There is absolutely reason to be concerned that this is uh a crisis that's gonna be exploited by uh venture capital, by tech capital.
SPEAKER_01Hello and welcome to Tech Won't Save Us, a podcast that wonders how Apple is going to keep saying that it promotes privacy when it's installing a COVID-19 tracking app on everyone's phone. I'm your host, Paris Marks, and today I'm speaking with James Wilt. James is the author of Do Androids Dream of Electric Cars, Public Transit in the Age of Uber, Google, and Elon Musk. He's also written for Canadian Dimension, Briar Patch, and Passage, as well as many other publications. You can follow James on Twitter at James underscore M underscore Wilt. In today's conversation, we talk about how technology probably won't solve all of our transportation problems if we still keep relying on automobiles, and why instead we need much more of a focus on transit and alternatives to cars. Tech Won's Save Us is a new podcast, so if you enjoy what you hear, make sure to go to Apple Podcasts or anywhere else you listen to podcasts and leave a review so more people can find us. And obviously feel free to share this interview because it not only helps us, but it also helps James and the other guests who come on the show to promote their books and everything that they're doing. So thanks so much and enjoy the conversation. James Wilt, welcome to Tech Won's Save Us. It's great to have you on today.
SPEAKER_00Thanks so much for having me, Paris.
SPEAKER_01Thank you. So I want to start. Obviously, we're in this really um unique time with COVID-19 uh you know spreading around the world, and we're shutting stuff down to try to ensure it doesn't spread and to flatten that curve. Um and in response, like your book focuses on transit and transportation. So we're seeing uh some transit agencies eliminating fares, other transit agencies cutting back on service. Um and and obviously bus drivers feel uh particularly at risk in many cities because their passengers can come on and uh they can uh catch the virus that way. Um so what's your kind of response to what you're seeing um cities doing and transit agencies doing in response to COVID-19 that's maybe positive or negative? And what does that suggest for uh maybe future campaigns to make transit free, expand transit services, things like that?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, um you're you're right that there has been a really wide range of responses to this. Uh like in a number of cities across Canada, which is what I pay most attention to, they have made um uh they've just got rid of fares because they don't want um you know riders to have to interact with the bus drivers in front of the bus. And so they they're uh doing rear door boarding, um, which uh is interesting because I mean it's something that a lot of fare free advocates have have you know pushed for for a long time, but uh I definitely don't think they saw it kind of you know emerging this way within this context. So that's one way, another way that we've seen in places like uh Toronto is vastly increased um you know, sort of fare enforcement, uh, is that you know this is a trend that's been happening for a long time, that rather than working to improve service by increasing frequency uh of service and also reducing or abolishing fares, uh some cities have gone in kind of the opposite direction as service uh sort of flatlines or actually decreases as represented by ridership or coverage or that kind of thing, um they've uh increased the number of uh fair enforcement officers. Uh and so this disproportionately impacts, of course, black and indigenous people and people in low-income uh communities. And so we've seen uh some of that. But in terms of you know, like looking forward, uh you know, not to not to say that my book has it all or that you know the answer is just confirmed through this, but I do think that there is like a kernel of proof in the sense that the way that I laid it out in my book was, and this is you know, talking to many experts from across North America about transit, including yourself, is that you know, the the answer to um you know flatlining or defining transit ridership is improving service. Uh, and so that means putting more buses on the road, more trains on the road, uh increasing the frequency at which they come. So if you miss a bus or a training, you can be guaranteed that it's another one. Uh, you you know, you don't have to worry that you're gonna show up late to your uh job or your appointment or whatnot. Um, and also reducing uh fares to make it more equitable and affordable and something that people are going to tend to force, um, which we've seen numerous examples of uh around the world, and just make it a more comfortable experience. So things like you know, heated or air-conditioned uh shelters, lots of public washrooms, making it fully accessible for people with disabilities, et cetera, et cetera. And so these are the things I kind of lay out in my book, and you know, watching COVID unfold, it's like these are these remain the exact things that have to happen, is that you know, in order to guarantee social distancing, uh, you need to put more buses on the road. You need to make uh it more, you need to give greater ability for people to be able to hop on a bus while uh preventing overcrowding. And overcrowding is linked to a bunch of other issues too, including harassment and assault of you know, women non-binary trans people on transit. And so this is something that advocates have been pointing out for a very long time is that you do not want overcrowding because that can um allow people to engage in those kind of um hostilities towards people and then kind of get away with it. And so once again, we see that the response is is not to uh abandon transit and just say, well, we have to cut service because we're not getting enough fair revenue. Because that just puts the people who rely on transit, you know, the so-called captive riders, which I think is a kind of a problematic concept to begin with, but that's how many transit agencies do frame it. Um, that you know, that they just have to live with you know what what the city can pretend to afford uh to provide. Uh and so you know, I think moving forward, um, you know, keeping fares abolished, I think is a great step. We've seen really um radical successes, you know, in places like Dunkirk, France, uh, which saw a massive spike in ridership, and a full 50% of that came from