Salt Lake City, Utah became the fourth municipality in the States to offer free parking to the owners of fuel-efficient vehicles. Salt Lake City is offering free-metered parking to residents who drive vehicles that get 50 miles per gallon, have low emissions or are powered by an alternative fuel. The other American cities that have programs similar to Salt Lake City’s are New Haven, Conn., Fresno, Calif., and Albuquerque, N.M while, Austin, Texas, also recently approved a green vehicle incentive that provides $100 in free parking. [via]
While on the surface, this sounds like a decent idea — reward people making smart enviro decisions — but it could be argued that programs like these are only band-aid solutions to controlling vehicle-related pollution. In fact, it is possible it will create further traffic problems by enoucrgaing car ownership instead of pushing a switch to public transit usage. It may cancel out the benefits of better gas mileage because the net amount of pollutants are still being emitted. I’ll admit to not being well-versed on this issue, so these are just my intial thoughts.
Speaking of cars, production at Ford Canada plants dropped by 40 per cent in 2005.
