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Happy Holidays, Urban Visionaries!

#Trees #Stars

PBS video on climate change conferences

Comment:

I would love to hear your thoughts on this video. Mary.ANALYSIS AIR DATE: Nov. 28, 2011

New Climate Change Deal to Succeed Kyoto a Long Shot

SUMMARY

What's behind the long struggle to reach a new international agreement on reducing greenhouse gases? Margaret Warner and The Washington Post's Juliet Eilperin preview the U.N.'s annual climate conference.

New York Times article on Durban conference

Hi Eric,

Yes! I feel your frustration. Why is it taking so long to make decisions that will ultimately save the planet? "Worst-case-scenarios" of climate change are visible, but I think the lack of inaction is because it may not have affected enough people personally yet. Unfortunately, it may take more instances of erratic hurricanes and earthquakes to speed up decision making in some countries.

Mary

The conclusion of the meeting was marked by exhaustion and explosions of temper, and the result was muddled and unsatisfying to many. Observers and delegates said that the actions taken at the meeting, while sufficient to keep the negotiating process alive, would not have a significant impact on climate change.

“While governments avoided disaster in Durban, they by no means responded adequately to the mounting threat of climate change,” said Alden Meyer, director of policy at theUnion of Concerned Scientists. “The decisions adopted here fall well short of what is needed.”

There is almost no coverage of this report in the U.S. Frightening, sobering, worth reading.

#climate change #IEA

Mary on Co-housing - I love the idea, reminds me of Kibbutzim's in Israel.

What Is Cohousing?

Cohousing communities offer nurturing places where people of all ages grow and age well.

Cohousing is a type of collaborative housing in which residents actively participate in the design and operation of their own neighborhoods.

Cohousing residents are consciously committed to living as a community. The physical design encourages both social contact and individual space. Private homes contain all the features of conventional homes, but residents also have access to extensive common facilities such as open space, courtyards, a playground and a common house. See our Frequently Asked Questions, below, and the widely quoted Six Defining Characteristics of Cohousing.

Next Steps

1. Attend the Conference

2. What's for sale or rent?

3. Take a virtual tour

4. Take a real tour

5. Visit the directory

See more at the bottom of this page.

Old-fashioned sense of neighborhood

Cohousing communities are usually designed as attached or single-family homes along one or more pedestrian streets or clustered around a courtyard. They range in size from 7 to 67 residences, the majority of them housing 20 to 40 households. Regardless of the size of the community, there are many opportunities for casual meetings between neighbors, as well as for deliberate gatherings such as celebrations, clubs and business meetings.

The common house is the social center of a community, with a large dining room and kitchen, lounge, recreational facilities, children’s spaces, and frequently a guest room, workshop and laundry room. Communities usually serve optional group meals in the common house at least two or three times a week.

The need for community members to take care of common property builds a sense of working together, trust and support. Because neighbors hold a commitment to a relationship with one another, almost all cohousing communities use consensus as the basis for group decision-making.

More "What Is Cohousing" Content here!

What makes cohousing communities unique

The cohousing idea originated in Denmark, and was promoted in the U.S. by architects Kathryn McCamant and Charles Durrett in the early 1980s. The Danish concept of “living community” has spread quickly. Worldwide, there are now hundreds of cohousing communities, expanding from Denmark into the U.S, Canada, Australia, Sweden, New Zealand, the Netherlands, Germany, France, Belgium, Austria and elsewhere.

In a cohousing community, you know who lives six houses down because you eat common meals with them, decide how to allocate homeowners dues and gratefully accept a ride from them when your car’s in the shop. You begin to trust them enough to leave your 4-year-old with them. You listen to what they have to say, even if you don’t agree with them at first, and you sense that you, too, are being heard.

Cohousing residents generally aspire to “improve the world, one neighborhood at a time.” This desire to make a difference often becomes a stated mission, as the websites of many communities demonstrate. For example, at Sunward Cohousing near Ann Arbor, MI, the goal is to create a place “where lives are simplified, the earth is respected, diversity is welcomed, children play together in safety, and living in community with neighbors comes naturally.” At Winslow Cohousing near Seattle, the aim is to have “a minimal impact on the earth and create a place in which all residents are equally valued as part of the community.” At EcoVillage at Ithaca, NY, the site of two adjoining cohousing neighborhoods, the goal is “to explore and model innovative approaches to ecological and social sustainability.”

