Life Without Cars

Life Without Cars?

Was it Utopia or nightmare? The plan shocked state governments and businessmen alike. In announcing a sweeping new series of antipollution regulations last week, the Environmental Protection Agency outlined a fundamental, even traumatic change in an American culture that has grown deeply --and as the EPA believes, dangerously --dependent upon the automobile.

Gas would be rationed in some areas. Parking in major cities would be severely curtailed. New exhaust-control devices, although technically far from perfect, would be required on old as well as new cars. Most startlingly, the EPA proposals suggested that by 1977, limits on gasoline sales could force most automobiles off the streets of Los Angeles, a city almost totally dependent upon the internal combustion engine. The thrust of the proposed new controls would be to make it increasingly difficult for Americans to add their cars' pollution to the gases that already hover over the nation's major cities. Said acting EPA Administrator Robert Fri:

"We are basically attacking the problem by asking people to change their habits, their longstanding intimate relation with the private automobile."

Among the EPA proposals:

> In the New Jersey suburbs of New York City, the plan could theoretically bring about a 60% reduction in auto traffic, a limit on motorcycle use, and a freeze on new parking facilities.

> In Boston, street parking would be banned in the central business-region. A $5-a-day surcharge would be imposed at parking lots. Vehicles would be prohibited in some downtown areas.

> In New York City, which drew up its own standards, taxi cruising would be sharply reduced, as would parking, both on-street and off. Exclusive bus lanes would be created to encourage a switch to mass transportation.

Truck deliveries would be forbidden except at night. New tolls would be imposed on all East River and Harlem River bridges that now are free.

> In Minneapolis, downtown parking would be prohibited and replaced by fringe parking on the outskirts of the city, with shuttle bus service to the business district.

> In Pittsburgh and Philadelphia, special bus lanes would be established.

Parking downtown would be restricted, along with gasoline sales.

The other cities cited by the EPA were Springfield, Mass.; Indianapolis; Camden and Trenton, N.J.; Cincinnati, Dayton, Toledo; El Paso, Austin and Waco, Corpus Christi, Houston-Galveston, San Antonio and Dallas-Fort Worth. These areas, although somewhat cleaner, would be subject to similar measures.

In moving so boldly, EPA was essentially saying that the states themselves had not moved boldly enough.

Under the Clean Air Act passed in 1970, urban areas that could not meet national clean-air standards,* designed to protect human health, were told to propose cleanup plans that would meet these standards by 1975. Only a handful of states submitted adequate programs, in the opinion of the EPA. Of the urban areas cited last week, the only city to have its own plan accepted was New York; the other 18 flunked, or did not submit plans, and were assigned compliance schedules by the agency.

In the next few weeks, proposals will be published for more cities, including Washington, D.C., San Francisco, San Diego, and Fairbanks, Alaska.

Some will be able to meet national standards without new controls.

Immediately, the EPA announcement touched off protests nationwide --both from those whose businesses would be hurt by changing transportation patterns and from those who are responsible for enforcing the changes.

Richard Sullivan, New Jersey's Commissioner of Environmental Protection, said the federal plan was unworkable and that his department would draw up "more realistic" proposals. The transportation assistant to Boston Mayor Kevin White described various requirements as "too drastic," "unenforceable" and "unfeasible."

Wry Comment. Fri, whose agency drew up the plans in a literal interpretation of the Clean Air Act, realized that scheduled public hearings will produce considerable modifications before the proposals become law on Aug. 15. "I'm not sure," Fri said wryly, "these are the results Congress intended."

Anticipating the protests that quickly followed his press conference in Washington, he indicated that he would be willing to go to the Hill on behalf of the cities that will be hit hardest. If some of the plans appear to be totally unrealistic because of the economic and social disruptions involved, the agency will go to Congress for what one EPA official termed "appropriate solutions."

At the same time, the agency officials clearly feel that if cities are forced to begin implementing strong programs now, there will be more time to change them later on.

A number of cities have understandably begun to clamor for deadline extensions, and the EPA seems willing to relent in the tougher cases. The Government, with the approval of Congress, plans to grant two-year grace periods for Newark, Camden, Los Angeles, Boston and Houston, and one year for San Antonio, Philadelphia and Pittsburgh. The strongest argument for the extra time is the unavailability of efficient, durable hardware to reduce emissions. What is important in the end, Fri maintains, is that "two and a half years after the Clean Air Act became law, we are facing up for the first time to the most profound implications of that law."

Clearly there will be negotiation and compromise in the coming months. EPA is fully aware that alternative transportation systems are inadequate in most cities. At the moment, for example, it is inconceivable that Los Angeles could function without the automobile. As much as anything, last week's bureaucratic barrage may have been sent up simply to gain everyone's attention. In that, it was certainly successful.

*These standards place limits upon the concentration of such automotive emissions as carbon monoxide, hydrocarbons and nitrogen oxides.

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