Three Daschunds Howling at a Pancake

My older brother is in town. I won't go into the details, but the following picture is the manifestation of a discussion we had over the weekend.

Enjoy.



P.S. If anyone knows how to turn this into a blanket, please let me know.

Hey Fatty!

I, like any red blooded internet-er, enjoy me some blogs. One I check on a (near) daily basis is the Fat Cyclist. The blog started out many moons ago as a way to hold himself accountable for his weight gain/loss. It is mostly cycling anecdotes, fictitious letters to cycling luminaries/companies, and a killer mashed potato recipe. A handful of years ago his wife was diagnosed with cancer so the blog became a release valve for the stresses associated with that in addition to the usual cycling stories. He also started raising money for the Lance Armstrong Foundation through it. Last year he hit almost $1,000,000. His wife passed away this last year and it was amazing to see the support he got.

Anyway, he is funny and emotional and the story is compelling and he's from Utah and blah, blah, blah. It's a blog I like.

Tash and I were on our way out of IKEA a few weeks ago and I saw a guy in a black jacket with the Fat Cyclist logo on the front.

It was the Fat Cyclist himself.

I looked around a second when someone said "Hey Fatty!" before I realized that I said it. I yelled "Hey Fatty!" at a complete stranger, across a parking lot. He turned around and smiled and I flubbed something about how I read his blog. We shook hands, he said thanks for reading, and we parted ways.

A couple of things about our meeting:
1)I'm a little embarrassed that I was so excited to meet a guy who lives in the the next county south, and who I could have met on a bike if I wasn't as lazy as I am instead of at IKEA.

2) Not only is he not fat (which I did know since I read his blog and he is vain and posts pictures of himself all the time), but he is short. I'm not exactly a man of great physical stature (I'm relatively short and I'm jiggly in the middle), but I am taller than he is by a couple of inches.

Or so says Tash. I was distracted by the majesty of his internet celebrity to notice.

This now takes over the top spot in my famous person sightings (I've only had two, I saw Connie Chung and the Salt Lake Airport and Perry Ferrel on the beach in California).

Yep, it really happened.

I've been waiting to post about this till I was sure it wasn't a dream. It has now been a few weeks and the object of dream worry is still sitting in my house so I'm pretty confident I'm awake and that it isn't a joke.

As I'm wont to do, I'll tell the long version.

Mid-November, Logan and I were g-chatting and before we got to the usual topic (bikes) he asked if I knew why Tash had called him the night before. I did not know the reason, nor was I aware that she called at all. Then he sent me a link to a full Wasatch Touring kit on KSL classifieds and asked if I liked it. "Si" I said. It was cool. That night, Tash asked what size cycling jersey I wear.

Now, I'm not the sharpest tool in the Clifford family shed, but when my brother and wife are making calls to each other, then they both ask me about cycling clothing within the span of a few days, well, I knew something had to be up.

The next time Logan and I spoke (which was about bikes) I persuaded him to admit that Tash was going to get me the Wasatch Touring kit. And he did. I was excited. And did my best to play like I didn't know what was going on.

So you can imagine my surprise when Christmas Day came and the box with my name on it contained this


(The picture isn't 100% accurate. Mine has an upgraded saddle and crankset, and the tires Vittorias.)

A brand new, full carbon (made by the fine folks who manufacture carbon frames for Felt and Giant, among others), Ultegra/105 equipped Motobecane road bike.

Now, some of you may be thinking, "ok, a bike." But here is the thing, we have a dozen bikes at our house, guess how many of those bikes I bought new. One. I saved up my paper route money and in 9th grade (yes, I still had a paper route in 9th grade) bought a Bianchi mountain bike. At nearly a grand it was the biggest purchase I had ever made. My road bike - the one I rode in LOTAJA, and up our canyons countless times, and all over - I bought off my boss at Gart Brothers. It was a late 80s/early 90s 7-speed steel bike with downtube shifters. It weighs more than the aforementioned mountain bike, which is a serious faux pas in the cycling world. Going all the way through my bicycle linage, this is only my second new bike. Ever. A pretty thoughtful gift to say the least.

My first real ride was a quick 28 mile ride down south. I got some hills, some flats, some corners (both climbing and on the flats). I was surprised with how smooth and responsive the ride of carbon was. Having an extra three gears in the back didn't hurt either. I only had my camera phone, but you get the idea







I won't go as far as to say it is a fast bike, a bike is only as fast as the person riding it. But while I am not fast at all right now, it was a great ride. I have some big riding plans this year (well, one plan really, and that is to ride - a lot. Maybe even till my legs fall off.). With this new, beautiful machine I'm sure motivation will not be a limiting factor.