Many other communities have visions that focus specifically on the value of building community. Sonora Cohousing in Tucson, AZ, seeks “a diversity of backgrounds, ages and opinions, with our one shared value being the commitment to working out our problems and finding consensus solutions that satisfy all members.” Tierra Nueva Cohousing in Oceano, CA, exists “because each of us desires a greater sense of community, as well as strong interaction with and support from our neighbors.”

For more on "What is Cohousing," see the widely quoted Six Defining Characteristics of Cohousing.

The Cohousing.org website has lots of ways for you to learn more about cohousing. Some of them are:

Take a quick virtual tour: This slideshow offers a glimpse at the variety of cohousing communities and the people who live there.

Cohousing in the News: Lots of magazines and newspapers have introduced their readers to the idea of cohousing. Here's a list of that coverage with links to the articles.

Cohousing Now!: We publish a free online newsletter sharing what's new in cohousing. Click the "Subscribe" button in the upper right corner to receive the free online publication.

Visit cohousing communities: Visiting a half dozen actual cohousing communities is an eye-opening experience. And here's an article that describes why it's such good exposure to the idea.

National Cohousing Conference: If you really want to know more about cohousing fast, consider attending one of our annualNational Cohousing Conferences.

Questions?: Your questions may well be answered in our FAQ, below - or Contact Us by email or voice mail (toll free).

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

Cohousing Glossary

What are the 6 Defining Characteristics of Cohousing?

Cohousing Basics

What is elder or senior cohousing?

What is retrofit cohousing?

Getting Started

Legal Questions

Living Together

Money

Link to Us!

Thich Nhat Hanh-a Buddhist Approach to Peace and Ecology

The role of journalists and corporates in combating climate change

Zen master Thich Nhat Hanh in a rare interview on the risks to our civilisation

A fisherman in the dried reservoir of Lam Takhong Dam, northeast of Bangkok, Thailand. Photograph: Vinay Dithajohn/EPA

I recently had the privilege of conducting a rare interview with the 84-year-old Zen Buddhist master Thich Nhat Hahn, who has written a best selling book on climate change, called 'The World We Have – a Buddhist Approach to Peace and Ecology.'

He has been in the UK to lead a five-day retreat called 'living peacefully, living mindfully' at Nottingham University, which was attended by nearly a thousand adults and children. He had also spoken to several thousand people at London's Hammersmith Apollo.

I have written an article about his views on the spiritual revival that he believes is essential if we have a hope of saving our civilisation and protecting the planet but also wanted in this blogpost to pick up on a couple of specific points we talked about: On the responsibilities of journalists and other media folk to head off catastrophe as well as his views on the role of corporations in promoting sustainable consumption.

We have carried a few blogposts already on how journalists can responsibly cover the issue of climate change. Nick Ceasar, head of the sustainability practice at Ashridge, wrote just the other day about looking at how Integral theory can help improve coverage.

There is also a really interesting article on the same subject by journalist Christine Ottery on her 'Open Minds and Parachutes' blog.

Thich Nhat Hahn, or Thay as he is known, believes in essence that our society has become spiritually polluted by the dualistic notion of god, or Buddha, being outside of ourselves, which has created feelings of separation, anger, fear and despair. We cover this up with over-consumption and a search for power, fame sex and so on, which has created the mess we are in.

On the question of the role of the media in bringing us back from the brink, he believes that it is not enough for journalists just to write about the issue of climate change, but that it is important they become the change they want to see.

He told me: "Without collective awakening the catastrophe will come. I think people in the mass media, journalists, film makers and others, you can contribute to the collective awakening if you are awake and then your life will embody that awakening.

"The way you eat, the way you live your life, will embody the awakening and what you say and what you do will have the power to create the collective awakening or we will be destroyed.

"Civilisations have been destroyed many times before and this civilisation is no different; it can be destroyed. We can think of time in terms of millions of years and after that life will resume little by little. The cosmos operates for us is very urgent but geological time is different."

I also asked Thay about the role of corporations in responding to the multiplicity of issues we face including climate change, the over-use of resources and loss of biodiversity. It's difficult enough for an individual to break out of their consumptive habits but how does a company do the same if it's very purpose is to grow and increase profitability.

This is what he had to say: "In our community in Plum Village [in France] we also want our work to expand and we want more people joining us and establish more communities everywhere. We believe it is possible to do so in such a way that we can protect the environment, we can create happiness and conditions for living happily.

"The same kind of thing could be done within corporations if the directors and associates and members of the corporation have that kind of healthy idea of happiness. Then the motivation to grow will not create damage. The idea of happiness is crucial and we know that in Plum village our happiness is not made from power and wealth and fame of sex. Our happiness is each day building brotherhood and sisterhood, having understanding and love among us.

