Here are some articles that caught my eye this week...
Oh, and here's a rose from the garden...
I love cycling to and from work. It's free. It's clean. It's faster than the car or bus. And it's a great workout. No need for expensive gym fees.
But in New Zealand, most people don't see cycling as a viable way of getting to work. Cycling makes up about 1% of all trips. Twenty years ago it was 3.6%. Most New Zealanders get to and from work by car, usually one person to a car. By contrast, in some northern European countries 20 to 30% of trips are made by bike.
This is pretty appalling for a country that markets itself to the outside world as being clean and green - "100% pure". And pretty appalling for a people who pride themselves on being fit, rugged and outdoorsy types. This is bullshit, of course. Most of us are indoorsy - we spend our days inside homes, offices, cafes, cars and gyms.
The New Zealand government wants to increase cycling and walking to 30% of total trips in urban areas by 2040. There's fat chance of this happening unless central government and local authorities make a sustained investment in cycling facilities, like networks of bike lanes (proper lanes, that is, separated from the road), kerbside bike racks, and roads where cyclists and walkers get priority over cars.
Cyclists have to play their part too. There's nothing more off-putting than seeing cyclists with hairy white legs, riding along in tight lycra shorts, bright reflective jackets and cheap crappy helmets.
For cyclists, the following should be de rigueur: fit and tanned bodies, slick bikes, snappy gear, and cool shades. If we want more people to cycle, then we have to make it cool, stylish and fun.
If you could design your city of the future, what would it look like?
This article highlights scientific research into ways that biotech could be used to create sustainable urban habitats and fight climate change...
"Forget skyscrapers studded with undimmed lights. Instead, think of crystal whites and luminous blues forging the city’s silhouette. Picture a city that sucks in carbon and uses bacteria harvested from dead fish to light the darkness."
The ideas outlined in the piece are interesting, and would be pretty cool if they came about. But why wait for some utopia? We shouldn't lose sight of the fact that there are many practical things that we can do now to make cities more liveable and sustainable and less polluting.
Like giving walking, cycling and public transport priority over cars. Like making cities self-sustaining, though measures like distributed and micro renewable energy generation (solar panels on rooftops), urban farming, and household rainwater collection and greywater recycling. And like growing or renewing urban forests to soak up carbon dioxide and provide habitat for other animals.
Best cop flick ever?
Tough question - there's so many great movies to choose from. Dirty Harry, LA Confidential, Hot Fuzz, Miami Vice...
But my top pick is not American or British. It's a Brazilian film, "Elite Squad", directed by José Padilha, which came out in 2007.
Based on real life, Elite Squad portrays the experiences of a captain and two rookie officers in BOPE (Special Police Operations Battalion), an elite military police unit in Rio de Janeiro. Set in 1997, the film takes the viewer deep into the squalor, crime, corruption and drug warfare of Rio's favelas. There are no golden beaches in this film, no bronzed bodies relaxing on the sand at Copacabana, no fun games of beach soccer. This is intense stuff - urban warfare, fought between paramilitary police and drug gangs, in tight-packed slums.
You can't really describe BOPE as a police force. It's a commando unit, clad in black, heavily armed, and engaged in urban combat. BOPE's officers and men don't patrol a beat, investigate crimes and prosecute criminals. They live by the creed of the infantryman - close with the enemy and kill him.
Unlike Rio's ordinary police, which the film shows as slovenly, inept and utterly corrupt, BOPE prides itself on being hard, highly trained and honest. Up against merciless drug lords, BOPE commandos fight fire with fire: they infiltrate the favelas by night, shoot on sight, execute criminals, and torture to get information.
In the film, Captain Roberto Nascimento is burnt out. He's searching for someone to take over his squad so that he can retire knowing that his men are in good hands. He's found two promising rookies, Neto Gouveia and André Matias. Both joined BOPE from the ordinary police after running foul of their venal superiors. At the same time, Nascimento's been ordered to cleanse a slum of its resident drug gang so that the Pope can stay there during his visit to Rio.
The film interweaves these two stories. Along the way it exposes the corruption within the ordinary police - where police chiefs fight for control of lucrative kickbacks, precincts sell automatic weapons to drug dealers, and the cops shift corpses to other areas so that they won't have to investigate the killings. The film also takes a swipe at the hypocrisy of Rio's wealthy university students, who fuel the drug trade by smoking dope and snorting crack, while blathering on about Foucault and state repression.
