New York City 2030. London Today.

12:22 PM EST on January 29, 2007

On Thursday, as New York City's highest ranking transportation officials argued before City Council that the city's increasing traffic congestion and automobile dependence is "an indication of the vitality and the growth of the city of New York," London's Mayor Ken Livingstone was in Davos, Switzerland announcing that he aims "to make London the world's leading center for research and financial development on climate change." Livingstone said:

Cities produce 75 per cent of global carbon emissions and it is therefore in cities that the battle against climate change will have to be won... Climate change is a tremendous challenge to humanity. But for London it is also a tremendous opportunity. The world is shifting to a new technical and financial system in which we do not produce and waste energy, in the form of carbon, but must conserve it. London has the potential to be at the centre of this shift.

Mayor Bloomberg and Senator Charles Schumer (who happens to be married to New York City's highest ranking transportation official) are also focused on financial systems. They continue to use their clout to press the case that New York City is "losing its leading competitive position" to London and other world cities due to onerous corporate financial regulations. Financial journalist James Surowiecki, in this week's New Yorker, writes that it is difficult to find evidence to back up these claims.

Meanwhile, the evidence that climate change is human-induced and happening much faster than previously thought, is increasingly abundant. But for Bloomberg, Schumer and Weinshall, climate change either is not on the radar at all, or it's an issue to be dealt with far off in the future. So, as Mayor Livingstone positions his city to be a 21st century global leader, New York City's leaders, remarkably, fiddle with the Sarbanes-Oxley Act and keep the traffic moving.

Aaron Naparstek

AARON NAPARSTEK is the founder and former editor-in-chief of Streetsblog. Based in Brooklyn, New York, Naparsteks journalism, advocacy and community organizing work has been instrumental in growing the bicycle network, removing motor vehicles from parks, and developing new public plazas, car-free streets and life-saving traffic-calming measures across all five boroughs. Naparstek is the author of "Honku: The Zen Antidote for Road Rage" (Villard, 2003), a book of humorous haiku poetry inspired by the endless motorist sociopathy observed from his apartment window. Prior to launching Streetsblog, Naparstek worked as an interactive media producer, pioneering some of the Web's first music web sites, online communities, live webcasts and social networking services. Naparstek is currently in Cambridge with his wife and two young sons where he is enjoying a Loeb Fellowship at Harvard University's Graduate School of Design. He has a master's degree from Columbia University's Graduate School of Journalism and a bachelor's degree from Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri. Naparstek is a co-founder of the Park Slope Neighbors community group and the Grand Army Plaza Coalition. You can find more of his work here: http://www.naparstek.com.

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