people who had previously driven, right? So, you know, in terms of getting cars off the road and people onto buses, that's a super great step. Uh, and also, you know, it does protect drivers. So in the case of COVID, the the key concern is, you know, um, you know, operators will get coughed on, sneezed on, um, these kind of things. And, you know, there's been a string of incidents where this has been happen, this has happened intentionally, and that's that's a real huge issue in itself. But even just accidental, you know, the the risk of an operator being exposed to this, um, and we've we have seen transit operators die as a result after warning that this exact thing will happen, um, is that minimizing the amount of interaction between the operator and the riders through fare-free transit and also all-door boarding. So if people can enter it at the at the uh the back or the midsection of the bus. Um, yeah, and once again, just improving the transit experience uh for everyone is like a great step to ensuring that people can continue to provide the truly essential work that is required during this crisis. So a lot of that is low-wage workers, and a lot of those low wage workers will be working um hours which are not nine to five. And so this is something that many cities have traditionally neglected is that they'll provide decent transit service through the nine to five commuting window. But then if you work, or if you need to grocery shop or if you need to pick up your kid for childcare, um, anytime after or before that, um the transit service can often um you know kind of neglect you. And so, really, really working to improve that, and ultimately what that means is through the abolition of fares, that this revenue comes from general revenue. And so, you know, uh a government will fund it like they fund a uh a healthcare service in Canada. I mean, that's kind of a complex example in itself, but you know, the idea that we treat public transit as a public service and that it is thus funded uh publicly, as opposed to through fares, which are ultimately user fees that are often very uh regressive, even with low-income passes. And so I think all of that is to say that you know, what I tried to outline in the book that we need uh greatly increased funding. We need to prioritize um transit vehicles uh over automobiles on the streets is also very necessary. And improving the experience for transit riders who, as transit advocates often point out, have to start as a pedestrian or a cyclist in order to get to the transit stop in the first place. Uh so all these things remain true. A lot of cities will look at this and be like, this is the time we have to administer further austerity. But what that's gonna do is just create this vicious cycle that many transit agencies are not gonna uh survive, or if they are gonna survive, they're gonna come out with very, very weakened service. Uh, and so this is once again just a time to really, really commit to uh, you know, a radical improvement in transit service, which protects everyone involved, the riders, uh, the operators, um, all the other transit workers uh who show up every single day uh and put themselves at risk, um, which is you know ultimately the result of uh lack of funding and lack of um support from government.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I think that's a really great point because like the fundamentals of what we need for great transit doesn't change just because there's a virus going around now, right? It it really highlights, it even further highlights that those are the things that we need in order to improve transportation in our cities. And I think that one of the real benefits of your book is that you really focus on vulnerable people, on minorities, um, on the people who often are not included in the conversation around transportation in cities, right? Um, like you talk about the the captive riders. Um, I saw Jarrett Walker write recently about transit-dependent people and how now these people are often some of the only people left on transit services. Absolutely. And in many cities, the services have been cut, so it's more difficult for them to get to their jobs when those are the very people who are keeping our society running right now, who are keeping us fed, who are ensuring we can get from place to place, who are who ensure that we get our packages from the great evil Amazon and anywhere else, right? Yeah. Um, but uh like these people who commonly we so easily kind of denigrate as low-wage workers, as people who are just getting subsidized on transit because they can't afford a car, right, right, who have no skills and thus thus don't really contribute anything to our society and so don't deserve to be paid very much, and all these sorts of things. Like it's kind of being flipped on its head and uh it's being proven that the job creators are not really the the value creators or the people who we're really dependent on. It's the people at the very bottom who are often treated really terribly, um, who uh we all now depend on to be able to stay home and to work from home and all of these things. Um but like these these people are again in many cases not um like being put at risk because they're being put on transit services that have been cut back um instead of uh you know actually increasing the service to ensure that they can stay safe and they can uh keep socially distant from each other. Exactly and all these different things, right? Yeah. And so I'm I I wonder as well, because there has been talk of um density kind of being one of the problems uh with coronavirus, right? Right. And I saw some numbers recently from China that suggested there was a significant shift from um bus and metro use towards private car use in response to the coronavirus. Um so I wonder like you talked about what uh really we should be doing in response to coronavirus and what we should do after coronavirus to improve transit services, but are you worried that being socially distant, maybe people being scared of being close to other people will actually and of course the oil price being down and gas being so cheap that there will be a push for even more automobility and kind of these tech solutions to automobility, these autonomous vehicles, you know, electric cars, ride hailing, and all these sorts of things. Um, once we get to the other side of COVID-19, um, or do you think there is still a lot of opportunity to push for better transit services?
