I’m at my fave cafe again, reading SPUR’s report on the future of the Bay Area’s water supply, and I remember…

Freshman year at ucsd, holy shit I was so surprised and disgusted with the girls on my floor’s water usage.

most girls were from socal, LA area. and they’d be brushing their teeth or washing their face with both hands, and THEY’D LEAVE THE TAP RUNNING. while they aren’t even touching the running water.

so if I were there I’d turn it off for them.

one girl from LA said it’s totally okay because we’re not going to run out of water—in the future there would be desalination so we can use ocean water.

holy f—- you serious
that shit is gonna be hella expensive. It’s way cheaper and easier to conserve water now so it wouldn’t be as difficult and costly to meet demand in the future, esp. with the effects of climate change.

it only takes a quick flick of the wrist to turn the water off!!

and then especially in socal, where water is supplied from faraway norcal and the colorado river.

I’d never want to live in dorms again and be daily pissed off by the unawarely and unashamedly bad behavior of others.

wish there was more environmental education in early schooling to prevent behavior like this. I know I’m kinda privileged in that I attended an elementary school named after John Muir, with a creek in the back, learning about composting, etc.. Other schools all over need to teach more about nature—where our food comes from, where our water comes from.. then we wouldn’t have these college kids with bad, wasteful habits that they continue to bring along into adulthood.

jamisonwieser:

I woke up this morning to a news report that the 15% of Californians would likely vote against the water bond based on the $11.1 billion price tag, though a majority would be willing to vote for a cheaper bond.

Likewise the study found a majority of Californians now oppose the $58 billion California High-Speed Rail project.

Both the water project and the High-speed rail line don’t seem that expensive to me given the importance of safe, clean drinking water and the alternative to high-speed rail is three times as much on roads that still couldn’t carry the capacity.

And that’s the thing that gets a lot of the opposition is about big numbers and not the actual merits, relative costs and the scale of these mega-projects.

High-speed rail service to Disneyland will be the end result of hundreds of interconnected projects. Many are already underway and will start paying off in other ways long before the last spike is driven.

Along the Peninsula, HSR will share the Caltrain corridor and this week the CA High-Speed Rail Authority approved its share of electrification funding.

The old diesel trains could be ditched by 2019 in favor of all-electric propulsion according to Caltrain’s Jayme Ackemann. …

Caltrain modernization, which boasts a cleaner approach to travel, will arrive a decade before high-speed rail service to Los Angeles becomes a reality.

Maybe we just need to reframe the costs for statewide projects. $0.058 trillion looks a lot smaller than $58 billion.

Bicycle boulevards save lives. Bioswales protect our environment. Both make Portland’s neighborhoods safer, cleaner and greener. And today, the Portland City Council will vote on making smart investments in both.

In 2007, I shepherded passage through Portland City Council of the nationally recognized Green Streets Plan. Green streets reduce the amount of rain that goes into Portland’s sewer and stormwater treatment system. They involve planted bioswales that are built on neighborhood streets where they slow or divert traffic. The upshot: Green streets manage stormwater runoff, reducing the need for expensive sewer expansions. 

They help prevent sewer backups. And they provide the infrastructure needed to calm traffic on quiet streets that serve as low-stress bicycle boulevards…

by Mayor Sam Adams. oregonlive 17.03.13.