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Bogota, the Bicycle, and Transportation

Monday, June 19th, 2006

Climbing into the mountains, I reached the high plain were Bogota, at 9,000 ft above sea level, sits. Bogota is far off my route (see map), and you might be wondering why I chose to bike to the capital of Colombia.

In the 1990s, in the face of horrible road congestion, Bogota did something amazing — it reduced space for cars. The city removed lanes from a number of major thruways to make way for new high-speed busses, and sidewalks that were used for parking cars were replaced by pedestrian walkways and bikeways. A large number of pedestrian bridges were built, allowing people to easily pass over the major roads of the city. In short, the city was redesigned around people instead of around the automobile.

I talked with a number of locals about how the city had changed. Some cited statistics – whereas traveling across the city used to take a few hours, the new bus system, named the ‘transmilenio’ will take perhaps 45 minutes. Safety has improved as well. Not only did traffic accidents reduce significantly, but violent crime also nearly halved (here is an article about this). Most people, though, remarked that Bogota is simply a nicer place to live and people respect the city more. ‘People throw less trash in the street’, I was told, and ‘now people are proud to be from Bogota.’

I stayed for a few days with Ricardo (shown below on the left), who runs Ciudad Humana (‘human city’), a foundation that promotes improved civil life and transportation in the city. The foundation is a strong supporter of bicycle use in the city, and I spent much time with this group. I helped with a project to fix bicycles in the southern (poorer) region of town and also gave presentations to groups of young people who are learning how to be bike mechanics.

Bogota now has over 300 km of dedicated bike routes in the city, and I biked at least half of them in my week in Bogota. According to Ricardo, since the installation of the ciclorutas, bicycle use has increased 5 times in the city, and now there are probably between 300,000 and 400,000 trips made daily in Bogota by bicycle. A large portion of this use is in the southern, poorer region of town, and I joined Ricardo and a few other members of Ciudad Humana one morning to bike across the city and see the rush hour bike traffic.

To be sure, the ciclorutas are not perfect. There are many places in the city where they do not connect, and you may find yourself in the situation of the man shown in the photo on the right. Also, they are placed on the sidewalk in such a way so as to put pedestrians and cyclists in competition (you can watch the video on the right to understand this). But the ciclorutas are nonetheless incredibly successful, showing that with more investment, even more is possible.

I spent my last day in the city enjoying the ciclovia, an event every Sunday where many roads are closed to cars and open only for bicycles. Apparently, I saw it on a low turnout day (blame the world cup – Brazil was playing), but the roads were still filled with bicycles and people out to enjoy themselves. (The clowns on the right are in charge of making fun of people without helmets.)

The new Bogota has another benefit as well — people are traveling more efficiently, using fewer fossil fuels. Indeed, redesigning Bogota around people and bicycles has not only improved the safety, health, and pride of its citizens, but the city has also reduced its effect on the global environment. This is a win-win situation — better city living and less carbon dioxide emissions. Hopefully, more cities in the world can follow Bogota’s example.

Posted in Climate, Colombia | 5 Comments »

Deforestation in Central America

Sunday, May 14th, 2006

Deforestation is a major problem in Central America. A quick look at the statistics shows that in the past 15 years, 20% of the countries’ forests have been destroyed. As I have biked through Central America, I have seen countless roadsides which were once covered by forests, but are now ranch land or farmland.

The problems associated with deforestation include loss of biodiversity, soil erosion, more landslides, greater flooding, and more carbon dioxide to the atmosphere. Cutting down forests releases a large amount of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere, and in these small, mostly poor countries, these emissions are comparable to the countries’ use of fossil fuels.

While in Panama City, I talked to someone who wrote Panama’s proposal to reduce deforestation. The people cutting down the forests, in general, are very poor – subsistence farmers who need to clear land to grow food to eat. It seems that the only viable method of reducing deforestation here is to find these people other work or to pay them to not cut down the forest. Protecting forests without finding these people other income could cause great hardship.

In Panama City, I also visited Futuro Forestal, a company that purchases pastureland and converts it to forest. The wood from the forest is harvested after 25 years, and sold. While this is not as good as a full forest, it still takes significant carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere, and is far better than ranch land. It also provides local jobs and makes a profit. You can also buy carbon credits through them as well.