SPEAKER_00I I think there's both. Um, I think uh there is absolutely reason to be concerned that this is uh a crisis that's gonna be exploited by uh venture capital, by tech capital, uh as crises have been exploited for many, many years. And I, you know, that's something I try to point out in my book is that the that the reason that you know ride hailing services like Uber and Lyft have been able to really capture the public imagination and you know really materially change conditions on the ground is because in a lot of places transit service is is deeply insufficient, um, and there are real, real problems with it. And so, you know, the likes of Uber and Lyft have been able to successfully make appeals to affluent people who can afford to rely on ride hailing um and and really kind of shift the conversation in that way. So I definitely can see that sort of thing continuing. You know, the idea that you know Uber and Lyft or autonomous vehicles are you know intrinsically safer because you're the only one in the vehicle aside from the driver, and you know, you can maintain this social distance by sitting you know, a kid corner from the driver, etc. etc. You know, like lots of you know steps being taken. Um but you know, to return to the concerns around you know, like harassment and assault on on transit, which is something that that is a deeply real concern uh and it has happened to many, many um women in non-bed binary and trans people um across the world, is that you know Uber and Lyft has responded to that and been like, well, you know, look at us. We can we can guarantee your safety and we can respond to this crisis by offering you this service. And then, of course, what do we find out uh through Uber's uh own disclosures is that you know thousands and thousands of people have been subjected to harassment and assault uh in these environments as well, and there is very little um accountability or transparency. Um and you know, Uber has has taken steps to really try to minimize the amount of liability that they're exposed to, because of course they claim that they're just you know they're just uh a matchmaker, so to speak, between the rider and the and the driver. Um and so you know, looking at an instance like that, we can see very clearly that you know this is really a marketing ploy, that they'll say we're safer, uh, but there is really no guarantee of that whatsoever. But that isn't necessarily the point. We're not really dealing in the realm of factual or evidence-based arguments. If we were, uh, you know, buses and trains would be dominating our streets because as Jared Walker always tries to point out, you know, transportation is a issue of geometry and there's just not enough space in cities. Um, so that's really not the conversation that we're having. It's about appealing to people's fears. Um, a lot of these fears can be deeply racist, deeply classist, uh, exaggerating fears that already exist in terms of um people's willingness or lack thereof to take transit in many major American cities, um, in some Canadian cities as well, is this idea that transit is something that uh, you know, and this is these are not you know words that I would use, but this is you know uh transportation that poor people use, or transportation um, you know, that's uh you know, homeless people use, or these kind of things. And so there's this is already the stigma which is produced under conditions of austerity, once again. And so, you know, to point to the uh to the second part of your question about the opportunity, the opportunity absolutely still remains. Um, there are some really strong transit rider organizations across North America. Um, TTC riders in Toronto comes to mind, um, and you know, uh organizations that have been doing really effective work um in collaboration with uh transit unions, um, whether it be uh ATU or other transportation unions. And so there's a lot of opportunity within that, but of course, there's opportunity in many, many different uh sectors of society. And uh at this point, it's it's kind of scary at how quickly things are progressing towards the scenario that is kind of like the worst case or close to the worst case. So, you know, I try to strike that balance in the book itself in terms of tone. Like, you know, things are really bad in terms of transit. I started by talking about the declining ridership over the past several years. Um, you know, and there's no use denying the fact that transit, many transit agencies are deeply in trouble. But out of that, we can also come up with a better analysis of why that is the case. It's not because transit is inferior, it's not because people don't want to write transit, it's because you know good transit service isn't being provided. And when it is being provided, it's often to um, you know, the tech hubs. It's it's often you know used as a means of you know uh appealing to capital to come invest in the city. And so when it's done with that intention, um it often uh you know uh really undermines the case for transit that we should be making, which is that this is a this is a this is infrastructure, it's service that has the has the potential to be liberatory for everyone. Um it you know offers a potential for really great uh unionized work that has a potential for really radical uh climate action, has the potential for uh you know improved accessibility for people with disabilities and seniors, and um, you know, I I'm basically like listing the fundamental argument about my book here, but that it ultimately is a potential at this point. And in order to translate it from a potential into an actuality, we need to struggle for it. And so that's where the opportunity is, is that we we're in a moment of crisis, and if we organize, we can win those. But if we if we don't, if we sit on the sidelines and only appeal to you know fact-based responses, as as important as those are, you know, that's what uh most of my book is is is arguing uh on the merits of facts. But if that's all that we do, uh we will likely continue to lose, and transit service will likely continue to suffer uh as a result. Um, so I don't know if that strikes the adequately optimistic, pessimistic analysis, but that's that's what I'm kind of hoping for.