Now if only we could do something about the snow.

To the Dangerzone!

A week or so before Christmas, at our official Planning Center eat-stravaganza (aka Christmas Lunch) we were talking beards.

The boss's wife doesn't like them, so he never grew one, now it's peppered (salted?) with enough white that he doesn't want to grow one - he doesn't want to look older any more.

Boss #2 has a goatee, and feels like a full beard makes him look like a chipmunk with acorns in his cheeks.

I beamoaned the fact that while my dad looks like a yeti when he stops shaving for a week and my brothers (both older and younger) can grow decent face socks, I am cursed with the whiskers of a 14 year old. While I could grow a mean John Taylor neck pillow,



it's patchy at best on my cheeks, and I've always been wary that the mustache part would be dangerously close to pervert territory.

So as I cried in my hummus about the sad state of my facial hair my co-workers consoled me. Boss #2 said that since I have never gone past 4 days of growth I don't really know how it would look, it could fill out. Since we were at the front end of a three week period devoid of meetings and a managerial mandate to avoid slacks had just been issued I thought now is as good a time as any. So I got the permission/encouragement from the boss men to look like a homeless man for the next few weeks to see if my facial hair would pull through.

It has now been about a month, and the first few weeks were rough. I almost shaved every time I stepped in the shower (I shave in the shower, it opens my pores and softens my hair. What my whiskers lack in quantity, they make up for in stiffness). But I endured.

Last night at dinner at my dad's house my little sister said "Christopher! you look like Kenny Loggins!"

I think she had this Kenny in mind



not this Kenny



But I'll take either.

Really?

As anyone who knows me will verify, I have a love/hate relationship with running (I love when I'm not running, and hate when I am running). Last Wasatch Back I decided I'm past the point of being able to run it without training. If I run this year, I get an awesome 5-year medal, so I want to run.

Last night as Tash, Morgan, Katie and I were visiting some friends topic of running came up and Jared (friend) began extolling the virtues of barefoot running. I had heard mention of it before, and everyone knows about those crazy barefoot running Mexicans. So I decided I would look in to it for a couple of reasons.

a) Jared said there is less impact and you feel lighter on your feet so you can get into more of zone, which not only makes running bearable, but it makes it fun.And you don't feel so beat up afterward.

b) If it works and I can run faster and farther, then I look totally awesome with no shoes on. If it doesn't work, and I'm stay slow, I can blame my lack of shoes for my poor performance. So really, it's win-win.

Anyway, I thought I'd check it out this morning so I started googling and the auto fill feature gave me this:



Barefoot running shoes? If they are shoes, you aren't really barefoot anymore, right?

Life on State II

I think you will probably hear more about this Life on State project in the next few weeks/months than you really want to. But in 30 years, when State is a jewel in the Salt Lake Valley diadem you will appreciate it.

Anyway, the Midvale meeting was, to put it nicely, a bust. The South Salt Lake meeting, on the other hand, was a success. Because we are really, really excited about this project and we want a bucket of public input, we are having a couple more meetings

July 8
Jordan High School
6:00

July 9
Murray High School
6:00

Not only will these be exciting forays into the magical world of planning, but there will be ice cream (cus summer).

If you can't make it to the meetings (even if you can make it, actually) you can still help give us some direction by taking this survey. If you take the survey and want to give us some more input then email me cclifford@planningcenter.com.

I want a 10 gallon stetson and a horse that bears my brand

The other day Tasha asked where I would go if I could go back to any time period, any place. The answer, which shouldn't surprise anyone who knows me, is the southwest of the late 1800s. While the only things I have to show for my love of the southwest/cowboy/ranch ideal is a couple pairs of boots, a stetson, and some second hand cowboy shirts (which I'm too chubby to wear now, by the way), I would live that life in a heartbeat.

I wouldn't even have to go back in time. I drop everything to be a rancher/farmer (I know their is a big difference between the two) and never look back. Which is saying something because I really do love my job. I can easily see myself in just about any Marty Robbins song.

Anyway, that love was reaffirmed last week when I was scouring flickr for pictures of downtown Logan, Utah for a project a work. Amid the pictures of the Bluebird, Logan Canyon, Main Street, the tabernacle and the rest of the Logan landmarks I found this beautiful piece of cowboy poetry carved into the back of a headstone in the Logan cemetery.


