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2024 was certainly a strange year across the state. California is held up as a model for fighting climate change and promoting sustainable transportation modes, but our reporting shows that the state is still struggling to meet its own lofty rhetoric. Streetsblog’s Melanie Curry has been a leading voice exposing this climate hypocrisy and SBCA’s work will be even more critical in the future as California attempts to provide alternative leadership to that of the incoming Trump Administration.
The state’s transportation commission talks a good talk on active transportation, but continues to approve costly and wasteful highway widening programs.
Governor Gavin Newsom himself led the charge to dramatically reduce California’s main funding program for safe streets, the Active Transportation Program. The legislature rejected the cuts, but the current program still ended up with a mere sliver of funding compared to previous years - and especially compared to highway investments.
The state’s high-speed rail program has been making only slow progress because of uneven leadership from the legislature and governor’s offices. And now state leaders are hoping that hydrogen-powered trains, an unproven, untested, and potentially unusable technology, will be a magic bullet.
The news is not all bad. Yesterday, the state Air Resources Board announced it was finally launching its statewide e-bike incentive program, and some good legislation became law - including the Complete Streets Bill. The California Bike Summit was an inspiring gathering of like-minded advocates.
And Streetsblog loved keeping you up-to-date on the many hot takes about vehicle miles traveled and how (and why) the state measures it.
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