SPEAKER_01No, that that's perfect. Okay. Um I I think that's that's like a fantastic point, right? Because we see that in the cities where um local municipal governments are willing to really invest in transit, really expand services, really make bus services better, um, streetcars, metros, all those sorts of things. Um, like the ridership does tend to go up, right? We see that in in Vancouver, in Seattle, where they've made made major investments in transit services. The ridership has increased as well. And of course, in Vancouver, at least until recently, um, the transit service didn't even have to compete with Uber. Um so that's right, you know, that wasn't there to take away the ridership, as so many studies show that Uber does. And of course, you touched on Uber and Ride Hailing, um, and and how it very much serves um often a more privileged group of people, um, even though a lot of their marketing suggests that they serve everyone in the community, and and it's very egalitarian, right? Um, but but all we need to do is look at the studies that are done, which show that the people who use Uber are predominantly young, uh college educated, urban, and earning uh above $75,000 a year in the United States or above $100,000 Canadian a year in Toronto, right? Um so we can see that the people who are benefiting most from this service are people who are relatively well off. Um whereas uh the impacts of uh services like Uber is are to um uh like increase congestion, take people away from transit services, um, and so it actually negatively impacts the uh transit services and sort of the transportation options that are available to lower income people um in communities, right? Absolutely. But I like I think one of the valuable pieces of your book is that you go through these arguments, you go through um like the the facts on ride hailing, you're not just you know making some ideological argument, some like cultural Marxist argument or something, right? Um so so so we really get that, and it's really important. And I I would like you to also touch on because you mentioned climate, and and climate is is a huge part of this, and there's a lot of um comparisons being made toward how we like completely change our economy overnight to respond to coronavirus. Like we shut everything down, it looks like it's gonna be shut down for a while to come, and we've been told for years that we can't do anything like that to respond to climate change, right? Um, so not only now are a lot of cars off the road, so we have this opportunity to really decide how we respond to um coronavirus, like how we form our transportation systems when um coronavirus is over and when we can kind of go outside again. Um, and we we can decide whether we just unleash the automobiles again or put a lot of transit in its place and reduce the space for automobiles. Um but it also presents us this opportunity to really kind of think about what the economy should look like and whether. we should really start to respond to this uh climate crisis, whether we should bail out the oil industry or whether we should respond with a Green New Deal or some sort of massive um action, right? And and uh one of the the biggest source uh sources of emissions in our societies is transportation. Um and we're often told that electric cars are the solution to reducing those emissions because as soon as you cut off the tailpipe everything is solved, right? The tailpipe emissions. But in your book you explain how it's not as easy as that. So could you talk about why electric cars are not so much our solution to this problem, um what the potential issues with that are and why transit is like the better alternative.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, for sure. I I think it's important in this kind of conversation to always start with acknowledging that the merits of electric vehicles because there is absolutely a reason why you know people have tended towards them as the solution. And in terms of like um you know radically increasing the efficiency of the motor itself like internal combustion engines are just you know hideously inefficient in terms of how much of the energy um gets translated into the momentum uh you know propelling the the vehicle itself um electric motors are are very very efficient uh they use energy way more um effectively than than um gasoline or diesel powered and so you know that's that's definitely a merit um it it reduces um air pollution from from the engine itself uh you know it's uh it's quieter uh you know you can charge it at home um you know there's there's all these kind of you know benefits which which I think we have to acknowledge uh up front of course um that they're real uh but at the same time uh we have to compare it to what is the potential um you know politics and benefits of of transit as a comparison so one thing I know that you've written about um and that I I touched on on the book is and this you know it's it's a it's a tricky line because this is a it's a line that is harnessed by uh the right wing to to dismiss any advances in in climate policy is but there is a kernel of truth in it is in terms of the the sheer uh impacts on on resources um so the amount of mining that has to scale up in order to actually support everyone having a very large battery uh in their vehicle and there is this battery size race going on because of course there's fears about uh your your car running out you know uh you know if you're going to the grocery store and then you're stranded and then uh so in response uh some some uh often often unfounded fears of course right oh yeah yeah absolutely absolutely yeah and and then and you know this is this is uh propagated by the right wing lobby that obviously has investments in in maintaining fossil fuel status quo uh but you know uh companies like Tesla have have responded by just creating really really good gigantic uh batteries which you can drive for hundreds and hundreds of miles at a time uh and these require a mass amount of resources and so I spoke with uh Theorio Francos who's a uh prof um in the US and she's done a lot of really really excellent work around lithium mining and and what that looks like um in the lithium triangle uh in in South America and it it's already having really devastating impacts on um on on the watersheds on the indigenous uh land use and all these sorts of things and you know of course we can always you know claim that uh there's there's some tech solution coming off in the near future that will uh render that you know obsolete or whatever but frankly it's it's not here and we have to make decisions on on the technologies that we have available at at this time um because that's that's a popular way of kind of dismissing and undermining critique is is you know and this isn't just in transportation it's everywhere is you know we see it in the oil sands is oh you know we've got a solution coming off in 10 years to Tailwind's wastes you know we'll clean it all up no problem but you know we never actually see that actualized um Elon Musk is definitely going to solve this for us I know yeah yeah totally so the so the resource materials uh are are a huge part and of course you know transit uses uh you know electric vehicles uses uh in transit uh also relies on batteries but the argument that I I find quite compelling is that the better integrated the better planned your transit system is the the uh the lower uh the resource demand will be and so if we look at the use of streetcars or trolley buses um if they do need batteries at all they're very small batteries um and these are basically you know in the case of trolley buses it's for when they go off wire uh and so you know you can look in Vancouver with the trolley buses is that they are predominantly linked to the wires but if whatever reason the plan requires them to go off wire they rely on the small battery and then once they relink they can recharge. And so that's a far smaller