I would have liked to know him in real life, I'm sure he had a wicked sense of humor.

Life on State

I think about three people read this blog. Since the three of you know me, you know that I am an urban planner. You know this because it is the only thing I talk about. Well, that and bikes. You also know about this project I am working on at work, the one about State Street, yep, that one. The one I've droned on and on about for months.

Well, it is in full swing now. We have a website (it will look much, much better in the near future), a facebook page, and we are even twittering (tweeting?)!

I think I may be the first person to get a facebook profile because my boss told me to.

Anyway, we are having two public meetings at the end of the month. These are the first two of the process and we are looking for a) a lot of people and b) a lot of input about State Street. We have done some existing conditions analysis (did you traffic volumes haven't changed much on State since 1970), but the process is still in its very early stages. These meetings are really going to be the jumping off point for our work in the next few months. And we do actually listen.

The meetings are:

May 26
Copperview Elementary
8449 South Monroe Street
Midvale
6:00 PM

or (because they will be the same meeting)

May 28
Columbus Center
2531 South 400 East
South Salt Lake
6:00 PM

You should come (and tell everyone you know to come) because it is one of the rare opportunities to get involved in the planning process at the beginning as opposed to right at the end when it is too late for your input to matter.

Tell us what is working on State, what isn't working, and how we should go about fixing it.

Oh, and there will be food.

There is a woman sitting in her car at my dad's house blasting Mormon pop with a gigantic plastic sack of bagles on her lap. So there's that.

The Garden, 2009

This year we are taking our little piece of land in a different direction - flowers. I love the idea of growing some of our own food, and our urban farm (in the smallest, loosest sense of the phrase) was my little baby last year. However, we just don't get the necessary sun to grow much food. So we are going to scale back the vegetables to a couple of tomatoes (not five like we had last year), some pepper plants (probably anahiem and jalapeno), and various herbs.

That said, our HOA decided to convert some of our common area into a community garden. So we might try our vegetable hand again.

Our little flower garden, on the other hand, will get the attention it deserves and has not gotten the past few summers. As most 20-something-environmentally-conscious-Obama-supporters-living-in-a-dry-climate do, we want to use mostly native, water-wise plants. At the same time we want some color and texture variety.

As much as I would like to think otherwise, my green is in the horns, not the thumb (a little gardening humor for you). So with the help of my mom and the landscape architect in my office we have a great starting place.

We are heading to the Red Butte Garden plant sale this weekend and the Wasatch Community Garden plant sale next weekend. Hopefully we will come back with a trunk of plants we wanted and a couple of surprises.

When I cleaned out and organized our little shed last weekend I discovered we have about a dozen pots of various sizes and quality. So our front door step will get a floral treatment and we will have a potted herb garden behind our house.

I am excited to get some plants into the ground. I'll post pictures and probably write geeked-out, step-by-step explanation of the process. I'm sure you can't wait.

The End of Days

Bikes, soda, me being fat, blah, blah, blah. I'll get to that later. Right now I want to talk about something that has been on my mind a lot lately - Zombie Apocalypse. Everybody has a zombie exit strategy, I don't care who you are, you have thought about it. Everybody has at least a cursory "I know the fastest way to the freeway so I can get the hell out of Dodge" type of plan. If you say you don't you are a liar.

Anyway, I am sure it will be a 28 Days Later type of outbreak. We will not be slowly chased by shambling, mindless hordes. It will be a virus, it will make fast, strong zombie warriors. And it will be bad.

Without going into too much detail I'll just say Tasha and I have non perishable food, easily accessible outdoor sportsman gear, and a 4-wheel drive vehicle that always has at least half a tank of gas. I am sure it will bite me that I don't own this yet, but I will get one, .357, of course. (If it's not too late. I'm looking for some power, and a longer barrel length increases accuracy, cus I want to hit those blood thirsty freaks from as far away as possible. This one wouldn't be a bad idea as a back up. Its handkerchief duel design is perfect for when zombies ambushe and I need to clear leather in a heartbeat.)

We will head south (viruses have a more difficult time in hot, dry climates) and stay away from cities. I'm confident in my hunting/fishing/survival skills, so we will wait it out in a defensible position with a (preferably) spring fed water supply. We will teach Morgan the old ways and tell him stories of sky scrapers and civilization.

