TCI Regional Policy Design Stakeholder Submissions

We need to reduce greenhouse gas on every front to create an environment to meet the basic needs of clean air, pure water, viable soil for plant life and food supply, and David the sustainability of all life forms that enrich life on Earth. Sound transportation strategies, building strategies, community planning strategies, etc. designed to support the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions in order to achieve these objectives for a healthful future for the generations to come.

Alternative fuel vehicles, including hydrogen fuel cell electric vehicles, will play an important role in decreasing transportation CO2 emissions in the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic. Ensuring access to reliable and affordable hydrogen fueling infrastructure will play a key role in supporting consumer adoption of fuel cell electric vehicles, thereby reducing CO2.

To that end, TMNA supports efforts by TCI to ensure that the Reference Case accurately represents the need for this fueling infrastructure. NEMS’ fuel availability methodology is based on the historical relationship between vehicle stock and refueling stations. However, given the historical shortfall in hydrogen refueling stations, a Reference Case based on this historical relationship could lead to further underinvestment in hydrogen stations.

If improved to address this problem, NEMS could be used as a tool to assist in projecting how much overall hydrogen infrastructure will be needed to support a growing population of fuel cell vehicles in the TCI Regions, and this infrastructure requirement could be communicated to the states as part of investment planning in infrastructure. It should be noted, however, that hydrogen infrastructure works best when taking into account travel patterns, local vehicle adoption, station redundancy, etc., rather than distributed evenly across all regions. Industry can provide the best guidance for specific placement and number of hydrogen stations needed. It should also be noted that hydrogen stations currently require up to 2 years from planning to opening in order to find land, obtain permits, and complete construction.

Attached are Toyota's comments regarding the TCI Draft MOU. Please let us know if you have any questions. Kind regards.

My name is Keonte and I'm an Intern for Transport Hartford at the Center for Latino Progress. I attend A.I Prince Tech as a 12th grader and I live in Hartford. The Transportation & Climate Initiative (TCI) is a very important matter, it can play a big role in our future. TCI should be talked about amongst younger age groups because our future should be safe from pollutants that encourage global warming. To accomplish this, TCI is a way for states to work together, developing policies to reduce carbon emission and deliver better transportation systems. Encouraging this could better our air quality. Hartford has lots of pollution from the highways and car traffic, which has led to high asthma rates in my community.

Public health investments from TCI money could reduce those high rates. considering a large number of kids that go to the middle school are,
TCI investments can support more crossing guards throughout the streets as well as enforcing the stop signs more. Cars tend to speed; this is a safety issue that can cause a lot of damage.
THA has organized workshops and meetings to discuss these matters. I want to see more transit-oriented development in communities and more people being able to use the bus in their area without worrying about how to get to where they are going. We also need a better traveling system that has more clean energy, reducing carbon emissions. TCI is meant to make people feel safe and secure me personally. I support it cause it can be a benefit to everyone, old or young taking a change now can positively change our future for others to come.

My name is Shaniya Davies. I go to Weaver High School in Hartford Connecticut and I'm an intern with the Transport Hartford Academy. I've been researching the Transportation Climate Initiative (TCI), a regional effort to reduce pollution, improve transportation, and develop clean energy. We want to see more people care about climate change.

Last summer, our organization surveyed over 800 people who live and work in CT who believe our state should adopt TCI. Transportation is a major contributor to greenhouse gas emissions, mostly because of how much we drive cars - so we need better options. For TCI’s investments, 92% of our survey respondents want to see CT Improving existing public transportation, including buses, trains, and dial a ride, while 91% said expanding /Improving sidewalks and bike lanes to provide safe alternatives to driving should be spending priorities.

As a teenager with asthma who gets around mostly by walking and taking the bus, public health, walking safety, and transit service are big concerns that TCI investments can help us address. Many people in my community have health issues in their systems.

I have asthma and there is too much pollution. Asthma is a serious thing to deal with people who could have asthma attacks. They could be low on breathing. It could cause death on somebody. I don't wanna risk falling in the middle of the street or getting run over by a car. TCI will promote sustainability and healthy/livable communities. Should have benefits and more effort in the environment by working together and making more increase and do better. It should change all stages of transportation, including people who take the bus in making decisions planning, design, and construction. We can have better data analysis to measure resources, benefits, and outcomes of a community.