battery propelling a far greater number of people uh than than a Tesla or an Issunleaf or whatnot. And that kind of gets to the broader point around sheer efficiency of transit as a mode is that the fact that you can fit 40 to 60 people on a pretty regular size bus, of course if we're trying to deal with overcrowding maybe maybe it'll be on the lower end of that is that that it's far more efficient on a per passenger per kilometer um ratio than it is if you're putting one to two or even five people on a Tesla. And you know the idea that five people are going to be riding in a Tesla is not borne out by any of the evidence of the push for carpooling over the last several decades is kind of a solution to gasoline consumption. And so that that would be another point for me is just that the that the potential in the transit mode if it is properly funded and if there is really good service is a lot bigger and it's a lot more efficient than um if we make a push to electric vehicles. And I I I mean I could go on this like all day but I think the final point I'll make uh at the moment is that electric vehicles maintain uh many of the negative impacts of automobility uh that we currently see today. And so yes it reduces um tailpipe emissions yes it reduces air pollution from the engine but you know in the case of uh environmental impacts it maintains air pollution from the tires uh and from the brakes and yes these there's regenerative braking so there's an argument against that but from the tires themselves uh there's a huge amount of air pollution um that is created uh from that that often ends up in watersheds uh or in the ocean itself um and the microplastics and all that kind of thing um but in terms of other impacts of automobility there is uh a lot of automobile related inequality and so the amount of money that you have to shell out for a a new or even you know gently used automobile is quite a lot and I don't think you know advocates of electric vehicles necessarily factor that in because the way that they look at these things is you know it's a sensible purchase that's going to pay off over a decade or two decades because the amount of money that you spend on actually powering the car is far less than you can use it as a robo taxi. Yeah you can use it as a robo taxi you can you can um store electricity over it you know overnight and then feed it back into the grid for a benefit um you know all these kind of things but you know for a lot of people who are facing deep transportation inequalities today that doesn't resolve anything even with very generous um state subsidies for electric vehicles uh and so there is you know uh it's kind of like an elite projection in terms of what's possible for uh everyone to use and of course the more people who we we have using electric vehicles the more batteries we need to produce and the more impacts it has on communities uh where these minerals and metals are mined. Uh and then there's also the spatial inefficiencies the fact that we just simply don't have enough space in cities uh to for everyone to have an electric vehicle the fact that transit is an inherently more uh efficient service uh in terms of emissions but also just in terms of the amount of space that it uses there's that famous meme uh where you have uh the you know uh 40, I think it's 40 or 60 uh cars and it just fills up the entire uh screen up to the horizon and then there's one bus and then there's like a small pocket of cyclists and they all represent the same number of people, right? So that's a pretty intuitive way to to to look at that problem. You know I could I could continue to kind of give examples of why electric vehicles are are not the future we should be advocating for. But I think the way that it's been talked about even on the on the electoral left has been kind of disappointing is that we often see uh electric vehicles posited as um something that can be uh proliferated alongside transit an argument that I try to make in my book is that like really we have to be thinking about this as an either or I know people will criticize that or say that that's you know overly reductionist or whatever but we but every every uh private automobile that is on the road is slowing down everyone else including transit and you see that every time you take transit in Winnipeg which is where I am is that the the reason that the buses are so slow, the reason that they're so late the reason that you can't rely on them is because they get clogged up in uh you know in cars and the the simple solution to that is taking space away from cars. So that means dedicated lanes we've seen successes on this uh in this in the streetcar line in Toronto and the uh rapid transit in in New York City uh is that you know we need to physically be removing vehicles from the road and replacing that with really really high quality transit. So that's like another reason why I kind of push back against the idea of electric vehicles is that like it's it's making transit worse. Every time someone buys an electric vehicle it's it's a rider it's a potential transit rider who is going to be opting to drive their electric vehicle for the foreseeable future. And that's a great concern to me and I think it should be to more people on the left generally speaking is is that we really need to double down on uh I mean double down triple down quadruple down on on transit on um you know active transportation which includes uh quality pedestrian infrastructure uh cycling all these kind of things uh to really knit a city together in a way which uh not only gives people the option to take transit but makes it greatly preferable because it's far uh more affordable it's far uh more enjoyable and you can count on uh getting from one place to the other uh far more efficiently uh and and far lower emissions as well so I'll leave it at that for now.
SPEAKER_01Yeah but but those are fantastic points right like I I think the equity question is a really big one um because I I read this study out of um the Nordic countries and obviously Norway is one of these uh countries that has a really high penetration of electric vehicles. Absolutely and even the experts over there were saying like we're really concerned that we're subsidizing electric vehicles but that subsidy is primarily going to higher income individuals. Whereas if we had put that subsidy into transit services, you know the the benefits would accrue more to lower income people and the people who actually need those subsidies not higher income people who can afford these vehicles anyway and are often buying them as like secondary vehicles and not really taking advantage of them in the way that they should, right?
SPEAKER_00Well yeah and we've seen the same thing in in the states uh is that the that the subsidies are primarily going to higher income households and one of the interesting things that that uh one study has has found is that uh many of the switches that are happening are from um fairly efficient hybrid vehicles uh to electric vehicles and so the relative improvement uh from an emissions point of view is quite low uh but we also have to just like think about okay what does it mean that a a single family or even an individual is getting say a $5,000 uh subsidy from the state for their electric vehicle which is likely going to only benefit them maybe you know if they have a a a partner uh and kids maybe that's that's two or three people but on a pretty regular basis we're we're talking about a $5,000 subsidy for one to two people. And think of what that could do if we kind of accumulated all of those and you know invested that into transit and even beyond that point just the idea that we're really encouraging more automobility which once again is making every other mode of transportation uh less less efficient and less viable um so yeah we're seeing that happen in in the US and Canada pretty much everywhere where where these kind of subsidies are being implemented.