"When people practice with us, we see the transformation and healing that is a very nourishing and rewarding for us. That is why we can continue and we want other people to help us because we have an aspiration and the same aspiration and spirit can be in every corporation. If they have the same kind of idea of happiness then the development of the corporation will not go against their awakening or the environment. That is why a spiritual dimension should be brought into the life of a corporation. There should be an awakening, happiness, love and mutual understanding. Without these the conflict is always there."

Whether or not you agree with Thay, it is refreshing to hear a spiritual perspective around climate change, rather than just the scientific view.

To some, Thay may come across as naïve or over-simplistic. Hearing him speak, reminds me of the character Chance in the film 'Being There,' played by Peter Sellers in his last major role before his death. Through a series of co-incidences, the simple gardener, who has lived his whole life in isolation inside a walled New York mansion, becomes a key adviser to the American president because his descriptions of tending his garden are seen as profound metaphors for revitalising the economy.

Thay, a prolific author with more than 85 books under his belt, also uses simple metaphors, such as the need to water flowers, to express how people wilt without love and recognition. He too loves to tend the garden in Plum Village.

But there the similarities end, for behind Thay's simple words lies a lifetime of developing spiritual knowledge and wisdom. What he has developed is the ability to cut through the Gordian knot of modern day complexity and remind us that our search for happiness is an inner journey.

Comment:

At the 'Boston Pledge' sustainability conference last weekend, many of the above themes ran throughout the presentations. Presenters highlighted the need for companies to care less about their profits and more about the happiness of their employees. Many of the wonderful Indian presenters spoke about the spirituality behind a company's existence. They asked that companies regularly examine why they are in existence and if their business product would be missed if not around.

Mary

Over the past four decades, rising income inequality has left larger patches of affluence and poverty.

Interesting take on how cities are changing as a result of increasing income inequality.

Bronx Park East, a single-room occupancy residence, opens new possibilities for housing stock in New York.

Great article on the possibilities -- and barriers -- to rethinking housing. Who knew there were mandated minimum room sizes?

On November 9th, Maeve Curtis Myers became the world's 7 billionth inhabitant, give or take a few million. In 2030, when Maeve is 18 (wowza, deep breath!) around 5 billion people will live in cities, according to the UNFPA.

(Read first, watch video second)

Sometimes sustainability comes from unlikely places.

Laura’s post on Bogota illustrated the importance of safe public space. New York City has a great example of this called The High Line (www.thehighline.org). The High Line is essentially a park in the sky, one section of which was opened to the public in 2009 and the next in spring of 2011.

The High Line is an example of how public space can bring people together. The original structure was an old and dangerous train line that was built in the 1930’s. It lifted freight traffic 30 feet in the air removing dangerous trains from the streets of Manhattan’s largest industrial district. The track ran through the meatpacking district and Chelsea. No trains have run on the High Line since 1980. Friends of the High Line, a community-based non-profit group, formed in 1999 when the structure was under threat of demolition. They came up with the idea to work with the city, whose support they got in 2002, to try and maintain the structure of an elevated park. With generous funding from Diller and Von Furstenburg, architects were hired and construction began on the construction of the park in 2006. Since then, many public art projects have been exhibited and admired against the backdrop of outdoor gardens, wildflowers, and the Empire State building in the distance.

The concept of"human scale" mentioned in Peter Calthrope's book, Urbanism in the age of Climate Change, is of relevance here. Though the High Line does not feature "local, decentralized services" as Calthrope mentions of a neighborhood designed to human scale, it does make the city more accessible to its inhabitants. In fact, the High Line allows New Yorkers and their guests to see the city in ways they never would have before. It IS a section of walkable New York that involves the face to face interaction that Calthrope also emphasizes as an important part of human scale.

The High Line was funded by millions of dollars from generous donors. Some people might view this as a stroke of luck. Nonetheless this project would have never happened if two ordinary people who were interested in the history of the High Line had not attended a community meeting and followed through on an idea they had. The mobilized artists and interested community members that made up Friends of the High Line are the people that made this happen. This has now become a big moneymaker for the city.

Above is the Ted Talk with Robert Hammond on how the High Line came to be and how it has brought people together.

Do you see this project as being an urban sustainability project? Why?

Are there places in your cities that you think could benefit from this type of revitalization?

-Karyn Lo Muscio

Solar Energy. An Overlooked, and Cheap (!?!) Renewable Resource.

