In a February survey, 73 percent of Americans said they feel they have no choice but to drive as much as they do. Studies have found that owning a car is more important in getting and holding a job than a GED diploma. Americans need convenient, secure transit choices other than driving alone in gasoline powered cars. This package of systemic transit policy upgrades recommended by the non-partisan Mobility Choice Coalition realigns a mixture of federal, state, and local policies to incentivize commuter choices while reducing oil consumption and quelling nuisances such as traffic jams.

<div id="__ss_5086983" style="width: 477px">Mobility choice <div style="padding: 5px 0 12px">View more documents from transportsdufutur.</div> </div> <p style="text-align: justify">The package includes five measures to remove the perverse incentives that encourage gasoline use in current policies: Allocating transit dollars to optimize oil savings, smart traffic management, HOT lanes and congestion pricing, insurance choice rather than “one-size-fits-all,” and liberalizing local land development rules. It also includes measures to expand the transit options for everyone, including: increasing vanpool, car pool, and private commute options, expanding inter-city rail when cost-effective, and providing transit vouchers to low income households.
</p> <p style="text-align: justify"> Lisa Margonelli, Director, Energy Policy Initiative New America Foundation, present STRONG project. STRONG (Secure Transportation Reducing Oil Needs Gradually) is a menu of policies to reduce US oil demand by more than 3 million barrels a day by 2020, without using new technology, vehicles, or fuels. STRONG America will result in large savings in oil, money, pollution, and carbon emissions by 2020, while reducing petroleum-intensive hassles like traffic jams. By 2020 STRONG’s gas savings alone could steer at least $347 million dollars a day to sectors other than oil in the US economy (if gas were $2.75/gallon). Importantly, STRONG gives Americans the power to decide how they commute, as well as what they drive by providing guaranteed loans for very efficient vehicles.  </p> <p style="text-align: justify">By 2020, the EIA projects that Americans will consume 15 million barrels of oil per day through transportation. Of that, we will produce only 6 million barrels domestically, with more than a third of those projected to come from drilling in deep water in the Gulf of Mexico. Economically, oil acts as a sponge in the US economy, as rising gas prices soak up disposable income. On May 11, 2010, for example, Americans spent $1.1 billion on gasoline–$239 million more than on the same day a year before, when gas was 62 cents cheaper per gallon. On a household level, lack of transit options means that the average family of four pays more to own and fuel a car than for either taxes or health care.</p> <p style="text-align: justify">Americans tend to believe that our dependency on oil and lack of control over gasoline spending is inevitable until new technology and fuels are available. But in fact, a significant quantity of our consumption is the result of perverse incentives and a stifling of other transportation options that are grandfathered into policies at the federal, state, and local level. Relatively simple fixes for broken polices, coupled with a plan to make transit less fuel intensive and help middle class families get to work can make the American economy more secure at both the national and household level.  </p>https://gabrielplassat.github.io/transportsdufutur/2010/08/for-a-strong-america-some-lessons-for-europe.htmlfor-a-strong-america-some-lessons-for-europe