driving

Caught at a Red Light
Last night I was biking home from the movie theater when I got caught at one of those red lights that cyclists dread. If you are a cyclist, you know the situation: you're on a small road and need to turn onto a larger road. Unfortunately, the light only changes if a car trips a sensor under the road. Your options now are limited: you can either run the light, wait for a car to trip the sensor, or climb off your bike and push the cross-walk signal (if there is one.) Well, at first I waited for a car to come, to no avail. Nor did the street have a cross-walk signal. My only option was to run the light, but as a law abiding cycl...

High gas prices have had some positive effects, such as increasing the popularity of mass transit, cycling, and compact cars, as well as reducing the amount of miles that Americans drive. However, as the NY...

My friend Carey is a single Portland, Oregon mom with a mortgage, a short commute to a full-time job and two school-age daughters. That translates to a fairly mainstream transportation need. She's also my choice for TreeHugger of the week because as of about two months ago she finally found a way to mothball her Honda and get off the gas roller coaster ride by buying a Zap three-wheeled electric vehicle.

Part of a personal transportation network
Carey is nothing if not pragmatic. She surveyed the small playing field. Of the five electric vehicles currently for sale, Zap seemed the...

The rising gas costs are hurting everyone these days. Public transportation prices are rising because of it; taxi drivers are crying over the climbing fuel prices; and the cost of goods rises everywhere, as shipping and trucking costs are factored into the price of everything we purchase. Truckers are protesting around the world.

A new software called Traffilog could help truck and taxi fleet owners better manage their assets and what drivers are doing when on the road. The company says it can save up to 16% of fuel costs. Traffilog has developed a product for the field ...

With millions of small steps available for people to green their daily lives, it's pretty easy to go burn-out. Should I stop flying? Unplug my cell phone charger? Or buy a Prius? Or a clothesline? Comparing the trade-offs between decisions takes considerable time and effort; you could end up a crispy little mass mumbling on your bamboo rug. But a professor at...

The average car on Australian roads today is only as fuel efficient as its predecessor was back in 1963. That’s the finding of prominent transport researcher Paul Mees, of Melbourne University, who is crunching numbers for the Garnaut climate change review. Paul says that “the current rate of progress in making cars more fuel efficient is no progress at all.” In 1963 the average Australian car went 100km on 11.4 litres of petrol. (That’s 20.6 mpg) They can only manage the same efficiency more than 40 years later.

Gathering data fro...

We already know that John McCain is advocating for a suspension of the federal gas tax for the summer in order to ease the recession. But what about the two democratic candidates? Well, as Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton take their battle for the nomination to Indiana, their increasing desperation for garnering votes has spilled over into the question of whether or not McCain's plan would be a sound one. Clinton, who is behind in the delegate count, supports ...