Oral History Program Benjamin Gilmore Interviewed by David Bute 25 April 2008 i Oral History Program Weber State University Stewart Library Ogden, Utah Benjamin Gilmore Interviewed by David Bute 25 April 2008 Copyright © 2012 by Weber State University, Stewart Library ii Mission Statement The Oral History Program of the Stewart Library was created to preserve the institutional history of Weber State University and the Davis, Ogden and Weber County communities. By conducting carefully researched, recorded, and transcribed interviews, the Oral History Program creates archival oral histories intended for the widest possible use. Interviews are conducted with the goal of eliciting from each participant a full and accurate account of events. The interviews are transcribed, edited for accuracy and clarity, and reviewed by the interviewees (as available), who are encouraged to augment or correct their spoken words. 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These oral history assignments were created to help Weber State students learn the value and importance of recording public history and to benefit the expansion of the Weber State oral history collections. ____________________________________ Oral history is a method of collecting historical information through recorded interviews between a narrator with firsthand knowledge of historically significant events and a well-informed interviewer, with the goal of preserving substantive additions to the historical record. Because it is primary material, oral history is not intended to present the final, verified, or complete narrative of events. It is a spoken account. 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It is recommended that this oral history be cited as follows: Gilmore, Benjamin, an oral history by David Bute, 25 April 2008, WSU Stewart Library Oral History Program, University Archives, Stewart Library, Weber State University, Ogden, UT. iii Abstract: The following is an oral history interview with Benjamin Gilmore. The interview was conducted on April 25, 2008, by David Bute, in North Ogden, Utah. Gilmore discusses the current situation of fuel in the U.S. and other local issues pertinent to the Ogden area. DB: I am here today with Ben Gilmore, it is April 25, 2008. We are in North Ogden, Utah at Mr. Gilmore's house. Ben, thank you for meeting with me today. We are going to talk about a few things today, mostly based on your car and your thoughts on the environment. Ok so let’s start off with what kind of car do you drive? BG: I drive a 2001 Dodge Stratus SE V6 Coupe, in silver. DB: Ok, now why did you choose this car? BG: Well, firstly my old car was about ready to die. I had a 1994 Geo Prism that wasn't doing too well. And it was a really good price, it was actually under blue book and it was in really good shape, and it got decent gas mileage so that’s why I got it. DB: And now, um, did the local climate affect your choice of car at all? A lot of people around here drive cars that have 4-wheel drive, or are 4-wheel drive capable, for the winter. BG: I'm used to driving a car that’s not very adaptable to the winters around here. So, I decided to go with the Dodge Stratus which is front wheel drive. Which is better than rear-wheel for driving around in the winter. Also, it has really nice tires on it. DB: Is this the only car you have? Will you be using the same car when the winter months start to come? 1 BG: More than likely yes. It’s possible that I might get another vehicle for towing things around, or moving things. Thinking of maybe getting a Toyota Tacoma, or a Chevy Suburban or something similar to that, but I'm not entirely sure yet because they do get horrible gas mileage. DB: Ok, yeah, now that’s a big issue for a lot of people. Ok so, just curious, with this car; a lot of people do take out loans just to buy their first car. Now did you take out a loan for this car? BG: Yes I did, and it was kind of killing two birds with one stone. I didn't really have any credit so I needed a new car as well so I figured I may as well go to the bank and see if I could get a loan for the amount that I need for the car. And so I went there and I applied and they approved me, and so I got a vehicle. DB: You said earlier that it got pretty good gas mileage, now with it being a v6 what kind of gas mileage does it get? BG: It’s around 20 in city, 28 on the highway. I haven't really gotten a chance to check it out for sure yet, that’s just what it’s listed at. But rest assured once I get it tuned up and such I will see what the gas mileage is. DB: What do you think about, about hybrid vehicles? You've got a lot of people now buying cars that can get upwards of 40 miles per gallon. BG: Well, I don't know necessarily what to think about hybrid vehicles. I mean they have a very low cost-to-performance ratio at least as far as engine power and stuff goes. I mean, I understand why people are getting them. But, you know, in Europe and lots of other countries they have cars that have been running on diesel for years that are more 2 efficient than these hybrid cars are and they're a lot cheaper as well. For some reason they have not been approved over here yet, I'm not entirely sure why. It’s still pretty kind of a crappy situation. I think they should be released over here, there’s no for us buying hybrid cars that have less gas mileage than these blue diesel cars that they have in Europe. DB: