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Information Swimming

Gas prices

All this talk about one-ways may be moot. It's time to prepare for gas to cost $5 per gallon, even despite some recent good news (easing prices and finding a new oil field in the gulf).

As late as 1995, gas prices averaged $1.10 per gallon. This year, they are averging $2.65 per gallon. That is a 140% increase. Gas prices have been very erratic in recent years, but have been increasing at an average rate of about 8% per year since 1995. At that rate, gas will cost over $5 per gallon in just 9 years. Even if it takes 15 years, it's not as far away as it may seem.

You often hear people refer to historic gas prices in "today's dollars", and how, really, gas isn't that expensive when adjusted for inflation. 2006 is proving to be high even compared to historic highs, and I know gas prices have easily outpaced inflation since 1995. I also know wages (certainly the minimum wage) have not increased 140% since 1995. It's also a chicken-and-the-egg situation: what percentage of our total inflation is simply due to rising gas prices? Shipping costs are part of almost every product.

I don't expect gas prices to increase at 15%+ as they have in recent years, but the trend is clear. There are 1.3 billion Chinese that are suddenly entering the car market. Just in the city of Beijing, there are 1,000 new cars added to the roads each day, and something like 400 used cars are sold there each day. I can only imagine the numbers for China as a whole. Demand for gas is only going to increase, and much faster than production will.

Cutting consumption is the best way to curb gas prices. Drilling in Alaska and this new field in the Gulf may provide temporary releif, but will not provide enough gas to satisfy the USA at our current level PLUS the billion cars China will eventually have. The beauty about cutting consumption is that it works to lower prices no matter whether the fuel is USA gasoline, Saudi gasoline, ethanol, biodiesel, or anything else. We may as well start now because someday we may not have a choice.

Year	Avg Price	% Change
1990	$1.30	---
1991	$1.10	-15.5%
1992	$1.09	-1.1%
1993	$1.07	-1.8%
1994	$1.07	0.4%
1995	$1.10	2.9%
1996	$1.19	8.0%
1997	$1.19	-0.3%
1998	$1.02	-14.5%
1999	$1.12	9.8%
2000	$1.46	31.0%
2001	$1.38	-5.4%
2002	$1.31	-5.1%
2003	$1.52	15.5%
2004	$1.81	19.5%
2005	$2.24	23.6%
2006	$2.65	18.3%

Here is the source for the data:
EIA.DOE.gov - Retail Gasoline Historical Prices

A link showing gas prices adjusted for inflation:
zFacts.com - Current gas prices and price history

This will be my last post for a while. I'm getting into a "busy time". I will still occasionally comment on other local blogs, and, who knows, maybe even have a guest post or two if they are so kind.

One-way streets (again)

I swear, this is my last post about one-way streets for a while. Here is an idea regarding the idea floating around to change Welcome Way/Harrison/Brady from one-ways to two-ways. Please keep in mind that I am not a traffic engineer.

I've thought about this one a lot because I commute it every day. I just don't see how this will get done without completely tearing up Welcome Way and re-routing it. It's going to cost a fortune. Here is one idea that might work and be a little cheaper: make Welcome Way/Harrison the "express" and Brady St. the "local". Access to the "express" would be more limited, i.e. turning many of the small residential streets into cul-de-sacs, and only putting lights at the major intersections. The speed limit could be raised to around 45. As the "local", Brady St. would not change and have all the access it does today, but in 2 directions. You'd still have to revamp where Welcome Way splits off from Brady, so that coming into town from I-80, you'd get to choose the local or the express. Coming North on Welcome Way, you'd have to split off onto a ramp and maybe wait at a light to re-join Brady and ahead back to I-80. I hope you can picture that. One drawback is the idea of sitting at a light when you are supposed to be on the "express", but then again, I'm trying to imagine a way to do this without building an entire interchange out there.

Of course, some of the businesses on Harrison would be against this if access were limited to their stores. Some funding may be required to help certain businesses relocate to Brady St., which would be the targeted area for commercial development. I know, it just makes the project more expensive, but this project is going to be expensive no matter how you slice it.

I think this idea might work OK from I-80 to about Duck Creek. Once you get South of there it gets dicey because there are so many residential streets that feed into Harrison. Limiting access to Harrison in those neighborhoods might push more traffic to the vertical side streets, kind of making them a mini-frontage road. Ideally, this frontage-type traffic would almost all be diverted to Brady St, but I guess there is no guarantee. The positive side effect in this trade-off would be that the houses on the horizontal streets may be more attractive since they will now be on a cul-de-sac.

Wanted: Director, Levee Development Corporation

I'm failing to grasp why it's such a big deal that Steve Ahrens might be hired to direct the Levee Development Corporation.

I'm not sure who the other candidates were, but is it Steve's fault if he happened to be the most qualified? I guess not everyone agrees on what "qualified" means in this case, but I still don't see it. Steve was an alderman-at-large and got a big chunk of voters to cast votes for him for mayor not too long ago. Some will say that election outcomes should not play a role in selecting someone for this job, but can it hurt? A large percentage of voters across the city already feel he represents their interests. That's important for a public position like this.

