I was at the LA Auto Show for a few hours this morning, and the talk was all about green cars. Who was the greenest, who had the most new technologies. Electric cars, plug-in hybrids, alternative fuel. You name it, and somebody had a car for it.

But California has always been a leader in pushing the car companies to innovate and adopt new technologies.  California’s emissions requirements are still the most strict in the nation and the widespread adoption of the catalytic converter was at least greatly enhanced by California regulation.

And California is still at it. Back in 2007, Arnold Schwarzenegger called on Detroit to “get off their butts” and improve fuel economy. Of course, that didn’t go over all that well in Detroit back then. However, in the time between then and now, a few things have happened in Detroit, and green is all the rage. Yesterday’s press conference with Arnold and the car companies was a little different:

California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger hailed automakers today for developing technology that will  slash emissions and fight climate change.

Speaking on the eve of the Los Angles Auto Show, the governor said “green” vehicles have proliferated at the show from three models to about 50 on display this year. The vehicles are needed to help automakers meet California regulations that will cut greenhouse gases 25 percent by 2020. (DetNews)

And once again, California is the leader. GM bigwig Bob Lutz described California’s role in the future of GM’s EV strategy.  When the Chevy Volt comes out next year, it will be immediately available in California first. Of course, our mild weather is one reason for that, but the fact is that there

is a very willing audience for these cars. In fact, 3 major electric utilities, SoCal Edison, PG&E and the Sacramento Mun. Util. District will be using some of the new Volts. They’ll provide testing and real-world data on how these cars work in the field. All the while the cars will be available in a select few dealer showrooms. Though, they won’t last long in the showrooms, as they are likely to be spoken for before they are ever in a showroom.

There’s still a long way to go before electric cars are really ubiquitous. We must build out a charging station infrastructure and provide incentives for people to switch to the more pricy electic cars.  And while some cities, like San Francisco, are working on building out infrastructure, there simply has to be much, much more in the way of volume for these to ever take off. It’s a bit of a chicken and an egg problem of course, but that’s often the case with new technology.

If California is ready to be a leader, we stand poised to spread the gospel of these low emissions vehicles. But given our precarious fiscal situation, that’s always a bit of stretch. However, even if we make some low-cost moves towards the future, we have the conditions that would allow this technology to prosper. And if some folks in Downey have their way, California will be the heart of it all.

This morning, I’ve been leisurely perusing through The Register. I may not always agree with their opinions (OK, so it’s more like ALMOST NEVER, but whatever), but I like their local news and I like their columnists. Well anyways, I was reading Gordon Dillow’s column today and I was stopped in my tracks!

I was driving along an open stretch of Pacific Coast Highway the other day, at or just under the posted speed limit of 50 mph, and every hundred yards or so I was passing groups of two or three or a dozen bicyclists pedaling along in the bike lane. And that’s when it occurred to me:

I don’t want to share the road. More specifically, I don’t want to share a high-speed road with bicycle riders – not because it’s that big of a problem for me, but because it’s too dangerous for them.

Now in case you haven’t heard, “Share the Road” is the slogan that’s here to encourage motorists to be more aware of bike riders while on the road, and to cooperate with them. Now this sounds like a good idea, but is it really? Or are we just asking for accidents on places like PCH? Gordon Dillow thinks so, and I think he might be onto something.

Follow me after the flip for more…

So maybe bikes can share the road with cars on streets in residential neighborhoods and other areas where the speed limit is 35 miles per hour and less…

But on roads like sections of Pacific Coast Highway, where speed limits range up to 55 mph, it seems like utter madness to have 3,000- or 4,000-pound cars going 55 mph hurtle past 25-pound bikes going 15 mph – with nothing more substantial between them than a thin white stripe delineating the shoulder or the “bike lane.” It’s like allowing baby strollers on the freeway.

Yes, I know we’ve spent millions of dollars creating bike lanes – as opposed to separate, no-cars-allowed bike “paths” and “trails” – along our streets and highways. I also realize that in this day and age there are few things more politically incorrect than to suggest that cars be given preference over bicycles. After all, in the popular view, motor vehicles are pollution-spewing, gas-guzzling (and gasoline tax-paying) monsters, while bikes are benign, environmentally friendly little munchkins.

But the problem is that when monsters mix with munchkins, the munchkins are inevitably going to get stepped on – too often with tragic results.

Really? Munchkins? Stepped on? Tragic?