What do you feel about the current gas prices? BG: I don't see a need for them to be as high as they are. A lot of the reason the gas prices are as high as they are is because of the taxes the government has put on them. I think there is no reason for the gas prices to be as high as they are. Sure they use the war in Iraq as an excuse for it, but there’s no evidence that points to that. DB: Now, do the current gas prices affect your car choice? You have a v6—you could get something with a little smaller engine and get a little bit better gas mileage out of it. BG: Yeah that’s definitely something that crossed my mind. But as I said before it was a really good deal on the car. DB: And you kind of like the performance? BG: Right and I am making enough money to go ahead and do that. DB: Ok, so if you weren't making enough money would you go with something a little smaller? BG: More than likely, definitely something with a four cylinder engine. I really don't think I would go with a hybrid. The performance really isn't up to what it should be in comparison to other cars that get good gas mileage. Like a Honda Civic, or other cars. 3 DB: Now does it affect your driving habits at all? Do you drive less now that gas prices are high, or about the same? BG: I do definitely make a conscious effort to drive as little as possible. Because, I mean, even I can afford the gas it seems like way too much to pay for stuff. In other countries gas is even more than ours is, but it does have a higher octane rating and it does actually give some performance boost in comparison to our gas. Whereas we have just gotten price raises without any performance boost. DB: Ok, now what do you think about places like England that enforce methods to reduce driving? Like Britain has one day a week you cannot drive. BG: I honestly think that would be a good policy, not necessarily something so extreme but maybe. I know other countries have minimum gas mileage requirements for various kinds of cars, and as far as I know we don't have that here. And if we do it’s a lot more lax than it is in other countries. DB: Well, there are some countries in the Middle East—I think it’s the United Arab Emirates—where they don't allow you to own a car that gets less than 20 miles per gallon unless it’s for professional use—construction, or things like that. BG: Yeah and I definitely think that’s a good policy. I mean all these politicians are talking about going green and everything, but they're not really doing as much as they could about it. It’s what people want, and things like that yet at the same time a lot of these people - these celebrities and stuff that are going green supposedly. They have SUV's and huge gas guzzling cars that get horrible gas mileage. DB: And their private planes. 4 BG: Exactly and it seems really hypocritical. I think there’s going to need to be some major changes. I mean I don't necessarily believe that global warming is a big deal. I mean climate change is natural, global warming is kind of a misnomer. I think that a lot of people have been misinformed about global warming. And I think that a lot of politicians need to stop using it for their own personal gain and actually tell people the truth about it. There have been multiple studies pointing to our climate actually cooling regardless of our Carbon emission. Frankly, we have a very, very small knowledge of what the climate has been like over the years. We have only been recording for several hundred years. And I think that definitely limits the kind of gravity that anyone can say about what we know about the environment. DB: Do you think that other people around your age are well informed? BG: Honestly, no, (Laughs). I've talked to quite a few people about it and it seems to be they'll just follow what they hear. They don't necessarily do the research themselves. They'll listen to the politicians, and just go around with it. It goes both ways, regardless of whether your Republican or Democrat. Most of these kids that are really in to politics don't necessarily do the research for themselves, they just kind of follow. DB: Kind of Al Gore's? BG: Yeah, and the funny thing is that at every single conference where Al Gore has spoken about global warming it has snowed—at least in climates where it can snow. DB: I don't know about that. Now, what do you think about alternative fuel sources? Right now there’s a big push for ethanol, but at the same time it’s pushing up the price of corn by almost double. 5 BG: I think ethanol is a good idea in concept, but it’s definitely going to be a while before they are able to implement it. There are some other alternative fuels that are being developed as well. There’s one that I read an article about recently that will run in current engines. And it’s actually more efficient than ethanol is. Then there’s also hydrogen cell cars which is something that is not going to be happening for a while because of the costs. It’s astronomical. I mean, it’s ridiculous how much they're going to cost. On the other hand, if the technology ever comes to a point where it’s something that’s financially feasible for most people I think that’s definitely the way to go. But as I said before about the blue diesels or whatever they are called that are in other countries. That’s using current diesel fuel, and they're getting 40 to 50 sometimes even 60 miles to the gallon. And I honestly don't see why