Anyway, one detail I am ashamed to say I overlooked in our Zombie Apocalypse preparation are pandemic barriers. Coveralls, respirators, gloves, anti-viral hand gel, etc. Thanks to the Internets I can take care of that.

The most reassuring thing is that Tasha and I can protect Morgan too (at the bottom).

I can't believe I thought we could get out of the Zombie Apocalypse alive without pandemic kits! We will, however, put shoes and gloves on our zombie pandemic-escaping baby.

50%

I am two days into my "commute 15 times in 30 work days" self challenge. So far I'm right on schedule. I didn't ride yesterday, but I did today. Again, my math is not so good, but it seems like 15 is half of 30, and 1 is half of 2, so that is on schedule, right?

Well, it killed me. I'm not sure what has happened in the last couple of months, but I don't think 11 silly miles has been that hard for me in a long, long time. I am ashamed to say it, but I had to make use of the smaller of my two rings up front. It took me 20 minutes longer than it used to. What a sad sack I am.

As Tasha said, though, "[I'll] only get faster."

I imagine that is true. I like to think I have enough base miles in my legs that I will be back on track pretty soon. To ensure that happens, I have made some goals for myself.

Ride I Think I Canyons.
Not just plug along through it, actually ride it in a decent time. I don't know what a decent time is yet, I'll figure that out.

Get a top 10 finish in one of the local crit series races.
One top 10 might not seem like a serious goal, and it might not be. I raced a fair amount in high school, and I did ok a some of the races. But that was in high school and on a mountain bike, I haven't ever raced a road bike. I am also 25. I think most of the other 25 year olds who race the series think they are a few equipment upgrades away from going pro. I'll test the waters and adjust accordingly.

We will see how it goes.

I'm kind of a joke

Last night I set my alarm for 6:30 this morning. I figure that gives me enough time to get ready, eat a bagel and ride my bike into work. So this morning the alarm goes off, I get up, look out the window to see no rain or snow, and a forecast of upper 40s to low 50s. The perfect day to start riding again after a much, much too long hiatus, right? The answer is yes, it was the perfect day. So what did I do?

I climbed back in bed and slept for an hour.

Granted, Morgan stared crying, so I fell asleep feeding him. And our kitchen sink is clogged, so Bruce is coming down with a drain snake at 5, so in order to be home when he gets there I would have had to leave work on my bike around 4. But those are justifications in the weeniest, laziest sense of the word.

Driving to the freeway with the window down made feel like enough of a tool that I decided I needed a shot of will power, so I started my lent a couple days early. I haven't developed any major vices since lent last year, so I'm giving up soda again. So far, so good. Water and grape juice all day today (which is big considering the fridge full of soda 20 feet from my desk).

I am also working on how to give up being lazy. Lent starts Ash Wednesday (the 25th, this year) and goes till Easter (April 12th, this year). Subtracting weekends, a conference in southern Utah, and accounting for my poor math skills, I'm left with around 30 work days. I don't think a goal of riding to work no less than 15 of those 30 days is impractical. Of course, I'll shoot for more, but let's honest, lazy isn't an easy habit to kick.

18 year old me would be bummed that my goal is 330 miles in 46 days, because that is around 7 miles a day. But 18 year old me can bite 25 year old me.

5:00

At first glance to day is going to be a relatively uneventful day. I woke up at the regular time, got Morgan ready for the day, got myself ready for the day, drove to work. Later I will see some friends, chat, then probably go to bed at a reasonable hour.

But looks can be deceiving, right? All of the regular thing that will happen today (I must say here that I truly enjoy the "regular things." I'm not doing too bad at all in the game of life) will be trumped by one plane taking off at 5:00 this evening.

See, Mike will be on it.

Now, as anybody who knows me knows, I'm not a mushy, sentimental, sad sack. But this is a big deal.

I have always had a cadre of friends. I'm not a social butterfly so this group usually consisted of a handful of people I consider close friends. However, I don't really think I've ever had a best friend, at least not in the standard elementary school definition of the phrase. Until I met Mike.

I will spare the details of our friend romance, but long story short -
I have lived in Mike's house
Been a witness at his wedding
He has been instrumental in me landing 3 of my last 4 jobs
We've built bikes
We got into fly fishing together
We've been elbow deep in deer guts
Camping buddies
Class mates multiple times
Graduated college
He is the other one in my profile picture
And on and on

Hell, he is Michael Charles Maahs and I am Christopher Mason Clifford (MCM and CMC), if that doesn't mean bro-ul mates, I dont' know what does.