So, who should be hired instead? Someone from the private sector? That would go over even worse with these people. As soon as the candidate proposes to "develop" the riverfront in any way that may benefit the "private" sector (i.e. part of the job they were hired to do), they will be accused of having a conflict of interest or being a puppet of DavenportOne. Prediction: this will happen regardless of who is hired.

Generally speaking, the people against hiring Ahrens like to say we need more accountability in our government. Shouldn't we try to hire the best candidate possible? Where's the accountability in that? If the city passes over the best candidate for political reasons, I think holding officials accountable for that decision would be an excellent idea.

I'm going to mention this again

I posted a while back an idea to consider converting 3rd and 4th Streets back to two-way streets, instead of Highway 61, as is currently being considered.

I'm just going to mention a few points, some of which I made in the old post, some I didn't:

• Our current setup is a bit redundant. We already have a major East-West route through downtown-- River Drive, just 2 blocks South of 3rd. Keeping Brady/Harrison as one-ways will provide the major North-South route to downtown.
  
• Two-way streets "seem" more pedestrian-friendly than one-ways, probably because traffic moves slower. Doesn't 2nd St. seem more pedestrian-friendly than 3rd? And isn't the idea to encourage more pedestrian traffic in our downtown?
  
• Converting them may be a way to get some of the success in downtown revitalization to spread North to buildings on 3rd and 4th. It may also better connect the neighborhoods North of 4th to downtown, which currently feel pretty cut-off.
  
• While it won't be free, converting 3rd and 4th Streets will be vastly cheaper than converting Harrison/Brady. 3rd and 4th Streets don't have a "Welcome Way" to untangle.

The Cruncher

Newsweek features an almost-weekly column by Allan Sloan about big business. It's usually quite depressing, because it's almost always about how some corporation was able to find a loophole to avoid paying hundreds of millions in taxes, or about how some merger was engineered specifically to save each company involved giant sums of tax money. A good example is this one: Clear Cutting. The subtitle is: International Paper slashed its tax bill by taking advantage of a little-known loophole. The deal shows how complicated and unfair the IRS code can be. Another good example has a much more straightforward title: The Big Guys Win Again. This is tax reform? Sadly, sometimes you get the feeling that if you could hire a team of Sloans to investigate, you could publish a weekly magazine just on this subject.

This week's column analyzed Warren Buffet's giant gift to the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation: The Truth About Buffet's Tax Bill. I expected to read about how Buffet would be avoiding millions in taxes by giving this gift, but it turns out he really isn't. It seems you can add this to the list of things Buffet as tried to do the right way.

The larger question in the back of my head is: should one group of people (the Gates Foundation) be responsible for disbursing such vast sums of money? They have a mind-boggling fortune now. Will they spend it wisely? Certainly their goals are noble, and they appear to be promoting accountability within their organization. But I'm concerned there could be waste, just with the huge scale of their operation. They are trying to tackle some very difficult problems. What if they fail? The odds are very good that they will fail at least part of the time. The only real tax that Gates and Buffet dodged by making these donations is the estate tax. I'm not saying our government would have spent it any wiser, I just hope this fondation knows what they are doing.

When candidates attack

First, I'd like to thank the Quad City Times for keeping all of their archives open and free. This is what enables bloggers like me to create posts like this.

From this morning's QC Times article "Culver Touts Education at Davenport Stop":
It didn’t take long for Iowa’s Democratic gubernatorial candidate Chet Culver to launch into criticisms of Republican opponent Jim Nussle...

No kidding, what's-his-face critisized the other guy? Oooh, I just can't wait to hear what the other guy has to say about that.

Three quarters of the coverage on these campaigns is about who-attacked-who, or who-attacked-what. I guess it just isn't newsworthy unless someone is critisizing, accusing, or ripping-a-new-one. It's happening both in the Iowa governor's race and the 1st congressional race, and it's downright silly. Why is it only news when one candidate attacks the other? Is it the candidates' fault for employing this strategy? Is it the voters' fault for having short attention spans, thus requiring these attention-grabbers? Is it the media's fault for sensationalizing, and mostly only reporting about attacks?

It's probably all of the above. Ultimately, politicians and the media have to answer to the voters and consumers. It's their job to inform themselves. But the candidates aren't off the hook. Their tactics alienate voters. Who wants to waste their time trying to inform themselves about what is presented as a petty squabble? The media isn't off the hook either. After all, they are the primary means for voters to inform themselves.

I don't know how to break this cycle. Liberals will say we need publicly-funded elections. Then conservatives will attack them for wanting to expand government. Then liberals will accuse conservatives of taking too much private money. Then conservatives will say, "Baaaah!" and liberals will and say, "Raaaah!"

I did a search on the QCTimes archives for all the articles related to the Iowa governor's race since June 15. Most of them were about an attack of some kind. See below. My favorite was "Governor candidates sparring". In other words, there were so many attacks that day that they couldn't fit them all into the headline. Right now, it looks like Nussle is in the lead, 2 rips to 1.

Dems accuse Nussle of forcing consolidation of Iowa school districts
Culver rips Nussle's record on education
Nussle critisizes Culver over pension fund
Governor candidates sparring
Nussle is critical of state livestock confinement rules
Nussle rips bonuses, says state government is top-heavy
Culver critisizes Nussle's vote on stem cells
Nussle rips Culver over mistaken statement
Culver calls for former CIETC member to resign