it isn't released over here. DB: What do you think the government should be doing in this whole situation? We've got the war in Iraq, which some people may be contributing, but we've also got this whole new oil deposit in the Dakotas. BG: As I said before, they definitely need to put more regulations on minimum gas mileage for vehicles. I think that would go a long way. Even just maybe, we were talking about 20 miles a gallon would be very nice and would help out a lot with our carbon emissions. I think they also need to limit how much gas can cost, or how much they can tax it. I mean it really does seem ridiculous how much gas prices have gone up within the recent years with no necessarily cement reason for it other than various wars going on. Or political climate or things like that. DB: Do you think that once/if the conflict in the Middle East is resolved do you think the gas prices will go back down. Or do you think the conflicts there will keep them high? 6 BG: I honestly can see people wanting to keep lining their pockets with money. I don't see it going down at least a meaningful amount within a short amount of time after. DB: What about just stagnating and staying at the same price? That over a couple years of inflation would be a reduction. BG: Right, I can definitely see it at least staying at the same price. If it does rise it will definitely rise at a much slower rate because they don't have something to blame it on. DB: Or just depleting the resource all together BG: Right. DB: Now we're going to move away from that a little bit, and talk about the upcoming commuter rail, Frontrunner, which is going to open this weekend. What do you think about that? How do you think that’s going to help? BG: I think it’s a good idea, I don't necessarily see a large amount of people using it. I definitely think that for the first few months just out of the novelty of it a lot of people will be using it to travel back and forth. I can definitely see maybe people that commute to University of Utah, rather than the bus systems. I do have friends that go down to college there, it’s probably a lot better option for them. They'll be able to get down quicker and overall it'll probably take less time. DB: Do you think it’s going to be a big enough draw that people are going to give up having their cars? A lot of people avoid public transit just because of that. They have their own car, they have their own space, and they can keep everything in there. And it’s a little more private of a setting. 7 BG: As with anything, people have their predetermined opinions on it—even if it ends up being a really good thing for them. It’s not something they'll necessarily use because they're so used to using their cars. But I can definitely see quite a few people converting over to it, at least a few days a week. Going to the Gateway, or going to concerts or various other things like that. I can definitely see that as a possibility rather than driving down there. Especially during rush hour and things like that, it would definitely be more convenient, quicker, and easier to use. DB: What do you think is going to be the demographic? Who are the people who are going to be riding it? BG: I can essentially see people of any age riding it really. I mean definitely the younger crowd that maybe can't drive yet. Elderly, at least we can hope, and anyone that’s just not wanting to deal with traffic. DB: Now don't you think it’s going to be mostly towards the younger population that has a lower income, and they may be a little more informed, or misinformed, about the energy situation, and the global climate change situation. BG: I can definitely see the younger crowd using it more—as you said, because of the political climate. Everyone is saying to go green. It’s just the best thing to do right now, so I can definitely see them doing that. But the income also plays into that as well, with the rising gas prices. DB: Ok now along with commuter rail, we have another project that’s being going on that’s sort of supposed to help with commuting to Salt Lake but as the same time it’s not going 8 to be saving gas an energy that the Frontrunner is going to be doing - that’s the legacy highway project. BG: Well I think they definitely should have planned better with it, from what I understand by the time the highway is actually built the traffic load is actually going to be too much for it. Which seems like something they'd actually want to plan for, but they haven't. Additionally, I'm not a huge fan of it going through the area that it’s going through. It is going to be endangering some wildlife. DB: Right, it’s going to be displacing a lot of wetlands. They're supposed to have to rebuild or recreate all the wetlands that they destroy. But the legislation doesn't require them to rebuild it in the same area, or even the same type of wetland. BG: Right that seems like they're trying to make it appear that there is some sort of solution to the destruction they're doing to the wetlands. It’s kind of an empty promise. It seems like they could route it somewhere else or build it somewhere else. Rather than building it through this wetlands, but they've already made their choice and everything is going through. So preserving the wetlands somewhere else is better than nothing. DB: One of the other arguments about it is that by the time the legacy highway is built and is in use, most of the population