Stopping deforestation in poorer regions will require foreigners and locals to work together – with foreigners helping to provide financial incentives to protect the forests.

Posted in Climate, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, Panama | 2 Comments »

Climate Change and Extinction in Monteverde, Costa Rica

Sunday, April 30th, 2006

Before arriving in San Jose, my father and I biked to the Monteverde cloud forest biological preserve. This preserve, at about 5,000 feet above sea level, literally sits in clouds, and is constantly blanketed by mist. We toured the forest, seeing bellbirds (see the video on the left and listen to the bird), quetzals (photo middle), monkeys, tarantulas, hummingbirds, strange insects, and much more. The forest’s thick fog provides moisture and nutrients for plants that grow on other plants, and the trees are thick with mosses and vines hanging off branches.

As with most places in the tropics, the biodiversity in Monteverde is far higher than what I am used to coming from the U.S. My hometown may have only a dozen types of trees, but here, in Monteverde, you will find hundreds of different species of trees. Likewise, there are more bird species in tiny Costa Rica than found in the entire United States.

This biodiversity, though, may be threatened, as the climate in Monteverde is already changing. As the oceans have warmed, the clouds at Monteverde are forming at higher altitudes, and the amount of mist in the forest is far less than it was in the 1970s (the photo on the left shows the clouds sitting on top of the mountain – Monteverde is behind the clouds). I talked with one researcher, Dr. Karen Masters, about what this means for the epiphytes — the plants growing on other plants, which account for half of the plant species in the forest. Her experiment (see video middle), although still underway, already shows the new conditions are poor for some species (see dead orchids on the right).

Two recent extinctions of toads in Monteverde, the golden toad and the harlequin toad, appear to be linked to abnormally warm years. A more recent paper, which looks at extinctions of toads around the world, shows that recent abnormally warm years are extremely well correlated with toad extinctions, suggesting that climate change is already playing a large role in the loss of species.

The climate is clearly changing here, and the science is backed up by common sense: if you change the climate, you will lose species that cannot adapt. There are many reasons we should preserve biodiversity, as diverse ecosystems provide better services as well as potential pharmaceutical benefits. For me, though, the strongest argument is for simple existence. Each species represents millions of years of evolution, which is completely lost every time a species goes extinct.

Posted in Climate, Costa Rica | No Comments »

Hurricanes, Climate Change, and Central America

Tuesday, April 18th, 2006

Since arriving in Central America, I have asked nearly every person I have stayed with about how hurricanes have affected their lives.

In Belize, the majority of the population lives in coastal settlements that are barely above sea level. The town where I learned to SCUBA dive, Placencia, was almost completely destroyed by Hurricane Iris in 1991. People with insurance or in the tourism industry have rebuilt. Others sold their land and moved. Down the road from Placencia is Sand Bite, a small town that does not receive tourism dollars. This town has not fully rebuilt from the storm.

Hurricanes are likely to be stronger on a warmer earth. A recent study (here is a description) showed how an increase in the power of Atlantic hurricanes over the past 20 years is correlated with warmer ocean water in the Atlantic. This makes intuitive sense – hurricanes get their energy from warm ocean water, and warmer ocean water should mean more powerful hurricanes. More powerful hurricanes are also predicted by climate models. Furthermore, much of the damage done by hurricanes is not just by their winds, but by the rain that accompanies the storms. A warmer atmosphere can hold more water, and thus will likely provide heavier rains (read more on rains here).

In 1998, a huge category 5 hurricane, Hurricane Mitch, tore through the Caribbean and then parked itself over Central America, affecting almost every country. Ten thousand people died, and over 100,000 were left homeless.

The storm hit Honduras the hardest. It destroyed some coastal communities and then dropped amazing amounts of rain. A security guard at the San Pedro Sula airport described water in his house up to his armpits. A family who I stayed with in the countryside told me that they lost all of their crops. I asked what they did that year, and they replied that they were hungry that year. In Tegucigalpa, the flooding reached the third floor of some buildings (such as the building on the left). According to my city guide Carleton, many of the houses on the hill sides washed away. He showed me a large section of bare earth (shown on the right) where there used to be houses.

