Green Jobs in Transit and Passenger Rail
I’ve posted below an introduction and link to a short piece I wrote a while back for the Green Economy Network on possible job creation from the development of transit. A student will be doing some work in this area at the CLC this Summer and we would welcome any input or leads on the topic.
Anyone interested in this area should also look at a good recent paper by Bob Pollin and Dean Baker looking (inter alia) at potential job creation from the further development of transit in the US.
http://www.peri.umass.edu/236/hash/a6c924ab94/publication/392/
“A major medium- to long-term government investment in public transit would make a significant contribution to reduction of Canada’s greenhouse gas emissions, and would also create literally tens of thousands of new jobs. Such an investment would also more than pay for itself in narrow economic terms.
Rising energy prices have already promoted greater use of public transit in Canada in recent years, with a 20% increase to 1.82 billion trips per year between 2003 and 2008.1 However, Canada is one of very few advanced industrial countries which lacks a national transit strategy, and federal investments fall far short of what is needed to build an optimal transit infrastructure in major urban centres. On top of low investment, very heavy reliance on passenger fares to finance operating costs compared to other countries works against the optimal development of public transit….