is going to have moved or is going to be commuting to a different area. So it may not be in use anymore. BG: Right. Well I mean that’s definitely a possibility I mean populations do shift. And things like that, and it’s kind of hard when the situations like that. Projects like that, that are going to take 10, 15 years, or even 5 years to really predict what’s going to happen there. And there’s definitely some risk involved, and that’s another reason that I don't 9 necessarily like those types of projects. They can only project so far, and even then they can be completely off. And they could build a system of highways in wetlands that nobody is going to use. DB: Along that line, what else can people do to reduce congestion down there besides building a highway? BG: The easiest thing to do obviously is carpool. You still drive around and see these people in these huge SUVs with just them in it—which is just absolutely insane in my opinion. I don't see any reason to get those types of vehicles if you're not going to tow around more than just one more two people. In that situation, if you're carrying around more than two people it might be a better idea to get a larger car or minivan that would get better gas mileage anyway. DB: What do you think about smart cars? Cars that only hold just one, maybe two people and a small trunk. BG: I think those are good as well because they do get very good gas mileage, they're very efficient. They're not necessarily the safest cars from what I understand. DB: Well, they have been introduced here in the U.S. But hardly anyone has been willing to try them. BG: Even though it is a car, it does seem like a different mode of transportation. DB: So something similar to a scooter or motorcycle? Now we've also got here locally in Ogden, the Ogden tram. The tram is supposed to go from somewhere around Washington or Wall, somewhere around the Union Station up to the top of Mount Ogden behind Weber State. 10 BG: Yeah that’s something that I don't necessarily agree with. I think it’s unnecessary, I think the costs more than outweigh the benefits for it. It’s one of those things that definitely seems like people would use it for the first few months, because it does have that novelty factor to it. But after that they're going to realize it’s not what they thought it was it’s not what they thought it would be. DB: Now one of the big arguments for it is that’s it’s going to attract tourists to Ogden. Definitely Ogden, downtown Ogden, needs some sort of income to help stimulate growth. Do you think it’s going attract enough people to be worth the investment? BG: In all honesty, no, I mean there are tons of other trams in other cities and things like that. Like Moab, they don't necessarily attract more tourists. I mean, sure, they add a little convenience, but it’s not necessarily something that’s going stimulate things enough to make a noticeable difference. DB: Now you mentioned the one in Moab, which actually Moab has two. From what I hear they're actually shut down, they're not even running. Because they don't get enough tourists or local population to even warrant staying open. Now also, we've got - one of the arguments against this that would stimulate tourists growth is that both Albuquerque and Palm Springs have them and they have actually made enough money to cover the costs and are actually now earning money. What do you think about that? BG: It could go either way, I think the cities that actually have had some success with those have some major attractions to go to. Whereas in Ogden we don't necessarily have many places that people would necessarily take those trams to. 11 DB: So you think it’s probably—it’s not going to be enough to bring someone here? But tourists who are already who are going to use them? BG: Correct, I mean if Moab is indicative of anything it definitely shows that you need some sort of big attraction in order for that to work. Whereas I don't think we have anything like that. DB: So, I'm just curious. Do you use any modes of public transportation? Do you use the bus system? Do you plan on using the Frontrunner system when it’s up and running? Do you do anything as far as carpooling? BG: I usually try and not drive by myself unless absolutely necessary. I do think that carpooling is definitely a good thing to do, and even if you don't believe in global warming or anything—which I don't. It’s still a good idea because it does get rid of congestion, plus I mean it’s a lot easier to keep track of your friends and stuff if you're' going out and doing something. DB: With the rising costs of fuel, do you think it’s something you might use more? If gas was at $5.50 a gallon, would you take a bus to work? Or would you alternate with a friend you work with on who drives? BG: It would definitely be a consideration, I know I’m definitely going to be using the Frontrunner when I go to concerts or when I go the Gateway as much as possible. Because even though my car does get decent gas mileage, it would be cheaper to maybe get a pass for the Frontrunner and use that whenever possible. DB: Alright Ben I think that’s about all the questions that I have for you today. But I would just like to thank you for meeting with me today and answering some of these questions 12 and hopefully this recording will shed some light on what the situations were back in April of 2008. BG: Not a problem, have a wonderful day. 13