Re: RE:Smog laws

[Tom Jennings <tomj@xxxxxxx>]

On Wed, 2004-09-15 at 19:49, C. Stevens Avery wrote:
> This could be argued indefinitely.

I agree, and to no real point. Thanks for not flaming me :-)

re: the annual (vs. biannual) test interval: it could be mere
foolishness, but I bet it's more of an information-gathering tool, and
will also likely flush out the "merely old cars" off the road, the
stated goal of the law. Costs being what they are, if the project proves
to be not cost-effective at cleaning up the air, if it turns out there
are simply not enough cars to remove from the road, it'll likely get
changed later.

At the amount of traffic we're talking about, it's pure calculus and
bulk statistics; there's little room in there for individual cars
maintained by people like you and me, unfortunately. 


For scale: 200,000 cars pass by PER DAY within 0.5 miles of my (and
thousands of others) house. There are probably a million or two
households in the greater SoCal area that are this close to a major
freeway. If each car produces 1ppm of crud, ... etc.

Also, your car, exceptionally clean at 3 - 4 ppm, is still up to 100
times dirtier the the newer ULEV cars, never mind when any of us with a
carburetor, put the choke on, press the pedal twice and start the car.
That alone produces more raw HCs and CO than probably a day's operation
of a ULEV car.

I don't like this situation, it fills me with dread, the idea that a
huge part of my life not only makes a mess that used to be OK (in a
number of ways of "OK") is singled out for special regulation. I'm not a
regulate-everything-in-sight person at all.

OK I'll shut up now, I'll let anyone else get the last word if they want
it, I don't need to.