SPEAKER_01Yeah of course and and like you said often we see left wing parties especially in North America or center left parties marginally um who present these environmental plans but when it comes to transportation the focus is so often on electric vehicles right instead of on expanding transit um and it was actually you who brought the trolley bus the electric trolley bus to my attention because I was like wow like obviously buses are much better than electric cars like electric buses um but then if you can implement trolley buses especially around the denser parts of the city then that further reduces the resources that you need to extract and the batteries that you need in order to make the city run, right? So you're cutting out the emissions assuming that you're using um you know renewable energies and fossil fuel energy production in order to run the system. Even then it would be more efficient as you say because those batteries are more efficient and and what have you. But like it would be a significant benefit if we can switch toward using trolley buses instead of just um like the larger scale of the electric buses, right?
SPEAKER_00Yeah and I and I I I I I should make just a very brief intervention that like even even if we're only using diesel buses or um compressed natural gas buses or whatever the whatever the the city's fleet is, getting uh way more people onto those buses is just an inherent climate solution. We we have the infrastructure in place and if we improve service if we hire more uh you know good unionized drivers and if we just make sure that this you know that this has like really continuous service throughout um the day and the night we will see uh just a major improvement in in emissions and you know this is something that we saw in the last federal uh election in Canada was that when transit was brought up it was often okay we need electric buses and of course I'd be like no no no we need we need trolley buses but like but like ultimately it's like no we just need improved transit service like commit to federal funding of transit service uh and you know hopefully reduce uh or abolish fares along the way and that will just radically improve uh transit ridership and that in itself is a climate policy I think over time you know over the next five ten years um as as these older buses uh begin to be retired uh whether it's just because of age or also because of a you know a desire for cleaner uh and and quieter uh you know buses we can switch towards these these uh newer modes um but yeah I just wanted to make the point that like even even given the the existing uh fleet of of transit infrastructure that we have getting more people onto that is in itself a climate solution yeah I think that's a fantastic point.
SPEAKER_01Now I have one final question for you. Of course often when we present transit and kind of like these larger reimaginings of what the city could look like there's pushback right because people are used to uh a certain way of building the city and of living in the city. And I often think about how Mark Fisher wrote about this concept of capitalist realism right this notion that it's easier to imagine the end of capitalism or sorry it's easy to imagine the end of the world than the end of capital. Exactly right um yeah so uh like I I think about that that notion and I think uh like uh there almost seems to be something similar with with automobility right we have this system of automobility we have these cities that are dominated by cars and it can be really difficult for people to imagine uh like what their life is going to look like in that kind of alternative system you know and and in your book you write that transit success is a virtuous cycle it can it can be difficult for people to imagine the benefits of a dedicated bus lane or an all-door boarding system until it's implemented. And every small success is a step in that direction. And I think uh Toronto's um uh dedicated uh King Street pilot project for street cars was kind of an example of that right and we're sort of seeing the same thing now uh in the United States with uh I think it's the 14th Street busway in New York City and Market Street being close uh to cars in San Francisco. So I'm wondering how do we kind of change people's mind and make them kind of wake up to the benefits that transit could have in their lives um and in the lives of the people around them as well. And what is kind of the way that we fight to get this kind of agenda implemented um when there is still so much pushback like on a political level.
SPEAKER_00Yeah absolutely it's and obviously it's it's like the most important question kind of that we're facing. I have a few scattered ideas. The first one is uh the promise of fair free transit and I know that transit wonks will hear that and just groan because they're like oh this is just like this is just uh a fake solution but um the reason that I I find it extremely appealing as as a struggle is because uh A it gives people you know a a really intuitive sense that the the interaction that they're having is with a public service and it's it's a collective service as opposed to something that you pay for as a user fee. And some people who ride transit do see it as that but that tends to be people who uh tend to be a bit more well off and can celebrate transit systems of different kinds around the world. And we did actually see that in in Winnipeg last year there was a very protracted very brutal uh standoff between uh the union and and the transit agency over some very very moderate demands uh from the union like just having slightly extended um you know bathroom breaks for for drivers and these kinds of things and uh they the the union took inspiration from um some actions that had been taken by the transit unions in Japan and also in Australia I think it was Brisbane uh was that they basically declared uh fare free uh days and it was kind of like a it was an interesting thing to see unfold because they they just they simply didn't enforce it so they they didn't they didn't inform people that they didn't have to pay but they didn't enforce it when people didn't and so there was this uh movement that was kind of encouraged by the union and also by supporters was just informing people the fact that okay on this day you don't have to pay and this is purely anecdotal but I know that when I took the bus that day and I had I did have conversations with other people who took the bus that day was it felt like a radically different experience of riding the bus. And of course that doesn't improve service that doesn't mean that you know your bus is going to show up on time or show up ever. But I think that's a starting point is is really redefining transit as a public service and linked to that is really pushing back against what we see again very racist and white supremacist fare enforcement in places like New York City, Toronto, we've seen um actions take place around the world where there's these organized fare hopping and there's also organized reporting of when transit cops show up. And so to link those struggles together to say by abolishing fares we are improving um the sense of of one's participation in a collective society. We are uh fighting back against uh racist uh policing which will often end uh