Thank you for the succinct summary: a go to site for finding out what is happening in this space.
Your thoughts about a global estimate of GHG emissions from informal transport are interesting. It is just so difficult to quantify this and, in fact, to quantify anything in a way that makes it globally comparable. Most variables in every country will have local measurement problems to deal with. For this particular issue, the estimations will be very sensitive to assumptions about fuel efficiency, journey distances, passenger numbers, congestion etc). Unfortunately, the estimates should have large error bands around them, but we all usually end up speaking in shorthand and use the mean value, which becomes the truth, even if it isn't: a problem in itself if you are trying to track change. I'm sure, though, there a good indirect measures for this, air pollution perhaps and the use of satellite imagery as a comparative metric between places that have been carefully measured and those that haven't.
I'm not steeped in the math of all of these calculations so I leave it to the experts. From your comment, it seems like even guesstimating the global carbon contributions of informal transportation would be dodgy.
Then again, how much precision do we need to act?
If our guesstimate of the total output of informal transportation was 5% or 20% of, would it drop the sector from a list of systems we should work to decarbonize?
The larger point I am making is that it would be easier if we had more reliable counts of even the number of these vehicles on the road and maybe that's the place to start. We need to treat makeshift mobility as the global phenomena that it is, with global effects, instead of trying to address it everywhere as simply local problems.
I agree a guestimate is a start. And with respect to informal transport (which is not an area I know much about, but I'm learning) it does seem important to at least start documenting its scale, impact and value. In an ideal world, we'd just make sure the confidence bands and caveats remain attached to the data when we refer to it.
(FYI, I was at a cities conference in Djkarata in 2005 and briefly met one of the people who started Go Jek. At the time he expressed a lot of concern about Uber making inroads into the transport market. He thought it would undermine Go Jek's business model. Fortunately for him, that clearly didn't happen).
>we'd just make sure the confidence bands and caveats remain attached to the data when we refer to it
for sure. (I am reminded about the difficulty of even measuring rural vs. urban land areas.)
Really interesting how GoJek focused on motorcycle taxis in SEA. Uber used their car model in SEA and lost out to Grab, but majored on auto rickshaws in India and found good footing.
Of course, all these ride hail companies are still under pricing their rides to capture market share. Who knows what will happen when the VC gravy train ends.
Thank you for the succinct summary: a go to site for finding out what is happening in this space.
Your thoughts about a global estimate of GHG emissions from informal transport are interesting. It is just so difficult to quantify this and, in fact, to quantify anything in a way that makes it globally comparable. Most variables in every country will have local measurement problems to deal with. For this particular issue, the estimations will be very sensitive to assumptions about fuel efficiency, journey distances, passenger numbers, congestion etc). Unfortunately, the estimates should have large error bands around them, but we all usually end up speaking in shorthand and use the mean value, which becomes the truth, even if it isn't: a problem in itself if you are trying to track change. I'm sure, though, there a good indirect measures for this, air pollution perhaps and the use of satellite imagery as a comparative metric between places that have been carefully measured and those that haven't.
Regards
Kevin Johnson
Great points, Kevin.
I'm not steeped in the math of all of these calculations so I leave it to the experts. From your comment, it seems like even guesstimating the global carbon contributions of informal transportation would be dodgy.
Then again, how much precision do we need to act?
If our guesstimate of the total output of informal transportation was 5% or 20% of, would it drop the sector from a list of systems we should work to decarbonize?
The larger point I am making is that it would be easier if we had more reliable counts of even the number of these vehicles on the road and maybe that's the place to start. We need to treat makeshift mobility as the global phenomena that it is, with global effects, instead of trying to address it everywhere as simply local problems.
I agree a guestimate is a start. And with respect to informal transport (which is not an area I know much about, but I'm learning) it does seem important to at least start documenting its scale, impact and value. In an ideal world, we'd just make sure the confidence bands and caveats remain attached to the data when we refer to it.
(FYI, I was at a cities conference in Djkarata in 2005 and briefly met one of the people who started Go Jek. At the time he expressed a lot of concern about Uber making inroads into the transport market. He thought it would undermine Go Jek's business model. Fortunately for him, that clearly didn't happen).
>we'd just make sure the confidence bands and caveats remain attached to the data when we refer to it
for sure. (I am reminded about the difficulty of even measuring rural vs. urban land areas.)
Really interesting how GoJek focused on motorcycle taxis in SEA. Uber used their car model in SEA and lost out to Grab, but majored on auto rickshaws in India and found good footing.
Of course, all these ride hail companies are still under pricing their rides to capture market share. Who knows what will happen when the VC gravy train ends.
A lot of gravy will slosh out onto the end of the track I imagine. Taking passengers and crew along.
Yes! And guess who gets cooked and served for dinner?