Roads: driving development or deforestation?

EurActiv: Roads in the tropics often go hand in hand with economic development. But the day before the International Day of Forests (21 March), an MEP and a number of scientists called for a response to the role they play in deforestation.

Ways of measuring forest destruction are becoming increasingly sophisticated. This week, an initiative from Mongabay, an environmental publication, and NASA’s Ames Research Center, won the prestigious Katerva Award for a Global Forest Disturbance Alert System to map the destruction of forests, on a quarterly basis.

The system uses satellite imagery to detect deforestation when it occurs, so that measures can be taken to investigate it before it expands. Similarly, satellite images have revealed the way forests can deplete soon after the construction of a road nearby.

“95% of forest loss occurs within 50 km of a road. Scientific reports and satellite imagery have demonstrated road building is a major driver of deforestation, from the Amazon to Indonesian and Congo Basin forests,” said Kriton Arsenis, a Greek MEP affiliated with the Socialists and Democrats in the European Parliament....

A dirt road in Brazil, shot by Figueirao, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license 

UK floods: raise roads and redesign houses, engineers say

Jessica Aldred in the Guardian (UK): Houses should be redesigned, roads raised and tidal lagoons built that generate energy to reduce the impact of flooding in the UK, according to a panel of senior engineers and academics. Recent flooding has affected large parts of southern England in the UK's wettest winter on record – particularly the Somerset Levels and Thames valley, resulting in more than 5,000 homes and businesses being flooded, major road and rail networks disrupted, and a political row over who is to blame.

"In some senses we're still in a mode of 'discovery by disaster'," said Prof Jim Hall, professor of climate and environmental risks and director of the Environmental Change Institute at Oxford University, said at a briefing held in London by the Science Media Centre and Royal Academy of Engineering. "With the exception of rail infrastructure, critical national infrastructure has come through this latest set of floods pretty well, but adapting to changing climate risk is still very much a work in progress."

David Rooke, executive director of flood and coastal risk management at the Environment Agency, said the organisation was still in "operational mode" with high tides and more rain forecast for this weekend, and still-rising groundwater levels. "No government across the world can protect all people, in all property from all flooding – but we will do all we can to minimise impact."

Prof Roger Falconer, professor of water management and director of the hydro-environmental research centre at Cardiff University, said the UK should be following the examples of other countries in designing houses that could cope with increased flooding.

"In this country we talk about putting houses on stilts and following the Netherlands. But I think it would be better if we turned and looked at the United States and countries with high tropical storms like Malaysia," he said, describing houses that have a garage and playroom in the basement and living areas on the upper floors....

Extremely flooded River Stour at Ilford Bridge, Bournemouth, in Dorset, shot by Tazbo123, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license

Study of Brazilian Amazon shows 50,000 km of road was built in just three years

Terra Daily via SPX: Although road-building is a major contributor to deforestation and habitat loss, the way in which road networks develop is still poorly understood. A new study is among the first to measure the number of roads built in a rainforest ecosystem over an extended period of time.

It was published this month in the journal Regional Environmental Change by researchers including two Life Scientists from Imperial College London. They say studies like this will help combat future deforestation by allowing for more accurate predictions of where it might occur.

Even though roads often occupy less than 2 per cent of a country's land surface, they may have an ecological impact on an area up to ten times as large. These indirect effects can include changes in air and soil temperature and moisture, as well as restrictions on the movement of animals.

Research co-author Dr Rob Ewers, of Imperial's Department of Life Sciences, said: "Knowing where the roads are and the speed at which they are built is key to predicting deforestation. A number of models currently exist which rely on this knowledge, but there are no good studies of how quickly roads get built and where they go when they are built. An understanding of road networks is the big missing gap in our ability to predict the future of this region."...

The BR-174 in Roirama, Brazil, shot by Agencia CNT de Noticias, Wikimedia Commons via Flickr, under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license 

US roads, airports unready for extreme weather

Joan Lowy in the San Francisco Chronicle via the Associated Press: The nation's lifelines — its roads, airports, railways and transit systems — are getting hammered by extreme weather beyond what their builders imagined, leaving states and cities searching for ways to brace for more catastrophes like Superstorm Sandy.

Even as they prepare for a new normal of intense rain, historic floods and record heat waves, some transportation planners find it too politically sensitive to say aloud the source of their weather worries: climate change.

Political differences are on the minds of the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials, whose advice on the design and maintenance of roads and bridges is closely followed by states. The association recently changed the name of its Climate Change Steering Committee to the less controversial Sustainable Transportation, Energy Infrastructure and Climate Solutions Steering Committee.

Still, there is a recognition that the association's guidance will need to be updated to reflect the new realities of global warming. "There is a whole series of standards that are going to have to be revisited in light of the change in climate that is coming at us," said John Horsley, the association's executive director.

In the latest and most severe example, Superstorm Sandy inflicted the worst damage to the New York subway system in its 108-year history, halted Amtrak and commuter train service to the city for days, and forced cancellation of thousands of airline flights at airports in New York, New Jersey and Philadelphia....

Tail nicked by the wind.... The Space Shuttle Enterprise damaged, at the aircraft carrier Enterprise, not far from the old headquarters of Carbon Based, shot by or Rondiel, Wikiimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license

Making transport a driver for development in Africa

AlphaGalileo via York University: A new report by a panel of international experts highlights policies to improve air quality road safety and congestion, supporting African development. Transport is playing a big role in delivering economic development to Africa. But as the demand for transport grows and cities expand, policy makers need to tackle transport challenges to make sure that all parts of society can benefit from this central driver of jobs and growth.

