gold, silver, and bronze rankings. More and more campuses are leaning into a more sustainable campus environment, and it helps students and staff stay more healthy in the process. 

Creating Safer Road through Policy, written by Keith Meisel, shares Natalie Draisin’s story and more about who she is. The opening talks about how Ms. Draisin first started getting involved in road safety. Meisel then goes on to explain what steps Ms. Draisin takes towards allowing others to have the right that she believes they are entitled to, the right to safe roads. Understanding not only Ms. Draisin motivation, but also her work is an important part of knowing who she is. Her work led to her, “her current position as director of the North American Office and United Nations Representative for the London-based FIA.” Her role is a massively impactful job, and the FIA is at the forefront of the road safety movement and policy making. One statement that Ms. Draisin says in this article and our interview with her is “The public health community avoids using the term ‘accident.’ That implies tragedies could not have been prevented. We use ‘crash’ because we know serious injuries and fatalities are preventable and therefore unacceptable,” Her perspective makes the reader look at the world of road safety in a new way. Meisel goes on to explain more about Ms. Draisin’s accomplishments like “interning with the WHO, working with the National Transportation Safety Board in graduate school, and her opportunities to work globally”. Meisel’s article's goal is to explain who Natalie Draisin is, how she got to where she is, why she is important and a leader in road safety.

The Building Code Effectiveness Grading Schedule evaluates the current building codes in communities and how the building codes are implemented. The estimations particularly emphasize the reduction of property losses from natural hazards including earthquakes, thunderstorms, floods, hurricanes, winter storms, and fires. The BCEGS was created due to the growth of insured property loss, insurance companies realized the requirement for a building code grading system. Then the International Organization for Standardization worked with the Insurance Institute for Property Loss Reduction, the International Conference of Building Officials, Southern Building Code Congress International, Building Officials, and Code Administrators International, and more than 1,000 code enforcement officers to develop the BCEGS. The BCEGS has three main factors when it comes to grading administration of building codes, plan review, and field inspection. Then the program’s assessment converts each community’s score to a 1 to 10 classification. States with poor BCEGS scores generally incur more damage during a natural hazard, increasing insured losses while providing more danger to properties, residents, and businesses. Their recent scores in 2019 have demonstrated that California has one of the best building code rankings with a classification of 3 in both commercial and residential aspects and Indiana has one of the worst with a commercial class of 8 and a residential class of 9. 

This article called Road Safety is a Human Rights Issue shares how the FIA along with many other leaders including the Mayor of Paris and the UN Secretary-General’s Special Envoy for Road Safety are working to promote road safety. These leaders spoke at the Geneva Motor Show about the current road safety issues. the FIA’s conference in Stockholm and the work they are completing as an organization. The article shares details about the joint press conference that took place explaining the content and action during it. The contributions of each of the leaders involved to the event are stated. In the summary, it becomes clear that like the title states “road safety is a human rights issue” and must be protected by law

The connotation behind the term urban renewal came about from the government funding the demolition of neighborhoods through the Housing Act of 1949, the Housing Act of 1954, and the Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1956. The Housing Act of 1949 was a crucial law that furthered urban renewal because the government-funded projects by paying two-thirds of the overall expenses. This act caused cities to tear down entire neighborhoods with bulldozers and rebuild schools and roads on the cleared land. Once the Housing Act of 1954 was implemented the government increased the funding for urban renewal projects and started to pay minorities to leave economically depressed regions. Due to these acts around 800 cities in America partook in urban renewal by 1965 and 1 of every 17 housing units was destroyed during the '60s. This led to the closure of local businesses, individuals who wered displaced lacked transportation because they didn't live close to work anymore, and lots of product waste from the demolition. By 1974 the government stopped funding these acts, but the negative connotation of urban renewal remains.