Speaker: Martin Wachs, Ph.D. University of California Los Angeles, CA

In order to comply with air quality regulations, California has adopted a multi-faceted program controlling automobile emissions. Measures adopted to promote cleaner air include stringent controls on new automobiles; inspection and maintenance of older automobiles; efforts to induce shifts from private automobile commuting to carpooling, vanpooling, and public transport; and, in the near future, the production of electric vehicles.

Professor Martin Wachs will provide a summary of the many measures being implemented in California, and will then provide a more detailed evaluation of the first three years of implementation of an employer-based mandatory ridesharing program, Regulation XV, which requires work-sites having 100 or more employees to provide ridesharing and transit opportunities to their employees. The evaluation will examine the effects of the regulation on commuting behavior, the cost of implementing the regulation, and the response to the regulation in the political arena.

Wachs is a Professor of Urban Planning at UCLA and has been carrying out a continuing evaluation of the effectiveness of Regulation XV of the South Coast Air Quality Management District, a mandatory ridesharing program in Southern California. He holds a Bachelor's in Civil Engineering from the City University of New York and MS and PH.D. degrees in Transportation Planning from Northwestern University. He has written three books and over eighty published articles on transportation planning and policy and has been awarded the Pike Johnson Award for presenting the best research paper at the annual meeting of the Transportation Research Board.