He and his wife are off to New Zealand where he will start a Masters of Urban Design program. It is extremely exciting and he will do a great job. He understands what makes a city livable and he has a gift for visual representation.

So good luck Mike.

BS x 2

I am a college graduate right. I had my advisers sign paper work, I stood in line at the office of the registrar to fill out more paperwork, I checked my DARS a million times, and I finished my classes a little over a month ago.

I did all of that but I haven't felt done with school. The past few weeks since I took my last final have felt like winter break, that I should be going back soon.

When I got home today there were two white envelopes from the University of Utah, my diplomas. Being graduated really hit me when I looked at those pieces of paper that said "Bachelor of Science Environmental Studies," "Bachelor of Science Urban Planning," and my name.

So now I can say with authority -

Eat it suckers! I am done with school!

TIcket to History

The Presidential Inaugural Committee is having a contest. Write an essay about what this election means to you and win a trip with a guest to the inauguration. I'm sure there will be a million entries and they are only picking 10, but I decided to write one.

So here is my essay:

2008 was an eventful year, on a global scale, but personally as well. I celebrated a three year anniversary with my wife, graduated from college, got my first career job, and welcomed my first baby in to the world.

When I held my baby boy for the first time on a warm afternoon in July the world melted away. It could be one of the most over-used clichés, but looking at the face of this little baby, suddenly, nothing else existed. I had my family, we were healthy, and we were together.

The world is different now than it was even a handful of years ago when my dad held me for the first time. The media is filled with gloomy to apocalyptic predictions. Wars, a bleak economic picture, poverty, peak oil, hunger – the gamut of hardship is represented.

But I am not convinced all is lost. The outlook for my little boy is not dark. There is good in the world. For every story of depravity and destruction I can see a story of somebody doing good, of somebody helping to lift.

That is what the November election and the next four years represent to me – a collective realization that things can be better. We have it in us to be great. The election of Barak Obama will be remembered as historic by future generations for a myriad of reasons. But I believe this time will remembered as a time when the selfishness and schisms so prevalent today were set aside to accommodate the greater good. I believe this will be seen as a time when we stepped up and became our best selves.

Years from now, when my boy and his wife come to Sunday dinner, and we stay at the table well into the night, like my family does today, I hope President Elect Obama is not the only thing we talk about when he asks about this time. I hope we talk about the early 2000s as a time when Americans realized their potential and regained our reputation as a country of opportunity, acceptance, and prosperity for everyone.

President Elect Obama is not the panacea for global or national ills. His message of change and hope represents the goodness inherent in each of us and the opportunity we have to affect change for those around us.

I don't usually enter contests so I don't know how my luck is. But I did call Arrow 103.5 last year and won a Led Zepplin CD, so who knows. Here's to hoping they like it.

In Review

2008 is done.

Looking back these past couple of days it has been a rather eventful year.

I got this guy

Finished my time here










Got a real job here









And got this












On top of that I've been married for three years, my little brother got hitched, my older brother and his wife are having a baby (which means that little one up there will have a friend), and we are at the door of what will be an exciting political shift (I think it is exciting. At the very least it will be interesting - regardless of your political stance).

Even with school wrapping up and a baby being born and work I have been able to spend time with good people and family, ride my bike a fair amount, run the Wasatch Back for the third year, do a little camping, hunt, play pung, win a few hands of pinochle, grow some tomatoes & carrots, and put my fly rod to good use. I even had some nymphing success with it (I've only caught fish with dry flies till this year).

The people I love are healthy generally doing well. So, yeah, 2008 was, by all accounts, a good year.

2009 looks like it will follow suit. Another year with my family and friends (although one of my best friends moved to New York [for medical school, so good for him] and I found out that another one of my best friends is moving to New Zealand [for an Urban Design Masters program, so good for him].), a good job with buckets of potential, no school for the first time in my life - aka more time, and my baby will start walking and talking, our bikes are in working condition and Morgan will be big enough for me to pull him around in our trailer. While the
two friends I mentioned above were two of my fishing buddies on top of just being great friends, my little brother and another good friend are still around and eager to spend time on the water. And I have the tools to start tying flies.

Of course, life has its ups and downs and things won't always be so rosy. So I figure I'll take advantage of this up while I'm this high up.