Elite Squad makes you think about the future of policing in the urbanized, overcrowded and anarchic 21st century. As the authorities bleed sovereignty and cede territory to drug lords, insurgent groups and militias, will police become militarized and focused on protecting turf, resources and revenue?
Is the future of policing about making war, not enforcing the law?
A better way to get in shape - cycle about or spend money at the gym?
On 6 September I set myself a personal challenge. To cut back on my use of the car and to get about using my own two feet (or failing that to use public transport) over a four week period.
Why? I wanted to become more self-reliant and resilient, and cut back on my use of fossil fuels. I wanted to gauge the difference this makes to my quality of life. I wanted to get a sense of how practical an "own two feet" lifestyle is for a suburban dweller.
How did I go? Over the 28 days of the challenge, I travelled 336.5 kilometres (208 miles). Here's how I got about:
Upshot - for four weeks in spring I was able to get around my city, doing the usual range of activities, largely without needing to use the car.
Some people might think that this challenge sounds like a drag. Far from it. I enjoyed it. It gave me plenty of sun, fresh air and exercise. It gave me time to think, to observe what was going on around me, and to discover some interesting nooks and crannies in my native city. It also had a psychological benefit: I feel healthier, and there's something very satisfying about being able to rely on yourself, rather than a car, for getting around.
What surprised me was how quickly leaving the car at home became a habit. So much so that I'm going to keep on doing it, to extend the challenge to one year. I'll report every month on my progress.
I'm not pledging never to use the car again. Cars are useful, especially when you need to move heavy stuff around, transport the kids between several sporting events on Saturday morning, or go somewhere where there's no public transport. But we need to learn to use cars wisely and in moderation, e.g., by getting the most use out of single car journeys.
Many thanks to everyone who encouraged me and made insightful observations and helpful suggestions over the last four weeks.
This is the end of week 4 - the final week - of "Operation Own Two Feet", my personal challenge to cut back on using the car. In the last seven days I've travelled 79 kilometres (49 miles). I cycled 42.5 km, walked 15.5 km, and caught the bus 21 km. I haven't used the car for the last nine days.
This morning I walked to my mother's house in the city, 10 km (6 miles) away, to pick up my son who had spent the night there. It took about 90 minutes, compared with 10 to 15 minutes if I'd gone there in the car.
You could argue that if I'd driven I could have spent the saved 75 or 80 minutes doing other things. But the walk served several purposes:
All up I'd say that this was a pretty efficient use of time and energy.
In the next couple of days I'll write about the overall result for Operation Own Two Feet, and draw some conclusions about the practicality of an "own two feet" lifestyle.
I used the car once, to pick up my son after school on a rainy day, a 1.5 km trip.
What's surprised me is how quickly I've got out of the habit of using the car. Before the challenge, cycling to the swimming pool, walking home from work, or taking my son on the bus to a friend's party, seemed like a hassle. Now, after just three weeks, walking, cycling and busing has become almost routine. It's also enjoyable.
Part of the difference involves reorienting your mindset. If you think about the benefits of walking or cycling - such as exercise, fresh air, saving money - rather than the "hassle", you're far more likely to get out and do it. Yesterday my six-year old son taught me a valuable lesson in this respect. When I suggested, with some trepidation, that we catch the bus into the city instead of driving, he leapt at the idea...
"Cool!" he exclaimed.
"Why's it cool?" I asked, a little surprised.
"Because in the bus you sit up really high and you don't have to wear seatbelts".
Perception is everything.
I've reached the end of week two of "Operation Own Two Feet". Looking at my daily log, I see that I've travelled 89 kilometres in the last seven days.
One kilometre was by car: a taxi ride, last night, with colleagues, on the way to a bar. Enough said. Otherwise I walked 29.5 km, cycled 23.5 km and bused 35 km. I did my supermarket shopping online and got the groceries delivered to the door.
Dean at Travels with Shiloh has followed my lead by biking to work: read about his experience here. One of the points Dean makes is that...
"As fun as this was I can see how it would get really old. Inclement weather would raise all sorts of difficulties ranging from annoyances to making the trip impossible."
After reading this I realized that if you're trying to leave the car in the garage, it helps to have several viable options for getting about. In Wellington, if the weather is crap I can catch a bus or train. It also helps to live in safe and compact places. But many people live in sprawling cities and suburbs where there are few alternatives to the car. As Adrian commented...
"potential walkers in American cities cannot - driving a car is safer in many instances, especially at night, because it means you don't have to walk through neighborhoods in which you are at risk of street robbery".
