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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (Oct. 1, 1990)
Monday, October 1, 1990 l Al- ray, Election official urges Texans to participate 66 EDI i,m BEAN ,1951 DOUi AUSTIN (AP) — Texas’ top elec tion official has a simple message: Vote or shut up. Secretary of State George Bayoud has been traveling statewide trying to register voters and telling people if they don’t vote in the Nov. 6 gen eral election they have no right to gripe about the results. “That would be a mistake,” Bay oud said. “It’s imperative that all Texans who are eligible to vote par ticipate in the Democratic process.” The League of Women Voters is also using voter registration drives and direct mail campaigns to try to increase the turnout. “Voting is the most basic step for citizens to make a democracy work,” Diane Sheridan, president of the League of Women Voters of Texas, said. Sunday is the deadline for regis tering in time to participate in the Nov. 6 general election, although mail registration will be accepted un til Oct. 9. “We are the world’s greatest de mocracy, and we need to lead by ex ample here in Texas,” Bayoud said. So far, Texas has led by medioc rity. Prior to the March 13 political party primaries, about 8.3 million Texans, or 66 percent of the 12.4 million eligible voters, were regis tered to vote, the secretary of state’s office said. That is a little below the national average of 67.5 percent, Mark Too- hey, a spokesman for Bayoud, said. The primaries produced a record turnout for a non-presidential elec tion, but that had more to do with S ulation growth than a surge in tical awareness. The turnout of 2.3 million rep resented 28 percent of the regis tered voters. The Battalion Page 11 Spade Phillips, P.l. by Matt Kowalski GflEETiubS, GE’nruE Re/ideks. Realizinc, THE LUST THAT THE AVERAGE A+M STUDENT H4S ToR Bot-D, UNFAMILIAR, AND IMMOVATIv/E: IDEAS,THfi 5Tt?lP IS PRouD ro ^ PRESENT... SZ/MX Tubularman by Boomer Cardinale Nerd House by Tom A. Madison IE Natural fuels favor economy, ecology LER LONGVIEW (AP) ^ Skyrock eting gasoline prices in the wake of the Persian Gull crisis have many searching for cheaper alter native fuels to power cars and de- Iwevy trucks. In Longview, one independent gas supplier said he has seen a phenomenal increase in inquiries about converting cars and fleet vehicles to run on propane or natural gas. Already, General Motors has announced that its GMC Truck division will manufacture and sell light-duty trucks which run on compressed natural gas. The company plans to market at least 1,000 of the trucks in Texas and California next year. Natural gas is a clean, abun dant, safe and cost-effective alter native fuel, according to the Texas General Land Office. It cuts pollution by roughly 90 per cent com pared with gasoline. Concern over air pollution pushed Texas legislators to pass a clean-air bill in 1989, forcing large state and school fleets to buy vehicles powered by clean burning natural gas. American Gas Association offi cials say emissions tests show nat ural gas produces 70 percent to 90 percent less of the air toxins that make up low-level smog and air pollution. In all, natural gas can eliminate about 50 percent of gasoline by products that cause air pollution, Daniel Montoya of the Texas General Land Office said. “And because it burns cleaner, com pressed natural gas helps spark ugs last longer and reduces ve- de maintenance,” he said. State Land Commissioner Garry Mauro recently cited a Ra dian Corp. study that said if all the fleet vehicles in Houston ran on compressed natural gas, pol luting gases would be reduced by almost 16 million tons per year, enough to fill 12 Astrodomes. The study also says that fleet operators would save almost $16 million in fuel and maintenance costs. Under the Texas Plan, state agencies with more than 15 vehi cles, metropolitan school districts with more than 50 buses, private fleets with more than 25 vehicles and all metropolitan transit au thorities must buy only clean al ternative fuel vehicles after Sept. 1, 1991. These entities must con vert 90 percent of their fleet to al ternative fuels by 1998. “In the past couple of weeks, we have had a lot of interest in gas conversions,” Arles Johnson, owner of Spring Hill L.P. Gas, said. Johnson sells liquid petro leum gas, or propane. “Right now, I can sell a gallon of propane at $1.07,” he told the Longview News-Journal. “In some instances, I take a truck to a company to fill up their fleet.” Johnson said he will convert two vehicles next week to alterna tive fuel, which costs about $1,100 for a normal car. “We have had inquiries from several companies with large truck fleets concerning conver sion,” he said. “If a company con verts a large fleet, it can be a very cost-effective change. And on the new cars with fuel injection sys tems, there is little or no perfor mance difference.” Compressed natural gas is about 40 percent cheaper than gasoline, Montoya said. The nat ural gas equivalent to a gallon of f asolme will cost anywhere from 0 cents to 85 cents. Some drawbacks to com pressed natural gas are limited travel range and public availabil ity. Study International Business in Denmark All Courses Taught in English 0fX r j m eryD Discover the Possibilities Tuesday, October 2, 10:00 am - 2:00 pm Table in the MSC Main Hallway TM ‘O- / • 90 Herbert discovers thebe's no need to feed the fish tow. Pollution, traffic force debate over Houston’s transit policy HOUSTON (AP) — A gathering of mass transit officials from around the country has reopened a long- simmering debate over whether Houston, the nation’s largest city without a rail system, should end its addiction to the automobile. As gasoline prices once again sky rocket, public transportation advo cates increasingly must defend pro grams that some say have failed to wean Americans from their beloved cars. The debate over how to forge a workable mass transit policy comes to Houston this week as thousands of transit professionals gather for the annual meeting of the American Public Transit Association. Houston is saddled with air pol lution and traffic problems that are among the worst in the nation, yet its leaders are mired in a rancorous de bate over whether to proceed on a $1 billion, 22-mile rail project. The debate has its roots partly in reports questioning whether recently opened rail systems have been get ting motorists off the roads. These reports have found that the number of people driving their own cars to work continues to rise and that many expensive rail systems have failed to draw a substantial number of new passengers. At the same time, Americans continue to move to outer suburbs, where there is little or no public transit. 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