Onwards, inwards and upwards!

[update May 17, 2017: I see that the link below to Jake's article no longer works.  He may have taken the post down.  Obviously the post below no longer makes a lot of sense, but I recall that Jake was arguing that the future of transit was personal autonomous vehicles -- PRT -- and that London shouldn't build fixed lines, either BRT or LRT.]

This from TVDSB trustee Jake Skinner is good stuff.  So much of the transit debate in London seems to have come down to aesthetic preferences and untested assumptions (e.g., trains will convince young people to move to London).

One thing I would argue with is the idea that vehicle ownership will disappear with PRT.  1) Some people who haul a lot of stuff in their vehicles for work will prefer to use the same vehicle every day.  2) Some people may have specialized requirements (e.g., adaptations for disabilities) that aren't easily met by PRT fleets, especially in rural areas, where the fleet would likely be small.  3) Some people may prefer to customize their vehicles for aesthetic reasons.  I expect a mixed system of personal ownership and member-based fleets.

Ultimately, I favour road tolls, congestion charges and a carbon tax as the best ways to deal with global warming and traffic congestion.  Not, however, as a source of government revenue, or a fund for ambitious governments to "borrow" from.  The revenue collection could be administered by an independent third party and returned to all taxpayers through the income tax system.  There would be difficult problems to be worked out, e.g., the rates to be charged and which roads to cover, but they are probably simple compared to the mess of subsidies, grants, taxes and regulations in the plan leaked out of Queen's Park.  Such a system could eventually be merged with a PRT system, as the cost of the charges above and the vehicle charge could be wrapped into one fee.

Books in Brief: Being Nixon

Being Nixon: A Man Divided
by Evan Thomas (Random House, 2015)
available at Amazon

Before reading this book, I knew very little about Richard Nixon, other than the outline of his political history (vice-president for Eisenhower, 1960 loss to Kennedy, 1968 and 1972 victories, Watergate, resignation).  Being Nixon is not a standard political biography.  The main events are covered, but it is not a detailed chronology about the political developments in his life.  It is primarily a psychological portrait, an attempt to figure out how his personality affected, and was affected by, the issues.  Previously having only a very a basic impression of the man, I was surprised to read about Nixon's personality, mainly his aversion to social contact and his fear of confrontation.  I was also surprised to learn how detached Nixon seemed to be from the events of Watergate.  In today's world, I expect politicians to resemble corporate leaders -- effective leadership comes not just from decisions, but from effective management of the team in the PMO or White House.  Nixon, however, seemed cut off from Congress, his own Cabinet, in fact anyone other than a few advisors such as Haldeman, Kissinger and Ehlichman.  He seemed not to know anything about the Watergate break-in or the other dirty tricks.

Overall, a good, entertaining and non-partisan introduction to Nixon.  There are more specialized books for those who want to look deeper at Watergate, Vietnam, domestic and economic policy, China, the USSR, the student protests, and the rest.