in in very large fines or incarceration um and then also it it protects transit workers and this is like a really big point that I try to make again and again is that there was an internal survey done of drivers uh across North America by ATU uh and they found overwhelmingly that um assaults or harassment of drivers uh is is overwhelmingly caused by fair disputes. Uh and you know this this isn't to say that you know you eliminate fairs and there's going to be no issues at all for drivers. Any driver will tell you that that is not true. But the fact that you know someone comes on and they are having a hard day for whatever reason whether they're dealing with traumas or mental health or substance use or whatever it may be and then you combine that with um the the an altercation clause over fares and that can be very dangerous for drivers and drivers should not be put in that position. So that's another argument that I'd make for care free and I I note um that transit needs to be much more democratic and needs to be understood as part of a collective struggle on many, many fronts against austerity, against capitalism and against privatization. And this is something that I don't think transit um advocates have really pointed out too much. And I think in part that is because they don't see this as much of a problem. I think they see uh oftentimes any transit um you know infrastructure being constructed uh as an inherently good thing but I think the privatization of transit which in itself is linked to you know ongoing austerity and the downloading of you know fiscal responsibility for building these kind of services on municipalities or counties or or that kind of thing um it it really really uh creates a lot of resentment um among potential transit riders and there's a whole bunch of complicated reasons for this I I won't get into at the moment but we've seen this play out in the UK we've seen how um buses and trains have become wildly more expensive um their service has been slashed the quality of service has has declined um and the the the actual routes that are serviced tend to be the ones that benefit um or are used by affluent people because if you know if private capital is is behind this then then the interest is to generate as much profit as possible which tends to be uh servicing you know more more affluent people so yeah we've seen that this in um with Metrolinx in in Toronto which is a very bizarre uh organization which is like kind of quasi-privatized that they are getting um pretty big money from the Canada Infrastructure Bank which was established to attract private capital including from the likes of SNC Lavellan which you know itself uh completely botched the construction of the Ottawa LRT as we're seeing again and again and again so what this can do is have the reverse effect is that you have an entire um you know demographic of potential transfer Riders who see this kind of thing unfold and they're like, uh, okay, so uh SNC Lavlin and the consortium behind that, I believe they're called Rodeau Transit Group, um, decided for one of the you know for the LRT stations to use a very uh low quality um material for the steps. And so what that meant is that as as soon as it snowed, as soon as moisture got on the steps, people began slipping. So they're they're basically risking breaking bones or severely injuring themselves, just trying to get onto an LRT. And that's only like that's the tip of the iceberg in terms of problems with the Ottawa LRT, but people will have these experiences um of transit privatization and then kind of write off transit as a whole as a result. So that's part of what we have to fight. And you know, some ATU locals and other transit unions have been fighting against that, especially Doug Ford's attempt to upload the subway to the province and then presumably package that off for privatization. Um and you know, related to that is just the need to make this a real struggle, which is connected to many other struggles. So, struggles for public housing, struggles for better health care, struggles for childcare, uh, and access to education and all these kind of things. And so to really position it as part of a uh broader liberatory struggle, because I think if we, you know, this is coming from someone who just wrote an entire book about transit, but I think if we fixate too much on transit, we can run into some issues in the sense that uh we just accept any transit project as an inherently good one. And I think we've seen many examples of why that's not true. Um, you know, we can see Elon Musk uh, you know, trying to try to make his stabs at what he calls transit, which is clearly not transit. Uh, and some um some you know city officials in Chicago and elsewhere will will embrace that, even though they have a perfectly functional blue line uh to the airport. Uh and so you know, we really need to be careful about the kind of transit projects that we push for. You know, for example, it's not just about ridership, it's also about quality of service for existing riders. So in Winnipeg's North End, um, which is predominantly um indigenous and predominantly low income, uh, that that entire uh area of the city is very, very neglected by service. And there's arguably, there's technically transit service, but it's very, very uh poor uh in terms of its uh you know its efficiency and its timeliness and all the rest. And so I think you know, really working to um fight with those communities for better transit service and not do this top-down, okay, you're having this and this is going to be good for you, uh, because that can really lead to negative outcomes. Um, with that said, and this is something that um I've been somewhat inspired by, is the idea, and this is a complicated one also, but but just taking space for transit and for pedestrians and for cyclists, I think can be really effective. And I would be fascinated to see how this would pan out in in Winnipeg. But for example, because of COVID, um they have shut down a number of streets for pedestrians, cyclists, scooters, whatever. Uh, and this has happened in a number of other cities too. And it's kind of incredible just to walk on these streets. And I've experienced this feeling in in protests before where rallies and marches have taken the street before, is that you'll be in the middle of Winnipeg, in the middle of Portage and Maine. You know, you've got banks on on all four corners and everything, and you look around, you're like, this is a you have that kind of same experience as riding fare free, is that you you have this just this radical kind of like internal shift of what life could be like. I think that can be a very powerful thing. And so there's these, you know, there's these uh, I believe they're called tactical bus lanes, these ideas that you just you take a lane that exists on the road and you paint it uh red or whatever color, and then you say, this is gonna be for buses uh or you know, uh bikes or whatever uh only, and then you do that for a month, you do that for three months, you see how it goes. And this of course has to be in deep conversation with the people who are most effective, because when um when they do uh bus network redesigns, uh there can often be hostility towards that because people who have come to rely on a certain