It turns out I like blogging, when I remember. Since Planning Workshop is done (our project was a success and we have presented it to the Zoo, and are going to present it to the other organizations in the near future), this blog will become a little less planning related and a little more Tasha, Christopher, and Morgan related. I am a planner, I enjoy the built environment and how it functions, planning is 1/3 of my life, and it affects me/I pay attention to it/talk about it in the other awake 1/3 of my life. I even occasionally dream about it in the sleeping 1/3 of my life. So I imagine this will still be dominated by planning related material, but I'm sure there will be some not strictly planning related pictures and anecdotes.

So here is to 2009. May it be a well tracked, eventful year.

APA Utah: Oil

Yesterday I posted about peak water. The keynote speaker at today's session was Daniel Lerch, the author of Post Carbon Cities: Planning for Energy and Climate Uncertainty. As you may have guessed from the title of today's post and the theme of the conference, he spoke about Peak Oil.

That term has been around so I won't bore you with a page and a half synopsis. Basically, the idea is that there is a finite supply of oil on earth, oil discovery and extraction follows a curve, called the Hubbert Curve (because it was first proposed by M. King Hubbert in 1956), with production increasing to a point, after which production will fall and cost will increase (because the oil being produced is harder to get [tar sands and oil shale, for example], so more expensive. That, coupled with decreased supply means higher costs). That point is peak oil. There is some debate as to when peak oil will be reached, some say we already have, others disagree. Again, I won't go too deep, instead, I will send you here, if you want.

Daniel Lerch talked about planning after peak oil (he subscribes to the school that says we have passed peak oil, I do too). He brought up some very interesting points. The one I will write about here is volatility.

There are two assumptions we make about oil as a society, but also as planners; Oil will be available and affordable. After peak oil those assumptions are no longer given. The basic idea of supply and demand is at work. With typical supply/demand problems, Tickle me Elmo, for example, production can increase as demand increases. Oil is not the same. There is a discovery/production lag between demand and increased supply and a limited supply in general. This means that oil is volatile.

In a typical supply and demand model the time between now and when oil is no longer economically viable to produce would play out as you might imagine; costs will rise incrementally until we reach the magic dollar per gallon that we cannot afford. This is something we could deal with, we could plan for it.

Unfortunately, oil supplies will oscillate as new stocks are found then depleted which means uncertainty in both the assumption of availability and affordability. Uncertainty is a word disdained by anybody trying to created a long range plan of any sort. How does a city create a budget when prices vary (and more than likely vary wildly) from month to month.

When Hurricane Katrina hit fuel supplies were interrupted for municipalities and counties. When these smaller governments appealed to their state government for assistance they were sorely disappointed. The state fuel reserves were never meant to aid municipal governments, they were meant to keep state emergency vehicles on the road.

But this fuel volatility reaches far beyond local agencies. National and international trade will be affected, how will the economy cope? The recent rise in fuel prices brought with it a rise in food prices as transportation became more expensive and farmers converted their food crops to bio-fuel fields (another post).

Lerch's suggestions of how to effectively plan for the inevitable uncertainty are familiar refrains. He suggested 5 specific necessities, each with their own broad applications and effects:

1) Deal with land use and transportation.
My personal soapbox most of the time. Current land use practices are no longer effective. The idea of "drive till you can buy" shaping residential development will not work. I am afraid that in our increasingly polarized political climate people hear the phrase "lifestyle change" and think the suggestion is that we all live in 200 square foot apartments in 60 story towers and only eat soilent green.

Salt Lake County daily vehicle miles traveled (VMT) in 2007 was just over 24million. In one day residents and visitors of Salt Lake County drive 24 million miles, that is roughly 50 round trips to the mood - a day. Imagine if everybody lived a little closer to work and took some form of transit at least a couple of times. Put grocery stores closer and I don't think 75% reduction in VMT is unreachable.

I live in Murray and work in Draper, hardly the kind of walkable situation I would like. My round trip to work and back is 22 miles, depending on the route. I can do all but 5 miles of that on transit, two miles from home to TRAX (or TRAX to home) and 1/2 mile from the last 811 bus stop in Salt Lake County to my office (or the office to the bus stop). Usually I will ride my bike those 5 miles. But even if I drive to the TRAX stop I can cut 18 miles of driving out of my day with little effort.

As of now though, for most of us oil dependency is built into the system. On top of that (and I don't mean this to sound accusitory) the most important factor people consider when choosing a mode of transportation is convience. TRAX is full on Jazz game nights not because Jazz fans are a particularly eco-conscience bunch, but because it is easier than trying to find a parking space downtown on game night.