"many American communities have been developed...to discourage walking (or any form of transportation other than personal car for that matter).
Shopping, businesses, recreational facilities, parks, are placed far from residential areas. Bike lanes are virtually non-existent (not to mention bike racks) and our incredibly poor driver training/testing standards means biking on the road can be particularly hazardous."
Sometimes I think that even enlightened urban planners get things around the wrong way. They look for complicated solutions to urban transport - light rail, trams, bus only lanes - but eschew simple and practical measures.
Wide pavements, walkways, pedestrian-friendly crossings, public bike racks, cycle lanes - these are simple and cheap measures which could help cut the number of cars on the road, manage pressure on public transport and finances, and reduce waistlines, blood pressure and cholesterol.
Ah ha, so the ancient Britons did have cities after all! So much for Roman propaganda that they were just a bunch of savages who lived in grass huts, sacrificed babies and dabbed themselves with woad.
Having said that...
In the 21st century most of us will live in cities of one sort or another. Here are some ideas about the possible evolution of cityscapes over the course of the century.
Historically subordinated to feudal interests and nation-states, many cities, large and small, will regain some degree of autonomy. Large educated populations and high technology will give some cities critical mass, enabling them to become self-sufficient in revenue, food, water, energy, and waste management.
These cities will consist of vibrant urban cores, and hinterlands which were once sprawling suburbs but have been depopulated and converted to the intensive production of food, timber, energy and water. The "inner wasteland" of the urban core will also be used to grow food and generate power. People will live in the densely populated core or in compact communities in the hinterland. Many residents will be employed producing food, water, energy, or in ecological restoration and waste recycling.
Such cities will become powerful political entities in their own right - city-states which hark back to the ancient Greek polis and the medieval city republic. They will govern themselves, retain tax revenues, levy militias (or pay for mercenary forces), and conduct their own foreign, security, economic, energy and environmental policies.
They may or may not break formally with nation-states: de facto forms of autonomy and symbiotic relationships will be common. A symbiotic relationship might involve a city-state paying the national government to provide for its defence against other nation-states or powerful non-state entities.
City-states may not necessarily be democracies. Oligarchies may thrive at the city-wide governance level, perhaps with communitarian and theocratic forms of governance operating in neighbourhoods, towns and villages. City-states will be linked to each other with high speed computer networks and transport. Some may form loose "communities of cities": separated by distance but networked for security, economic, cultural and sporting activities and the exchange of ideas and innovations.
>> Imagining the 21st century series
(Photo: Timothy K Hamilton, "Chicago nightfall panorama".)
Who'd have thought that skyscrapers, that symbol of rampant capitalism, would go green? It's like someone ripping out the guts of a Hummer and dropping in a poncy electric motor.
Chicago's Sears Tower is getting a green makeover. It will be retrofitted with solar panels and wind turbines, upgraded wall and window insulation and water systems, advanced lighting, fuel cell boiler plants, and energy efficient elevators.
The owners claim that the retrofit will lead to "unparalleled energy savings and reduced CO2 emissions...reducing the base building electricity use by up to 80 percent".
Meanwhile in Guangzhou, the Pearl River Tower is being hyped as the most energy efficient superskyscraper ever. When finished in 2010, the tower will have wind turbines, sun shields, solar panels, smart lighting and water-cooled ceilings. It's designed to use half the energy of similar sized buildings.
Of the two strategies - retrofitting an existing skyscraper or building a new one - I'd argue that retrofitting is the way to go. If you've got an existing structure, it makes sense to kit it out with the latest green technology.
A new structure may use less energy and emit less CO2 than a retrofit (because it was designed that way at the start). But you have to factor in the vast amount of energy that is used and the CO2 that is emitted in the manufacture and transport of building materials and the construction. And the building will still use extra energy which has to be generated somehow, probably through burning coal.
So while it's cool to see green design and technology coming to the fore, it's a shame that this is being wasted on monstrosities like skyscrapers, rather than making 21st century cities green, liveable and energy efficient.
And yes, call me a cynic, but we have to be mindful of "eco-skyscrapers" as another form of greenwashing, designed to give corporate owners and tenants a veneer of environmental respectability. Like Okhta Tower in St Petersburg, the fancy new head office of Russian gas corporation Gazprom.
An abandoned house in my neighbourhood.
SE emailed me about my Inner Wasteland and Regeneration series:
"While I cannot say I agree with you in every instance about the utility of making greenspace for the sake of greenspace, I can say that your ideas on Urban Wastelands may be coming to fruition in the US".