“Transport policies in Africa are of critical importance to the delivery of sustainable cities, healthy citizens and poverty eradication,” says Dr Dieter Schwela from Stockholm Environment Institute at the University of York. “This new report synthesizes knowledge on current trends, key issues and challenges facing policy makers and provides examples of best practice and case studies from African countries and internationally.”

Road safety is extremely poor compared with the rest of the world with Africa accounting for over 10 per cent of global road fatalities.  As urban populations in Sub Saharan African countries continue to expand at unprecedented rates, traffic congestion is increasing with some cities approaching gridlock.

Urban air and noise pollution is also worsening, particularly as result of the increase in numbers of vehicles and their associated emissions. Lack of air quality monitoring, emission standards and regulatory procedures exacerbate the problems. This has serious implications in terms of health and equity as well as thwarting economic development. Rapidly rising greenhouse gas emissions from the transport sector are also a cause for concern....

A road in Mauritania, shot by Boulmaouahibe, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license

Climate-proofing roads

IRIN: Disaster reduction experts have been calling on countries to “climate-proof” infrastructure like roads, but until now, there have been no studies showing the scale or importance of these interventions.

A recent study by the Intergovernmental Group of Twenty-Four says developing countries will have to spend about US$200-300 billion per year by 2020 to construct public infrastructure - like bridges, power supplies and roads - that are not only environmentally friendly but can also withstand extreme changes in temperature and rainfall.

The study, co-authored by economist Nicholas Stern, says developing countries are spending $0.8-0.9 trillion per year on infrastructure, the majority of which is financed by domestic budgets. To keep up with population growth, cover existing gaps, and make infrastructure climate-resilient as well, countries will have to spend a total of $1.8-2.3 trillion per year by 2020.

A good road network, the basis of most infrastructures, is critical for the development of any country. Roads are essential to trade, transportation, and the provision of food, healthcare and education, promoting economic growth at every level.

Researchers from the Joint Program on the Science and Policy of Global Change, at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, have joined hands with the United Nations University-World Institute for Development Economics Research (UNU-WIDER) to take a closer look at how climate change could affect roads in the developing world, using Mozambique as an example.  Food supply in Mozambique is already constrained by the lack of adequate roads linking the big commercial farms in the north to markets in the south. Climate change threatens what roads exist with frequent and intense flooding and high temperatures, researchers said....

A road in Mozambique, shot by Stig Nygaard, Wikimedia Commons via Flickr, under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license

Heat wave breaks temperature record in Twin Cities, buckles pavement on I-94

Andy Rathbun in the Pioneer Press at TwinCities.com: The season's first heat wave sent temperatures soaring into record territory Monday afternoon and buckled pavement on Interstate 94 in Minneapolis. The pavement failure on westbound I-94 at Lowry Avenue blocked three lanes of traffic and created major slowdowns. The problem started a little after 1:30 p.m. and continued into the evening rush hour as repairs were made, according to the Minnesota Department of Transportation.

Pavement blowouts were reported at 21 locations on metro highways, including seven on I-94 between the Lowry Tunnel in Minneapolis and Interstate 694. The National Weather Service office in Chanhassen issued an excessive heat warning for Hennepin and Ramsey counties. The warning began at 3 p.m. Monday and extends to 7 a.m. Wednesday.

The high temperature in the Twin Cities hit a record 97 degrees at 4:43 p.m. Monday. The old record of 95 was set in both 1979 and 1987….

A cooler moment on I-94 in Minneapolis, shot by AlexiusHoratius, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license

Danger to Louisiana coastal roads

Kathrine Schmidt in the Daily Comet (LaFourche Parish, Louisiana): Global warming could pose a threat to Port Fourchon and the roads that serve it, according to transportation advocates and port officials. The La. 1 Coalition, a group that has long pushed for major improvements to the road that connects Fourchon to the rest of the state, has asked scientists with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to work up a rough calculation of how sea-level rise would affect the highway, which is increasingly surrounded by encroaching water from the Gulf of Mexico.

Their conclusion: With a conservative estimate of sea-level rise and erosion, in the next 20 years La. 1 will be flooding up to 30 times a year just from high tides, cutting off access to the trucks that supply the offshore industry and for residents of Grand Isle, Louisiana's only inhabited barrier island.

“It won't just affect Port Fourchon,” said Chett Chiasson, executive director of the port. “It's affecting every coastal community throughout the world. If in fact sea-level rise is a reality, which it looks like it is, we're certainly going to have to combat that.”

With several attempts frustrated to get $300 million in federal money to complete the next stretch of the new La. 1 between Leeville and Golden Meadow, lobbyists for the transportation improvements aim to try a different tack. Their hope is the environmentally minded Obama administration may be more responsive to an application in the context of a global environmental issue, said Henri Boulet, a lobbyist for the coalition….

Soldiers of the Louisiana National Guard's 527th and 769th Engineer Battalions put together a wall of sand-filled Hesco Concertainer units in Port Fouchon, La., to help keep oil-tainted water from reaching Bay Champagne, May 21 2010. Shot by Senior Airman Jeffrey Barone