*Fly and Be Damned: What Now for Aviation and Climate Change? Peter McManners (Visiting Fellow, Henley Business School, Reading U; member, Green Economics Institute).  London: Zed Books, Feb 2012, 192p, $26.95pb. . Aviation is stuck in a stalemate between misguided policy and a growing imperative to deal with its environmental impact.  There is little possibility that the transition to sustainable flying can be a smooth evolution.  Chapters on our addiction to flying, projected expansion of capacity, climate change, globalization and aviation, green air vehicles, short haul to trains, global aviation policy, and an agenda for a sustainable aviation industry based on reducing environmental impacts.  McManners is author of Green Outcomes in the Real World (Gower, Oct 2010) and Adapt and Thrive: The Sustainable Revolution (Susta Press, Feb 2008).  (TRANSPORTATION * AVIATION * SUSTAINABILITY AND AVIATION * CLIMATE CHANGE)

 

* Transport for Society: Highlights of the International Transport Forum 2011.  International Transport Forum.  Paris: OECD, Oct 2011, 92p.  Transport is intrinsic to societal activity, and one of its greatest enablers. It allows people to reach their workplaces, provides individuals with access to education and services, and is increasingly important for leisure. It drives trade and creates jobs. How can transport provide even more benefits for our citizens and societies? How can all transport modes – for passengers as well as freight – contribute to growth that is sustainable? Transport Ministers and business leaders, mayors of major cities, top researchers and representatives of non-governmental organizations met together at the International Transport Forum’s annual summit in May 2011 in Leipzig, Germany, to examine these strategic issues. This publication condenses their main findings.  Topics include doing more with less due to shrinking budgets and growing demand, balancing mobility rights and needs with expectations and costs, transport and employment, equitable access (“No Passenger Left Behind”), security in transport, transport and a healthy environment, and Jeremy Rifkin on “Forty Years to Make the Shift.”        (TRANSPORTATION * INTERNATIONAL TRANSPORT FORUM)

* The Future of Interurban Passenger Transport.  Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development.  Paris: OECD, May 2010, 556p.  Economic growth, trade, and the concentration of population in large cities will intensify demand for interurban transport services.  Leading transport researchers worldwide discuss how transport costs shape the spatial pattern of economic activity, inter-urban travel demand, international air passenger transport, investment in high-speed rail links and networks, high speed inter-city transport in Japan, transport deregulation experience for privatization in the US, long distance passenger rail services in Europe, environmental aspects of inter-city passenger transport, etc.  (INTERURBAN PASSENGER TRANSPORT * CITIES AND INTERURBAN TRANSPORT)

** Transport Revolutions: Moving People and Freight without Oil (Revised and Updated Edition).  Richard Gilbert (OECD consultant) and Anthony Perl (Prof of Pol Sci and Urban Studies, Simon Fraser U). New Society Publishers, Oct 2009/408p/$26.95pb. Near-term impacts of increasing oil scarcity and higher prices on transport will require a revolution in thinking about how we move people and goods; ample movement can be sustained beyond 2025 by substantial use of electricity for land transport, use of wind power for water transport, radical changes in aviation, and restructuring how transport is financed and managed.                                                                                 (TRANSPORTATION * ENERGY)

 

* Sustainable Transportation: Problems and Solutions. William R. Black (Prof of Geography and Public Affairs, Indiana U). NY: Guilford Publications, Dec 2009/304p/$60. During the past two decades, sustainability has become the dominant concern of transportation planners; this textbook discusses the problem of sustainability, congestion, motor vehicle crashes, speed limit policies, pricing and taxation, the full costs of transportation, indicator-based planning for sustainability, national policy solutions, travel demand management, telecommuting and e-commerce, new vehicles, and intelligent transport systems.

 

** Transportation in a Climate-Constrained World. Andreas Schäfer (U of Cambridge), John B. Heywood (Sloan Automotive Lab, MIT), Henry D. Jacoby (Co-director, MIT Joint Program on the Science and Policy of Global Change), and Ian A. Waitz (Prof of Aeornautics, MIT). Cambridge: MIT Press, May 2009/340p/$27pb. An integrated assessment of factors affecting GHG emissions, past and future travel demand, technologies and alternative fuels that may become available for road vehicles and aircraft, policies to promote more sustainable transport, and how to achieve a sustainable transport system in the next 30-50 years.                                                           (TRANSPORTATION * SUSTAINABILITY)

 

* Reinventing the Automobile: Personal Urban Mobility for the 21^st Century. William J. Mitchell (Smart Cities research group, MIT Media Lab), Christopher E. Borroni-Bird (Director of Advanced Vehicle Concepts, GM), and Lawrence D. Burns (former VP for R&D at GM). Cambridge MA: The MIT Press, March 2010/240p/$21.95. Today’s cars are inefficient for personal mobility in cities: they need to be green, smart, connected, and fun.  Four big ideas to make this feasible and timely: 1) base underlying design on electric-drive and wireless communications; 2) a Mobility Internet for sharing traffic and travel data; 3) electric-drive vehicles integrated with smart electric grids based on renewable energy; 4) dynamically priced markets for electricity, road space, parking space, and shared-use vehicles.

 

* Two Billion Cars: Driving Toward Sustainability (Updated, with new Afterword). Daniel Sperling (Director, Institute of Transportation Studies, UC-Davis) and Deborah Gordon. Foreword by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger. NY: Oxford U Press, April 2010/320p/$16.95pb. Today there are >1 billion vehicles in the world, and the number will double within 20 years, largely due to the growth of China and India. Blame is placed on the auto industry, short-sighted government policies, and consumers. Solutions include low-carbon fuels and reinventing cars (see Reinventing the Automobile by William J. Mitchell et al; MIT Press, March 2010). California and China, the two places with the most troublesome emissions problems, are the most likely to be world leaders on these issues.

 

* The State of U.S. Railroads: A Review of Capacity and Performance Data. Brian A. Weatherford, Henry H. Willis, and David S. Ortiz. Santa Monica CA: RAND Corp, 2008/64p/$24pb. The volume of freight transported in the US is expected to double in the next 30 years, and shippers are concerned that existing infrastructure—much diminished after decades of track abandonment—lacks sufficient capacity to accommodate increased demand, despite improved productivity of US railroads.