Transit Doesn't Save Energy

You read that correctly:  mass transit does not save energy.  [Pause to allow the heads to explode.]

From whom did I acquire this heretical knowledge?  Surprisingly, it was Barack Obama's U.S. Department of Energy.  Each year the department publishes its Transportation Energy Data Book, a must-have for every well-stocked personal library.  The 30th Edition was published in June 2011 and Table 2-13 makes for interesting reading.

In 2009 (latest data available) the average amount of energy it took (in British Thermal Units (BTUs) to move a single passenger one mile in an automobile was 3,538.  A city bus took an average of 4,242 to move a single passenger for one mile.

Although it may sound counter-intuitive, it really isn't.  When driving alone, I use 25 percent of my (four-seat) automobile's passenger carrying capacity.  Next time you are out-and-about around 9 p.m., look to see how crowded the city busses are:  are they using 5%? 10% of the capacity.  Bus transit fares so poorly because so many busses are driving around with empty seats.  [Note: I prefer the old spelling of the plural.]

The comparison did not always appear so favorable to the car.  As late as 1990, the advantage was with the bus.  But as cars have gotten more fuel efficient (and the bus has not) automobiles are the more energy efficient transportation mode.

The Cato Institutes's Randal O'Toole (The Antiplanner), has run the numbers in more depth, and developed figures for individual cities.  Randal concludes that our fair metropolis of Minneapolis-St. Paul actually runs its transit system (including rail) at a slight advantage to the automobile, with an average energy requirement of 3,333 BTU per passenger mile.  Of course, this 6 percent advantage over the car is purchased with untold millions in operating subsidies from local, state, and federal taxpayers, and billions of dollars in duplicative infrastructure.  With automobile efficiency growing each year, it's not clear how long the transit advantage will last in Minnesota.

As Randal points out, we would be better off, not with more transit, but getting more people into hybrids and other high efficiency automobiles (Prius, 1,700 BTU/passenger mile).

Since much of the recent rationalization for transit "investment" centers on its potential to solve every problem from dependence on foreign oil to global warming, it is past time for a rethink.  Like so much else in that agenda, it falls apart in the face of mathematics.