Increasing convience will take a restructuring of transportation planning. The form of our urban areas will have to change. Planners will need to take a critical look at the fundamentals of planning. As with any big change there will some growing pains (or shrinking pains) and a learning curve. This will require mild to moderate changes in lifestyle. Changes which, I might add, actually enhance our quality of life. The kind of cites people like to visit are more compact, walkable cities, greener with less need for a car.

2) Tackle private energy consumption.
City governments are starting to convert to hybrid vehicle fleets and CF light bulbs. Most stoplights are LEDs. But government consumption is only part of the equation. Emissions from cars are also only a part of the problem. Numbers from the Department of Energy show that 75% of Utah carbon emisisons come from commercial buildings, electric power, residential buildings and industry. Buildings, and the power needed to run them contribute more to carbon emissions than drivind, by a long way. Emisisons like that come from some form of fuel, largely natural gas and coal.

As with reshaping our cities, changing private sector energy use is essentially a question of will. Building codes require vent fans in bathrooms and GFI outlets near water. Why not requre more efficent heating, cooling, and insulation? Why not require a percentage of energy be generated on site? When cities give large tax breaks to corporations so they will locate in their bounaries why not requre their facilities to be net energy producers?

The technology is available. Institiuting it is a matter of will.

3) Attack the problems piece-by-piece and from many angles.
As with most problems, there is no panacea. The phrase Lerch used in his presenation was "there are no silver bullets, but there are many silver BBs." Energy is a complex problem. Land use is a complex problem. The world is complex. It will require us to look at every angle, and will reqire a myriad of partial solutions. Again, a matter of will. For all of our glaring inadequacies and blatand idiocy, the human race is extremely intelegent. I have no doubt we can solve our ills, we just have to want to.

4) Plan for fundamental changes and make fundamental changes happen.
Our society is interesting. For most of history people could not avoid problems that were sure to affect thier daily lives. Part of that is because their daily lives were fairly simple so problems were not easily avoided. We have the interesting opportunity to live in a time when our lives are complicated enough that many problems we face are hidden and a time when we have a nearly endless variety of entertainment options to distract us. I think about energy everyday. However, I do not think less of people who don't. Because the problem is so complex, and we do have the distractions it is easy to not see the immidiacy of the situation.

We can take a cue from any 12 step program here: the first step is admitin (realizing) you have a problem). Educating citizens, stakeholders, leaders etc etc, is the first step. I have some insulated coveralls. On the inside tag there is a warning, "Caution, these coveralls isulate from heat as well as cold. Use caution when working around flame or sparks as the wearer may not know they are on fire." How do you know to stop, drop, and roll if you don't know you are on fire? When we know we are in trouble, we will act.

5) Build as sense of community.
If number one is my soapbox, this is my favorite. Lerch used the example of a woman who was attacked in a neighborhood somewhere in New York who yelled for an hour before she died. When neighbors were interviewed by the police later they all said they thought someone else would take call the police. In this situation civil inattention went a step too far.

It is easy to feel insignificant in our cities, it is easy to feel like someone else will take care of it, whatever "it" is. Life in a community is different. A member of a community feels a sense of responisibilty to the rest of the community. More importantly, a member of a community feels like they can change something that broken, they are empowered.

Technology will only get us so far. It is the socical aspect of our society that will make all the chages possible. It might take a catastrophy to get people moving, but we might be able to get things moving and avoid a catastrophy.

It was a very interesting lecture. It is easy to see gloom and doom, but the good is there too.

APA Utah Water

Today was day one of the Utah APA Conference. The topic for the conference was "Peak Planning: Planning today for a resource constrained tomorrow."

I volunteered at the conference, partly to network, partly to see some of the sessions without paying the $100 fee, and partly because I like volunteering. I am not sure how it happened, but ended up picking up the keynote speaker, Meena Palaiappan, (who, by the way, is a very nice person) from the airport and dropping her off after the sessions.

She is from the Pacific Institute, a "nonpartisan research institute that works to advance environmental protection, economic development, and social equity." Her presentation focused on peak water.

Peak water? you say. I've heard of peak oil, but peak water? Come on, the earth is a closed system, we have "x" gallons of water and we won't run out because the only thing water does is change form and location, it never disappears.

