A day after watching in horror as a group of Pasconians perpetuated exurban sprawl across 50-year visioning maps provided by Reality Check Tampa Bay, we stumbled across this thinly reported blurb in the Tampa fish wrapper.
Why didn’t someone think of this a long time ago?
All we know at this point is that one John Ryan, apparently well known among Polk’s planners and conservationists, has proposed some sort of cap-and-trade system involving marketable development rights and urban development zones. His idea, we think, is meant to contain sprawl and preserve open space in Polk going 50 years out.
We’re trying to reach Mr. Ryan and hope to blog details of his idea in a Thursday p.m. post. Until then, we remain intrigued.
If you aren’t familiar with cap and trade, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency provides a nice thumbnail here. How well does it work? Take a peek at The EPA’s Acid Rain Program 2005 Progress Report. Not bad. The same concept is picking up steam as a favored mechanism for reducing greenhouse gas emisisons.
A piece published by the San Francisco Chronicle last March said big-business interests have “rushed to jump on the cap-and-trade bandwagon,” including General Electric, Alcoa, DuPont, Caterpillar and Duke Energy. GM, Ford, Toyota and Chrysler supported the concept in tesitmony before Congress, according to the Chronicle, along with a variety of large, institutional investors.
The reason they like it is pretty simple. It lets market forces solve problems where government dictates once ruled. This notion of ‘free-market environmentalism” has been gradually gaining credence for more than a decade. The rationale is compelling. Applying it to growth planning in Florida might just be one damn good idea.