[Graeme]

CITIES ARE THE GREATEST HOPE FOR OUR PLANET

If we design cities like ecosystems, they would have the potential to address many of our most pressing issues.

Of all the things people build, cities are the most important.

Cities are the largest things we build, and most people now live in them. But that’s not why cities are our most important invention.

Cities matter because they represent our greatest hope for long-term survival, not only for humans but for all species. They offer the best chance to dramatically reduce carbon pollution, provide shelter and community for the world’s growing human population, and protect rural habitat for species in decline.

But to make this hope a reality, we must recognize that cities — and people — are part of nature and subject to the same laws as the rest of nature.

For too long we have ignored the relationships between built and natural environments. Economic development has focused on “taming the wilderness” with technology. And while the “wilderness” is strikingly diverse, urban technology has been disturbingly monocultural.

ensia

[dohboi]

Cities certainly are places where major innovation can happen even while national and international bodies dither and waste time.

It will be good to have a thread like this to keep track of those.

But ultimately cities are essentially by definition unsustainable. They are also generally centers of power, the main result of which power is generally the ongoing destruction of global ecosystems.

[BobInget]

WE can see apartment house blocks consisting of 200 units, one foundation, one roof, fewer outside walls,
conjoined heating, cooling, electrical cogeneration, (PV panels, wind power, fuel cells) recycling, community gardens, recreation (clubs, gyms), in house laundry, child care to senior co/op housing are some of the possibilities.

[Lore]

I've pointed this out years ago as a solution which has long been promoted by the great architect and visionary Paolo Soleri who just passed away this last year.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paolo_Soleri

The cities we should be living in!

[Subjectivist]

I've pointed this out years ago as a solution which has long been promoted by the great architect and visionary Paolo Soleri who just passed away this last year.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paolo_Soleri

The cities we should be living in!

arcology-anyone-t54671.html

[dohboi]

Maybe, just maybe, if we had built them that way in the first place.

But we no longer have the leisure to build entire new cities if we want to leave some resources and an even marginally livable planet for later generations.

[dohboi]

http://www.climatecentral.org/news/citi ... cene-18262

Cities Designed like Ecosystems Offer Untold Gains

Of all the things people build, cities are the most important.

Cities are the largest things we build, and most people now live in them. But that’s not why cities are our most important invention.

Cities matter because they represent our greatest hope for long-term survival, not only for humans but for all species. They offer the best chance to dramatically reduce carbon pollution, provide shelter and community for the world’s growing human population, and protect rural habitat for species in decline.

But to make this hope a reality, we must recognize that cities — and people — are part of nature and subject to the same laws as the rest of nature.

For too long we have ignored the relationships between built and natural environments. Economic development has focused on “taming the wilderness” with technology. And while the “wilderness” is strikingly diverse, urban technology has been disturbingly monocultural.

Discuss.

[Narz]

If I had Bill Gates $ I would spend a few billion building some cities based on permaculture principles.

[Newfie]

Ah, in the land of milk and honey all things are possible.

They even give out free blue sugar drops.

http://robertlpeters.com/news/the-places-we-live/

[dohboi]

NArz, building a whole set of cities from scratch would be expensive indeed. But not just in money.

The process would take enormous quantities of resources and, no matter how carefully done, create huge amounts of GHGs and other pollutants and waste...

[dinopello]

Top 50 cities to see before you kick it.

Some of these are better than others with regard to after TEOTWAWKI... but I think the list would be almost completely different if that was the theme.

[Narz]

NArz, building a whole set of cities from scratch would be expensive indeed. But not just in money.

The process would take enormous quantities of resources and, no matter how carefully done, create huge amounts of GHGs and other pollutants and waste...

Housing 100,000 people in a small area will always create less waste than housing 100,000 in a scattered area.

Think about heating twenty houses vs. twenty units in an apartment building.

Being human in our modern age means producing pollution & waste, may as well minimize it.

[basil_hayden]

NArz, building a whole set of cities from scratch would be expensive indeed. But not just in money.

The process would take enormous quantities of resources and, no matter how carefully done, create huge amounts of GHGs and other pollutants and waste...

Housing 100,000 people in a small area will always create less waste than housing 100,000 in a scattered area.

Think about heating twenty houses vs. twenty units in an apartment building.

Being human in our modern age means producing pollution & waste, may as well minimize it.

There may be less waste in a city, but it's more concentrated. Not helpful when the solution to pollution is dilution.
Long Island Sound is a cesspool at this point in time.

[dohboi]

Narz, your argument misses my point.

If you think concentrated populations are good, we have plenty of that already. Improve the efficiency of those already-built cities rather than going to start new ones at enormous economic and ecological expense.

But in general, a city is pretty much by definition an entity that is not sustainable within its own area.

No city (over 1 million) in the world has ever or will ever grow all its own crops and derive all its other raw materials from within its own borders.

[Narz]

No city (over 1 million) in the world has ever or will ever grow all its own crops and derive all its other raw materials from within its own borders.

Sure, that's what the rest of the world is for.

100 suburbs of 10,000 each will never produce even a fraction of their own supplies either & are magnitudes less efficient than one large city (and have less potential for change/restructuring). Theoretically everyone could do food not lawns but A : that's not going to happen & B : even if it did suburbs still wouldn't be as efficient as cities because food is just a portion of inputs necessary for life.

[dohboi]

Obviously, I'm not promoting suburbs, here.

Meanwhile: http://www.resilience.org/stories/2014- ... t-problems

Want to See How Governments Are Making Real Progress? Look to the Cities Tackling Our Biggest Problems

A citizens’ group in Minneapolis made the point about bike safety by building pop-up bicycle-only lanes, using DIY plywood planters to separate the bike riders from automobile traffic. Bicycle advocates in Atlanta, Denver, Oakland, Calif., Fargo, N.D., and Lawrence, Kans., followed suit.

[Newfie]

Dohboi,

You are making good points.

The point, that's what the rest of the world is for, is misguided. We are running out of that "rest of the world". There is no space left between Boston and DC that is not part of a 1,000,000 city.

While this may have been a great idea 100 years ago, that time is past. The suburban land defiled, our valleys paved over.

Human civilization is in late middle age to early old age. The time of our great agility is past. Our crops sown. Winter approaches.

[dohboi]

"I look forward to the day when our roads become bike lanes. Then mountain-bike trails. Then oxen paths."