True. We have 1.4 billion cubic kilometers of water, 35 million cubic kilometers of that is fresh water, 70% of which is locked in ice* (a good reason to keep up with the global warming thing, let's unlock all that ice!). So easily accessible water is a limited commodity.

But we are humans, we have a pretty good track record of finding technological solutions to problems (At the height of WWII the majority of gas used by Germany was synthetic, which is another post for another day), so we ought to be able to use some of the other 97% that is salt water.

Enter economics.

The reason we use oil from all over the world is because we can sell it at a high enough cost to justify the expense of transportation, not just in our cars either. Petroleum is used in manufacturing things like plastics and fertilizers, so it is cost effective.

Water, on the other hand, is not cost effective to transport relative to its price. On average, Utahans use about 200 gallons a day** (daily single family household use, that includes outside use). Imagine paying 2.50 for a gallon of water when we use 200 gallons a day.

So if we won't ever run out of water, and it is theoretically possible to get more water when we run out in one location, what exactly is peak water?

Peak water refers to the point at which a) ground water is being used at a rate above recharge potentials b) water must be transported and ceases to be economically viable and c) peak ecological water. Peak ecological water is a much more immediate concern, basically, "[the] point of water use that causes serious or irreversible ecological damage—and eventually reduces the human and social welfare provided by water."

So while we won't ever really run out of water, we can use it and pollute it to the point that its benefits to humanity are consumed.

If you sit on a burrito the burrito still exists, but not in an edible state.*** Thus it is with water. We can use it to the point of unusability.

This post is exceedingly long already, so I'll tie it up with my favorite slide from the presentation
"The water 'crisis' is not the result of a lack of water, resources, money, or brains. It is the result of failing to use water, resources, money, and brains effectively."*

[I'm not sure how to cite a powerpoint on a blog, or if you even need to. But just in case:
* Meena Palaiappan Presentation to Utah APA, 11/6/2008
**Western Resource Advocates
***That is all me]

The Cart

Now, I don't mean to get all sentimental, but I had kind of a big day last week. The 29th was my very first public meeting as a planner.

I have been to public meetings, planning commission meetings, town hall meetings, city council meetings - but I attended them all as a member of the public. This was my first experience from the inside.

As I have mentioned before, my firm is working on a small area plan for the future BRT station at 3500 South and 5600 West. MAX, the 3500 South line, is already operational as a mixed traffic BRT route, with the dedicated right of way and stations under construction. The 5600 West line will be completed as a center running BRT route from 2700 South to 6400 South by 2015.

That means the intersection of 35th and 56th will be one of the best serviced intersections in the Wasatch Front with two high quality transit lines.

Our job is to help the cities along the 56th West route implement land use strategies now that will boost ridership when the line is in place. This meeting was the beginning of a dialogue between West Valley City and the residents of the area to discuss the what the future might look like.

The meeting took the form of a (mild) charette.* We spent the first hour giving the meeting attendees a crash course in transit oriented development planning and an overview of the area, with an explanation of what BRT is. That was followed by a brainstorming session. Everybody was given slips of paper and was asked to write down what they liked/disliked/wanted to see change/etc about the area. The answers ranged from "higher density" to "open space" to "better lighting." We then gave everybody green and red dot stickers so they could vote on the ideas they like or didn't like.

When we had a sense of what the public wanted, our pencil man extrodinare, Greg Haws, started sketching plan view renderings on fodder while the attendees gave suggestions.

We ended up with a couple of good scenario stars, one more office and retail heavy, one more residential heavy.

It was exciting to see maps I had made on the tables and the walls, to see the land use analysis I had done in the presentation. I have to admit, I got a thrill when someone asked a question and the table looked to me, cus I was an official.

There are some things we would have done differently in hindsight, but overall I think it was an effective meeting.

We have another one on the 19th of the month where we will be unveiling our fleshed out scenarios and looking for feedback. Feel free to come.

*Charette is the French word for cart (I think). Way back when, architecture students in France were much like any student today, procrastinators. At the end of the old tyme equivalent of the semester the professors would pull a cart around the school. When the cart came to you, you had to put your project on, completed or not. Students would then walk beside the cart and finish their projects, on the cart.

A modern charette is an intensive brainstorming and work session, where images are drawn up on the spot and at the end there are a series of somewhat fleshed out possible scenarios. A good example of this is the plan for the Cottonwood Mall redevelopment. The plan was created in a little over a week. Planners and architects stared with a blank slate, worked nine straight 18 hour days, and finished with the current plan.