Consider the numbers. According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, in 2005 there were 115 “pedalcyclists” – that’s the NHTSA’s word – killed in traffic crashes in California, nine of them in Orange County. True, bicycle fatalities were only about 3 percent of the total 4,300 traffic-related fatalities in the state, but if you factor in such things as “fatalities per miles traveled,” it’s pretty clear that statistically it’s more dangerous to ride a bike on the roads than to drive a car.

Yep, when we look at the numbers, it just seems unavoidable. It really is dangerous to have bikes on the same lanes as cars. Now we can argue that all this danger is caused by the slower and lighter bikes trying to mingle with the faster and heavier cars. Or perhaps, we can argue that all this danger is caused by all these cars just going too fast…

But the point is that regardless of who is at fault in a car vs. bike collision, it’s the bicyclist who’s going to suffer, physically at least. Once again, no 25-pound bike is ever going to “win” in a collision with a 4,000-pound car – and yet we persist in trying to mix heavy, high-speed motor vehicles with light, low-speed bikes on high-volume, relatively high-speed roads.

And this is why cars and bikes just can’t get along on the same road. And perhaps, we should start taking this into consideration more often when we plan more bike lanes.

Perhaps we should follow Irvine’s example. The City of Irvine has 44.5 miles of off-road bike paths connecting to the 282 miles of on-road bike paths. In Irvine, bike riders have the chance to get off the road once they leave those quieter residential neighborhoods with the slower cars, and get onto these special paths just for bikes that take them to lovely parks and gorgeous nature preserves. Maybe Irvine is doing something right that other communities in Orange County, as well as other parts of California, should pay attention to.

And perhaps we should create more off-road bike paths besides busy highways like what is being done on SR-133/Laguna Canyon Road from Irvine to Laguna Beach. What Gordon Dillow saw recently on PCH also used to happen all the time on Laguna Canyon Road. And sometimes, that mix of speedy bikes and even speedier cars was quite a deadly one. But now, the bikes are getting their own lane. And most likely, this will make both the bike riders and the car drivers both happier and safer.

So perhaps when we’re considering new roads and new bike lanes, we should try to keep the two separated. And perhaps we should especially do this with highways where dozens upon dozens of cars speed by every day at 50 miles per hour. After all, shouldn’t we keep the good, brave bike riders safe and happy? : )

Not that I think Arnold Schwarzenegger is a Democrat or anything, but he, along with the full force of the statewide elected leadership, is pushing the EPA hard to allow the state’s greenhouse gas emission controls on vehicles to go forward.  The Supreme Court has already ruled that the EPA can regulate greenhouse gas emissions, yet the EPA is dragging its feet on giving permission to California and the other states lined up behind us.  Attorney General Jerry Brown was impassioned on this issue when meeting with regulators in Washington this week.

“This is more important than any issue that EPA’s going to have to face,” California Attorney General Jerry Brown told regulators who will recommend whether to give California the waiver it needs to implement its emissions law.

Brown asked the hearing panel to take a message to EPA Administrator Stephen Johnson.

“We want him to speak truth to power,” said Brown. “There is a tremendous influence of the oil industry. We know (Vice President) Cheney and (President) Bush are oilmen, they think like oil folks. … We say grant the waiver.”

This would be the most sweeping law regulating vehicle emissions in our nation’s history (and it was passed in 2002, pre-Mr. Green Hummer, folks), and would lead to an 18% reduction in greenhouse gases in our atmosphere due to cars by 2020.

To his credit, Schwarzenegger (along with Brown) has vowed to sue the EPA if they don’t act on this by October.  And he and Connecticut’s Jodi Rell penned a strong op-ed in the Sunday Washington Post about the issue (on the flip):

It’s bad enough that the federal government has yet to take the threat of global warming seriously, but it borders on malfeasance for it to block the efforts of states such as California and Connecticut that are trying to protect the public’s health and welfare […]

Since transportation accounts for one-third of America’s greenhouse gas emissions, enacting these standards would be a huge step forward in our efforts to clean the environment and would show the rest of the world that our nation is serious about fighting global warming […]

By continuing to stonewall California’s request, the federal government is blocking the will of tens of millions of people in California, Connecticut and other states who want their government to take real action on global warming.

If this doesn’t happen, by the way, it’s because the President signed an executive order calling for federal agencies to “continue studying” global warming until the end of 2008 (hey, that coincides with the end of his term!), which may stall any action.  Though this is a partisan blog, I think we can all agree that this is a noble effort to get the EPA to do the job the Supreme Court told it to do just one month ago, and grant the permission under the Clean Air Act to let California regulate vehicles the way it demands.  The health of our planet is at stake, and we must see action on this soon. 

You can contact the EPA yourself here.