Taking care in transportation

With oil at a record $61.62 a barrel today, perhaps it's appropriate to look at ways to make our oil go further, whether we are making personal or business decisions. With talk about human-generated climate change, perhaps it's time to think of ways to reduce our impact on the earth.

Here are some interesting links I found:

• What can YOU do about climate change? from the Climate Action Network Europe (click on Transport). Interestingly, the calculation results at the end indicate that a bus ("coach") may pollute less than a train in some cases, which surprised me. The CAN Web site has lots of information, as well as links to their offices in other parts of the world.
  
• Mobility and environment, a page by Francesco Mondada listing energy and time requirements for various modes of transportation, plus his personal choice for local transportation needs.
  
• Train vs Plane vs Car, Donald McBride's comparison of the three modes, complete with footnotes so you can check out the data.
  

This isn't an indictment of any one mode of transportation; it is a bit of data to help us think about how we get places. I've also not vetted the numbers, so corrections and better references are welcome. It's certainly clear that a bus carrying 40 people is more efficient than the same bus with only 2 passengers, so keep all this in perspective. Incidentally, I'm rediscovering the pleasures of walking or riding the bus instead of driving and parking.