The New York Times article, Here Comes the Sun ,written by Paul Krugman describes how our country is on the precipice of an energy transformation driven by the falling cost of solar power. However our political system will delay the energy transformation that is within reach. Industry backed organizations behind environmentally disastrous extraction means such as fracking and their political allies are actively hostile to burgeoning alternative energy industries.

Krugman continues with the story about Solyndra, the solar panel maker that was vilified by the G.O.P as a poor government investment. The often unheard side of this story is that Solyndra went under because the cost of solar panels dropped rapidly, and they couldn’t keep up with their competition.

This current issue is the newest piece in our country’s history of political backlash against renewable energy and climate change policies. Pulling from our reading for this class, I am reminded of Bulkeley & Betsill’s (2003) description on how internal conflicts and influences from the fossil fuel industry are a few reasons why the US has been slow to engage with international treaties aimed to combat global climate change. As it turns out the US has been heavily influenced by members of the fossil fuel and automotive industries under the Global Climate Coalition (GCC) (Bulkeley & Betsill 2003, p. 45). Interestingly the GCC, headquartered in Washington D.C is a coalition of trade organizations from the petroleum, chemical, transportation, iron and steel production, and utility sectors. They also fancy themselves as the leading voice for business and industry (Bulkeley & Betsill 2009, p. 45). I believe this has unfortunately created a paradigm where climate change, sustainability and anything labeled green are perceived as inherently bad for our economy

In an time where high unemployment rates and a down trodden economy are a burdensome reality, it is easy to gain support from the public to support resource extraction under the guise of job creation. Oftentimes this approach is the first step to appeal to the general public. Next, the public is vehemently exposed to indoctrinating propaganda from the political and corporate machinations against any sustainable or climate change solution. All creative tools, solutions and ideas for sustainability are suppressed and squandered. There is a lot of money, lobbies and creative advertisement that goes into push back against climate change adaptations/mitigations and sustainable solutions.

At this point, I fully understand what Ken Pruitt from the Environmental League of Massachusetts said that being right is not enough and environmentalists have to alter their communication style that matches its opposition. In an effort to tie up this semi-tangential post, the sun is a glaringly obvious source of renewable energy, it stares at us almost daily. Even when it is covered in those pesky clouds, it is still there. It is obvious that solar energy is one way to create renewable energy and prevent more green house gases from insulating our life planet. In light of this (pun not intended, but it stays) is it a MAJOR FAIL from environmentalists to not make solar energy a slam dunk politically and policy-wise? Are there any proposed bills in your community that could create positive environmental outcomes? How could you tailor its message to make it a slam dunk in your community?

Thanks for reading this, and if you are going to respond by saying, “Oh, I’ll just buy the sun, and create renewable energy for myself and for the world!” You can’t. This woman already did, and in my opinion she is failing at making solar energy a global reality just like the rest of us.

- Melissa Santley

Reference:

Bulkeley, H., & Betsill, M. (2003). Cities and climate change: Urban sustainability and global environmental governance. Oxford, UK: Routledge

#solar energy #fracking #climate change #sustainability

FYI from EJM: A new documentary on contemporary urban planning, well reviewed by the New York Times.

#Urban #urbanism #urban planning #cities #film

This article is very relevant to our discussions this past weekend. It's looking at Miami, and talks about how "higher ground" is being gentrified with pending flooding (that has already started). Some interesting perspectives...

Recommended by Kim

Check out this interesting and relevant article about small cities.

MA: The Most Energy Efficient State?

MA has edged-out CA to become top dog in the 2011 ACEEE State Energy Efficiency Scorecard report. The report is thorough, and you can attain a free copy here.

In the fifth edition of ACEEE’s State Energy Efficiency Scorecard, we present a comprehensive ranking of the states based on an array of metrics that capture best practices and recognize leadership in energy efficiency policy and program implementation. The Scorecard benchmarks progress and provides a roadmap for states to advance energy efficiency in the residential, commercial, industrial, and transportation sectors. A new, diverse set of states has followed a group of leading states by adopting significant energy efficiency policies, which will lead to innovative and effective programs. Nonetheless, tremendous potential remains for energy efficiency savings in all of the states should motivate decision-makers to advance energy efficiency. Cost-effective investment in energy efficiency now will be critical for the success of local, state, and national economies in the future.

P.S. To those of you using tumblr for the first time (myself included), thanks for adapting. - Ben

Take it for what it is worth -- a rating/ranking of great downtowns.

#Cities #Downtown #Forbes #Urban

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