Green Belt replaces the Iron Curtain

Along Scar from Iron Curtain, A Green Belt Rises in Germany. Excerpts from the article follow:

A forbidding, 870-mile network of fences and guard towers once ran the length of Germany, separating East and West. Now, one of the world’s most unique nature reserves is being created along the old “Death Strip,” turning a monument to repression into a symbol of renewal.

... 

Conservationists and government officials are striving to make the Greenbelt the backbone of a German-wide system of ecological corridors. Since 1990, the Federal Agency for Nature Conservation has established more than 20 large protected areas connected to the old East-West border. Those protected areas might eventually become part of a much larger effort — proposed by The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) — to create a continuous, pan-European nature reserve stretching from northern Finland to the Black Sea along the route of the former Iron Curtain. 

... 

“We wanted to prove that this is an area of value and that it can transcend the horrors of the past,” says Riecken. In collaboration with Friends of the Earth, Riecken’s agency began a painstaking inventory of the ecosystems and species along the Green Belt. “We had teams of ornithologists, botanists, entomologists, people for many different taxa, walking for hundreds of kilometers along the former border and recording what they came across,” he recalls. Observations from local birders and plant aficionados were fed into the database as well. In the end, more than 1,000 species from Germany’s Red List of endangered species were identified.
‘We wanted to prove that his is an area of value and that it can transcend the horrors of the past,’ said one official.  

Canada Under-Investing in Green Energy

From an article on the need for Canada to invest in green energy for our economic development:

Data from a recent study shows that U.S. and China spent the equivalent of about $360 and $187 per capita respectively in climate-change-related infrastructure projects in 2009, while Canada only invested $87 per capita [my emphasis]. Canada’s failure to match U.S. clean energy investments in recent years has cost our country 66,000 jobs. 

Our failure to harness opportunities to make Canada a leader in the green economy is endangering our economic future. Furthermore, this appears to be happening against the will of Canadians, 83 per cent of whom support investments in green jobs

Village-In-The-Air Apartment Building Design

This 150-unit multilevel-residential-building-on-stilts  is pretty cool. From the article:

Designed by Budapest based architecture firm Építész Stúdió it’s called the “Village in the Air” will have a total floor space of 15,000 square meters and 150 apartment units. Though the apartment complex, a series of connected buildings, is raised on stilts, the complex as a whole has been designed horizontally, with the idea of a spread out village as the largest and best way to group people residentially. 

The architects capped the height for the buildings within the village at four stories. Some buildings will have only two or three stories, but with four, the buildings will match the height of the surrounding trees, bringing the built environment in line with nature. Further greening the complex is the fact that the buildings are elevated off the ground, meaning the whole surface of the village can act as a park.

Green roofs symbolically connect the building tops with the ground underneath in addition to providing environmental benefits. Well defined courtyards and atriums help break the large scale village into smaller pockets of neighbors, making the complex as a whole more personal.

A Realistic Energy Plan for the City of Toronto

This Clean Energy Plan for the city was co-authored  by a group of local Greens and presented in 2006, largely in response to the proposed Portland power plant (now called the Portlands Energy Centre, live as of 2008). The plan noted some important opportunities that we should still be pursuing to improve our efficiencies in power consumption, most notably:

Ontarians use 60% more electricity per capita than our neighbours in New York state. There is immense conservation potential, far more than this generator will achieve, at far lower cost and with many substantial economic and health benefits.

Even with the last few years of home and business power efficiency rebates there is likely to still be considerable room left for improvement. For this reason, the rebate programs offered by the federal and provincial governments should be renewed until Ontarians are at least as efficient as our neighbours. The Ontario Home Energy Savings Program is now closed (no press release); the ecoENERGY Retrofit – Homes program also appears to be closed, but an extension or new program is expected following the election on May 2.

Toronto Environmental Alliance's position on the Portlands Energy Centre.

High Speed Rail on the Quebec-Windsor Corridor

Building high-speed rail to serve the Quebec-Windsor corridor is one of the most important investments that I can imagine for Canada. This article in Fast Company looks at some projected benefits for HSR in the US based upon the experience in the EU.

In the crowded Northeast Corridor (the perfect place for high-speed rail), 62% of the people choosing between taking a train or a plane from Washington, D.C. to New York pick the train, as do 47% of Boston to New York travelers. And the people who choose the train instead of driving would decrease wear on the roads, resulting in $270 billion in road repair savings by 2050. That pays for the trains right there. And lest we forget the environmental benefits, remember, trains are the most efficient mode of passenger movement, especially high-speed...

Now, the Canadian situation is even more interesting because the Quebec-Windsor corridor is home to probably 60% or more of the country's population. There is literally no other infrastructure project I can think of with the business and environmental benefit that would provide. Can you imagine making the trip from Montreal to Toronto in a little over two hours [estimate source]?

Despite its low cost (est. $2.6 billion) I don't consider the ViaFast proposal to be all that compelling for the Quebec-Windsor corridor because trains still have to compete with freight rail using the same tracks. An estimate for a dedicated, electrified track (presumably serving a 300 KPH rail service) is given in Queen's Policy Review  (QPR) at $25 billion [PDF].

In my last post I noted that tax cuts are a poor investment for creating a sustainably attractive business environment. The estimates given by the Conservatives put the cost at $10 billion between 2011-2012 and 2013-14 (the Parliamentary Budget Officer pegs it higher, at $11.5 billion) [Globe & Mail]. In the Fast Company article, they quote a recent report [PDF] by the American Public Transportation Association which notes that "for each $1 billion invested in high-speed rail projects, the analysis predicts the support and creation of 24,000 jobs" and all the taxes they pay. The QPR report, mentioned above, also notes the annual $170 million subsidy to VIA to make up their shortfall which should be considered, and the more-than $1 billion in subsidies to Bombardier since 1982 to keep it afloat despite it being one of the finest train manufacturers in the world. Finally, there is the cost of traffic congestion, estimated in 2009 by the OECD for Toronto alone at $3.3 billion per year which, granted, will not be wholly solved by HSR, but it will help. That's got to be half the money needed right there. If Ontario can find $4 billion to prop up GM and keep manufacturing jobs from evaporating entirely, surely we can find some money to invest to rejuvenate manufacturing in Ontario and Quebec while accomplishing one of the most important public infrastructure projects in the history of this country.

More Canadian HSR resources:
http://highspeedrail.ca/
http://highspeedrailcanada.blogspot.com/