Like for some people that have experience from taking the bus. For example I take the bus and the bus schedules don't even be right i would have to sit in the cold to wait for the bus. I was going to work by taking the bus and i waited for almost an hour for the bus come and i was late to work.So i would have to take the bus earlier than what i usually do so i wouldn’t be late and end up getting in trouble from my job, They Should have better routes and access,time management lets others know the exact time instead of waiting for a certain amount of time for the bus to arrive at the stop or destination.

Sidewalks should look better so people can walk without walking into cracks, holes, and more things on the ground. This is important for public health, cutting pollution, helping my community.

We know that in order to make our contribution to mitigating climate change, we need to start reducing our dependence on gasoline and diesel powered vehicles. This is not something that can occur overnight. TCI will allow participating states to take a tax from sales of fossil fuels and use that to invest in alternatives that are greener - rail, buses, and bike/pedestrian infrastructure. These investments will benefit us in other ways as well - improving bus transit, especially around our cities, will provide more options for working class people without cars, as well as for middle class people who might choose to leave their car home, but currently lack viable options. A shift away from private cars will relieve congestion in our towns. Building bike/ped infrastructure will make our streets safer for all.

The Transport Hartford Academy has been sharing a statewide survey on the topic of reducing greenhouse gas emissions from the transportation sector with those that live and/or work in Connecticut. The survey began on Oct 1st and will close on Oct 29th. The survey is being shared well beyond the network of environmental advocates. For example, AAA will be sharing the survey with Connecticut members. The survey has also been shared widely across city and town social media discussion groups. The survey includes home and work zip code information, and intentional outreach is being focused on areas of the state that do not have many responses. The survey currently underrepresents low-income, younger age groups, and people of color relative to their share of the state’s demographic. Intentional outreach is being focused on those groups and their responses could be considered separately to home in on equity issues.

Halfway through the survey, the results are quite interesting. There are clear preferences in Connecticut for which TCI revenue investments and complementary policies have the most support. Here are a few overall responses pulled from a 10/15 snapshot  65% Strongly Support and 18% Support a TCI cap-and-invest program in Connecticut. There was also a super-majority of support for dedicating a percentage of TCI revenue to overburdened and underserved communities and environmental justice projects.

Connecticut Survey Link – www.tinyurl.com/tci19survey

Live, Snapshot of Survey Results (these results update automatically until the survey closes on Oct 29th)
- Demographics, awareness, and support of TCI – https://centerlatino.wufoo.com/reports/transportation-climate-initiative-report-1/
- Support for potential TCI investments - https://centerlatino.wufoo.com/reports/transportation-climate-initiative-report-2/
- Support for potential complementary policies - https://centerlatino.wufoo.com/reports/transportation-climate-initiative-report-3/
- Survey comments on revenue investment and complementary policies - https://centerlatino.wufoo.com/reports/transportation-climate-initiative-report-4/

We believe strongly that these survey results (after the survey closes on Oct 29th) should be used to help shape Connecticut's approach to a politically viable and publicly supported state framework to the Transportation Climate Initiative. If similar or identical surveys were delivered in partner states, their results could be combined to set the most successful regional framework for TCI and the complementary policies.

Beyond the information gathered from the survey, sharing the survey widely across the state has a civic engagement and educational benefit. In the 10/15 snapshot 50% of respondents knew nothing at all about the Transportation Climate Initiative. 40% or respondents didn't know that the transportation sector was the state (and the region's) largest contributor to emissions.

The transportation sector is currently responsible for more than 40 percent of climate-changing greenhouse gas emissions in the region, and soot and smog from cars and trucks are major contributors to lung disease and other health problems region-wide, particularly in low income communities. Preliminary modeling estimates that by 2032, the proposed program could yield monetized annual public health benefits of as much as $10 billion, including over 1,000 fewer premature deaths, and over 1,300 fewer asthma symptoms annually region-wide, among other safety and health benefits.
The associated auction of pollution allowances under the proposal is projected to generate up to nearly $7 billion annually that participating jurisdictions could invest in solutions to further reduce pollution and to improve transportation choices for rural, urban and suburban communities. Each participating jurisdiction will decide how to invest the auction proceeds.

You cannot clean up the air by taking money from the drivers of relatively clean cars and diverting it to pay for trains and buses that generate more pollution per unit of productivity (passenger miles) than the cars. If you really want to reduce pollution, you need to reduce congestion. Clearly, buses and trains don’t lower highway congestion. The technology exists today to reduce congestion AND enhance personal mobility, without killing the economy. The best tool in our toolbox is congestion pricing.

https://www.concordmonitor.com/Trains-and-clean-air-29076184