Edens Lost & Found

Environmental educators look to Edens Lost & Found

2006-07-23T09:55:00.000-04:00

Edens Lost & Found co-director/producer Harry Wiland and environmental educator Deb Perryman of Elgin High School in Illinois are among presentors at the North American Association of Environmental Educators 35th annual conference, held this year October 10-14, in St. Paul, MN.

Wiland will host a one-hour segment fromEdens Lost & Found, a public television series that focusses on strategies that contribute to sustainable urban environments. The strategies include parks and open space, urban forestry, watershed management, public art, waste disposal, recycling, green architecture and mass transit alternatives.

Deb Perryman, Illinois Teacher of the Year for 2005, will co-host the Edens presentation with Wiland. Perryman, who is featured in the Chicago segment of Edens Lost & Found, has championed a "service learning approach" that NAAEE is weaving through the conference this year. Perryman is working with Edens Lost & Found to compile curricula that focus on sustainability issues. NAAEE has a preconference workshop on service learning and is planning a community service project for conference participants. Next year's NAAEE conference in Virginia Beach will have an entire strand on service learning.

Envisioning Seattle's Open Space System

In other "econews", the sustainability movement continues to grow and gain a firm hold in cities throughout the world. Seattle's Nancy Rottle submitted this news that shows how ecological and social conduits rely on each other to create healthy human and natural environments. Nancy is Assistant Professor, Department of Landscape Architecture and Adjunct Assistant Professor, Department of Architecture at the University of Washington in Seattle.

Citizens from civic, environmental, business, neighborhood and community groups have joined with the University of Washington to create a 100-year plan for Seattle's open spaces. Our collaborative vision reaches from the city limits to the downtown core, creating a comprehensive network of parks, civic spaces, streets, trails, shorelines, and urban forests that will bind neighborhoods to one another, create ecological conduits from the city's ridgelines to its shorelines, and ensure a wealth of green spaces for all citizens to enjoy.

More than 300 citizens on 23 teams collaborated in a Green Futures Charrette to develop an open space plan that addresses the entire city. Each charrette team, led by professionals and composed of planners, designers, developers, artists, engineers, ecologists, citizens and open space advocates, focussed on a different part of the city to envision livable, healthy urban watersheds and neighborhoods for the next century.

Leading up to the charrette, Open Space Seattle 2100 co-sponsored a series of public lectures and events, addressing civic open space, ecological cities, equitable access to open space, green infrastructure and Seattle open space design considerations. Concurrently, UW students conducted supporting research for charrette participants. The resulting charrette teams' plans have been coalesced and will be presented to our partners and supporters in City of Seattle agencies, the Seattle City Council, the Mayor's office, and the public. The plans will endure for the next century, but will have immediate application by influencing agency planning, neighborhood implementation efforts, and a potential parks levy in 2008. Visit the project at www.open2100.org

Please share your sustainability project.
Add a comment to this blog, or e-mail Edens.

Sierra celebrates urban sustainability

2006-06-24T19:43:00.000-04:00

The cover story in the July/August issue of Sierra, celebrates "Green Streets: Bright ideas about transit, recycling, energy, and food."

"A truly green city integrates environmental sustainability into everything from its sidewalks to its skyscrapers. Its public transportation is affordable and extensive, its streets safe and pleasant for bikers and walkers. It invests in renewables and energy efficiency, protects open space, reduces waste, and provides clean air and water and access to healthy food for residents of all economic classes," the magazine says.

The Sierra Club long has been a pacesetter in the environmental sustainability movement. We find it very gratifying to have spent the past three years producing Edens Lost & Found, and now are delighted to find that Sierra and Edens are, as they say, "on the same page."

Sierra recognizes a dozen American cities for their extraordinary efforts toward a "brighter, greener future:"

- Salt Lake City invested in a 19-mile rail system that is bringing people downtown to denser mixed-use neighborhoods.

- Atlanta allocated $1.7 billion to surround the city with a beltline of parks and trails accessed by public transit.

- Davis, California, now requires popular vote for approval of proposed large developments on farmland.

- Minneapolis expanded its recycling effort. A local nonprofit hires workers to harvest tons of construction and demolition materials and send them out again through the ReUse Center.

- Avondale, Arizona, developed a "recycling school" for residents who put garbage into recycling bins

- Missoula, Montana, bicyclers collect coffee grounds from local businesses and ride them to a community compost pile.

- Austin, Texas, provides free consultations to builders and homeowners on environmentally friendly construction techniques. The city fleet is changing to hybrid and biodiesel vehicles.

- Denver replaced 20,000 traffic lights with energy-saving bulbs.

- Scottsdale, Arizona, requires all new public buildings to meet the U.S. Green Building Council's highest standards

- Pittsburg's green built convention center incorporates a water-reclamation system, maximizes natural light and ventilation, and uses environmentally friendly materials.

- Oakland, California, is studying the feasibility of producing 30 percent of the city's food within a 100-mile radius

- Chicago boasts more than 2.5 million square feet of green rooftops which provide insulating cover while cooling the effects of concrete on the city's heat index.

- New York City has one of the largest hybrid bus fleets in the country, and was one of the first to adopt hybrid taxis

- Portland, Oregon fits new developments onto half the usual land area, leaving space for pedestrian walkways and green areas

- San Francisco has adopted progressive purchasing policies, invested $100 million in solar power, and started a partnership between culinary enterprises and composting efforts

- Charlotte, North Carolina, promotes brownfield redevelopment to clean up and refurbish areas that have gone into decline

We invite you to look at the four cities explored in Edens Lost & Found:
Chicago, Los Angeles, Philadelphia, and Seattle.

Urban sustainability is an idea whose time has come, and none too soon! Get on board; follow the Edens project online at: http://www.edenslostandfound.org and subscribe to the newsletter for more inspiration.

2006-06-11T13:17:00.000-04:00

"How ordinary citizens are restoring our great American cities" is the exciting core of the Edens Lost & Found effort. Produced by Wiland Bell Productions, Edens looks on the bright side of what is being done for urban sustainability at the individual, neighborhood, community, and municipal levels.

Look into EDENS WEBSITE for action guides, urban success stories, links to helpful websites, activities, and just plain inspiration.

The premise of Edens recognizes that we have lost the "garden of eden" we were given, but now are compelled to find it again. Rather than dwell on the causes of social and environmental degredation, Edens hopes that focus on positive effort will inspire new activism, deepen existing involvement, and edge us closer to the tipping point of universal commitment to the health of the planet.

Produced for Public Television, the first two segments of Edens Lost & Found aired in May. These dealt with Chicago and Philadelphia. In September, the Los Angeles and Seattle portions are due to be broadcast. Check local listings.

To further emphasize and spreak these grassroots movements, a companion BOOK has been produced by Chelsea Green Publishers. The book adds content to the television series -- and, of course, is available whenever you want to refer to it!

Edens Lost & Found is a project of the Media Policy Center Foundation, and seeks to spread awareness of problems and potential solutions to every community through town hall meetings and forums. There is also a NEWSLETTER that shares ideas and projects that are working around the world. Please sign up!

We'd love to hear what you're doing to keep the wheel turning. Post your project and please include a URL for any relevant website or blog. THANKS!