The destruction continued in the rest of Central America. In San Miguel, El Salvador, one man described a landslide that destroyed many homes. In Nicaragua, the family that I swam with on Good Friday invited me back to their house. Their house had been destroyed by Mitch, and rebuilt a year later by help from the government (photo left). Also in Nicaragua, I spent one night at the house of Cristina, who is shown on the right. Cristina explained that although no one in her community died, they lost all of their animals. “We ate a lot of rice and beans.”

Mitch was so strong that its name has been retired – whereas most names for storms are reused after a few years, meteorologists will never again use the name Mitch. If current research is correct, though, we will see more storms like Mitch. And, the people who will suffer the most will be the people who I have met here in Central America – people who live in poorly constructed houses, who live on vulnerable slopes, or who rely on the food they grow to live.

Based on these stories, it seems that the human toll of Hurricane Mitch was many times worse than any storm in the U.S. Again, this is because of how people live here — they have fewer resources to survive and recover from a storm. Yet, growing up in the U.S., for a long time I thought that hurricanes damaged only Florida and nearby states because that is what I heard about in the media. Somehow we need to expand our view to other countries, especially as our actions — emissions of greenhouse gasses — will make storms worse internationally.

Posted in Belize, Climate, El Salvador, Honduras | No Comments »

Coral Reefs and Climate Change

Tuesday, March 21st, 2006

As I had promised my friend Dennis, we arrived in the small tourist town of Placencia and set up our tents on the beach, planning to stay for a few days. We had one goal while in town: to see the coral reefs off Belize’s shore.

Coral reef ecosystems are some of the most diverse and interesting ecosystems in the world. Coral reefs consist of organisms that build hard calcium carbonate shells, known as ‘reefs’. These organisms house and protect algae, which form the basis of the coral reef ecosystem. The structures built by the corals also provide shelter for many different types of marine life, and coral reef ecosystems are extremely diverse. Over time, as the skeletons of reefs accumulate, the coral builds large underwater structures, making even islands (coral atolls) or ‘barrier reefs’ – long structures parallel to the shore. The largest of these barrier reefs is in Australia (the ‘Great Barrier Reef’), and the second largest is off the coast of Belize.

To see the reef close up, I took a SCUBA class. It felt strange paying as much for three days of SCUBA instruction as I paid for the entire month of February, but it was more than worth it, especially considering that these reefs may not survive this century. Dennis, who was already certified to SCUBA, joined me for my training dives, and we took a boat to the barrier reef with other vacationing Americans.

I was amazed by the amount of life in Belize’s reef. Having purchased an underwater case for my camera, I used all my memory cards almost immediately. At times I thought I was in an aquarium — huge schools of fish swam around us, eels weaved through the reef, lobsters hid in the reef, and long sponges rose above the ocean floor. (I have a number of high resolution movies that are too big to post on this site — you’ll have to wait till I return!)

These reefs are in trouble. Over 10% of reefs worldwide have already been destroyed, largely through changes in land use near the shore, which cause chemicals and excess nutrients to runoff into the ocean. This runoff can kill the delicate reefs. The reefs are also in danger from higher temperatures. When temperatures rise above a certain level, the algae in the reefs die, a phenomenon known as coral bleaching. In 1998, one of the hottest years on record, 16% of the world’s reefs were damaged by hotter temperatures. Some of these reefs survived, while others have not recovered. Higher temperatures will make coral bleaching more common, killing many reefs.

Reefs are also threatened by changing ocean chemistry. Much of the carbon dioxide that we add to the atmosphere is actually absorbed by the oceans. Carbon dioxide reacts with water to make carbonic acid, and, since the start of industrial times, the oceans have become more acidic by 0.1 pH. According to a professor who studies ocean chemistry in my former department at the Carnegie Institute of Washington (he also helped put together this lengthy report), the oceans may become too acidic for coral reefs to make their calcium carbonate shells. ‘Higher temperatures may not be the real problem,’ he told me before I left, ‘the reefs may simply dissolve.’

Coral reefs, such as the ones I swam by off the shore of Belize, are in great danger. Some reefs may survive global warming, but, without action, the majority of reef ecosystems around the world will likely collapse. These reefs are the most biologically diverse parts of the ocean, and without them, we will lose untold numbers of underwater species. These extinctions would be a tragedy not only in their own right, but also for fishermen, the tourism industry, and those of us who enjoy visiting these underwater jungles.

Posted in Belize, Climate | 1 Comment »

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