type of bus service and see that radically changed overnight with without what they consider to be proper consultation can lead to some really uh negative outcomes. So I think you know, even if you're doing a surprise tactical bus lane, you need to do it very as carefully as you can, but you also need to be prepared for the backlash from the people who have the most power, which is the business lobby uh and which is the affluent people who can afford to drive uh to the suburbs. Um and so I I think like it needs to be done as part of this understanding of class struggle that you know that transit is something that is uh serving the working class, uh, that it is it is itself a working class project because of the fact that these unionized drivers are uh you know uh and and not just drivers, but um, you know, cleaners and administrators and all the rest uh are are behind this. Um and then the final point I'll make, and I'm sorry for going on about this, but um is understanding transit as not just an urban issue, but an inner city, a rural and a national issue, and so really try to connect it together as a transportation um system. Okay, you know, so so this idea that I could take the train in an efficient way to uh Vancouver, which is which is not a possibility at the moment, but which is just like ludicrous given how big Canada is and how proud it is of its you know transnational infrastructure, which is basically a highway at this point, um, but but also really um working to radically improve transit service in rural areas because you know rural areas are tend to be older, there tend to be more people with disabilities, um, and depending on where you're looking at, they tend to be um heavily racialized. So in the deep south of the US, there's a lot of um black communities. But this is also in Nova Scotia, um, you know, like rural Nova Scotia has uh there's there's black communities there which are just like not served at all by um transit service. And so I think really advocating for transit as part of this broader network, this broader struggle which can uh interlink all sorts of um issues, like when the STC was closed down in Saskatchewan, what we saw was um people, you know, overwhelmingly like indigenous people were unable to get to medical appointments in the city. Um you had people with disabilities who were no longer able to uh see their family or friends, and so they were just sent into this isolation. Uh for seniors, um, once again, no longer able to get to medical appointments or get to the grocery store or like these kind of things, and start to really, really focus in on what did exist, which was the SDC, it was a ground corp, it was extremely effective. Um, and also look at like you know, Greyhound, which you know recently pulled out of Western Canada, and it was Greyhound was not a great service, but it contained the seed of what would be a great service if it was nationally coordinated. Um, and so I think I know that that was a bit of a rambling explanation of you know where we should look to, but I think if we combine fair free, if we combine an anti-privatization and pro-democracy, if we combine that with trying to take space from automobiles in a way which is deeply democratic and deeply rooted in other liberatory struggles, and finally rooting that with just this the sense that this is a national, and national is not a great word given how related it is to national sentiments. Um so maybe maybe a global project instead, you know, like just this idea that we can really struggle collectively for better transit service that can connect all of us, that can improve our lives, that can improve our ability to see family and friends and to experience leisure and to experience pleasure, uh, as well as just getting us to uh jobs in a way uh which and these jobs are hopefully you know tied to socially beneficial projects as well. Um, so I'll leave it at that for now. But um, those are a couple of my stray thoughts that I've come up with over the past while.
SPEAKER_01No, I I think that's a great place to leave it because it it shows us how not only are our transportation systems linked, whether they are within a city, within the broader urban area, in the national context and in the global context, like these are all linked and they allow people to get where they need to go. But also our struggles for a better world and for better cities and to rectify all of these problems that we face are also connected, right? Absolutely. Um, just just the same as our our lives are connected, just uh which we're seeing right now more than ever with COVID-19 and how essential some of the people who we often regard as inessential really are to our lives, right?
SPEAKER_00Absolutely.
SPEAKER_01So before I let you go, I do want to ask you one more thing. Is is there a book that stands out that has really been instructive to your thinking around transportation?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, in the introduction to the book itself, I laid out some kind of some assumptions that it makes throughout the book just to make clear to the reader where I'm coming from. And one was um Mimi Scheller's Mobility Justice.
SPEAKER_02I love that.
SPEAKER_00She's a so she's a sociology prof at Drexel University in Philadelphia. And it's just a really tightly written uh book, which makes the argument that we which is kind of it, you know, I've I've reflected my own argument uh from her, is that we just really need to be uh thinking of mobility as a much bigger issue than just getting from A to B. Uh so this is on the micro level. Um she she looks at um you know gender oppression um in in transportation um and also the individual experience of of a migrant or of a person with a disability um or racialized person, uh, but spanning that all the way up to how we think of mobility when it comes to climate change, when it comes to um migration as uh you know uh on a demographic level, um, all these kind of things. And so I I found her work really good. And I really encourage people to to check that book out. I think it's from Verso Books. Really, really recommended.
SPEAKER_01Awesome. Well, thanks so much, James. Uh thanks for chatting. It's been really enlightening, and hopefully everyone will go fight for better transit. Absolutely.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, no, thanks for having me, Paris. Uh, just last point is uh your work has been a huge inspiration of mine, and I relied on your uh a lot of your arguments and a lot of your the research that you've done uh for the book itself. And so uh thank you for the work that you do as well.
SPEAKER_01Thank you so much. Talk to you again soon.
SPEAKER_00Yes, yeah.
SPEAKER_01James Wilt is the author of Do Androids Dream of Electric Cars: Public Transit in the Age of Google, Uber, and Elon Musk. It was published by Between the Lines Books, and you can buy it at btlbooks.com, hopefully from your local independent bookstore or library and anywhere else that books are sold. Make sure to leave a review of Tech Won't Save Us on Apple Podcasts or anywhere else you listen to podcasts. Follow us on Twitter at uh at TechWon't Save Us. You can follow me on Twitter at at ParisMarks and you can follow James Wilt at at James underscore M underscore Wilt. Thanks for listening.