He kindly sent me this article about Flint, Michigan, a city with a dwindling population. Here the local county is shrinking the city - allowing abandoned suburbs to revert to woodland, and concentrating housing, business and services in the city's core...
"The local authority has restored the city's attractive but formerly deserted centre but has pulled down 1,100 abandoned homes in outlying areas. Mr Kildee estimated another 3,000 needed to be demolished, although the city boundaries will remain the same. Already, some streets peter out into woods or meadows, no trace remaining of the homes that once stood there."
Now I'm not arguing for making urban "greenspace for the sake of greenspace". What I'm suggesting is that urban wasteland should be converted into space that is productive in some sense. Examples of productive use could include...
communal gardens, which would provide food and livestock, plus employment and local resilience;
parkland, which would provide recreational opportunities; and
woodland, which would absorb carbon dioxide, stabilize hill-slopes, minimize rainwater runoff, and provide habitat for wildlife.
SE's given me a couple of other interesting ideas to chew on, which I'll follow up in another post.
Have you noticed how much of our urban space is covered only in grass - playing fields, bowling greens, golf courses, front lawns, roadside verges and so on? Why are we so obsessed with grass? At least playing fields serve a useful purpose (I can't say the same about golf courses) but the often spacious roadside verges don't.
The picture shows a verge at the entrance to Miramar, Wellington - another instance of the "inner wasteland". This is a large grassy area which is mowed every week or so by a tractor that burns Saudi crude. It features a billboard enticing us to buy cars that also burn Saudi crude. All up a poor use of space.
Pulling down the billboard and planting the site with trees and shrubs would be far more useful. As with this nearby site, trees would provide habitat for birds, make an attractive entrance to Miramar, soak up carbon dioxide, and cut the fuel costs of mowing the lawn.
Apologies to any golfers...
Golf courses are one of the worst examples of the "inner wasteland". They occupy a lot of space yet are used by a small number of people. They require large amounts of water. Vast quantities of chemical pesticides and fertilizers are dumped on them.
Imagine if this golf course in Wellington, NZ, was converted to a mix of community energy, food and wood production. Some areas of the space could be covered with solar panels, perhaps with sheep grazing the rows between. Other areas could be converted into community vegetable gardens, chicken coops, fish ponds, and stands of fruit, nut and coppiced trees.
As a global society we are butting our heads against natural limits to growth. There is, for example, not enough accessible oil left to satisfy our insatiable demand. There are not enough fish left in the world's oceans to meet our insatiable appetites. Throughout the world, the area of arable land is shrinking due to changing weather patterns, advancing deserts, salinization, and the exhaustion of rivers and aquifers.
In such a world, we have to rethink how we use available land, and for whose benefit. In such a world, golf courses are an extravagance, a waste of space.
Another 'inner wasteland' site, this one next to Burnham wharf at Miramar, Wellington NZ.
There'd be little point in trying to grow a garden here, as the north-west wind gusts across Evans Bay. But you can see that nature is already starting to reclaim the space, with pohutakawa and karo trees. So why not fence off the site, plant coastal native trees and shrubs, and allow it to regenerate? The trees would provide habitat for birds, make for an attractive entrance to Miramar, and soak up carbon dioxide.
For some time I've been writing about the urban 'inner wasteland': vacant lots, grassed or concrete verges and backyards, old industrial sites, empty
rooftops and so on. And about the need to use such land productively - for cultivating food, generating electricity, collecting and storing
rainwater, absorbing runoff, and growing trees to provide timber and fuel and soak up carbon dioxide.
Why? So that our communities can become more resilient by providing at least some of the basics of life - energy, water, food. So that our communities can generate extra employment and activities for local people. So that our communities can take a more active role in local environmental management.
I'm posting a series of photos to highlight the inner wasteland in my city, Wellington, NZ. It's not difficult to find inner wasteland. There are sites all around us - empty, ugly, weed-infested; strewn with rubbish, discarded condoms, and abandoned shopping trolleys; often tucked just out of sight and out of mind. Like the site pictured above - an empty building and lot at Burnham wharf, Miramar. For a society that is obsessed with property rights, we make poor use of a great deal of land.
I'll also look for regenerating places, where people are making productive use of land that was once waste (e.g., for urban gardening), or where nature is doing the job for us.
"The Storming of the Bastille", by Jean-Pierre Houël.
According to the Times, Scotland Yard is expecting big trouble during the G20 summit, which is being held in London on 1-2 April.
The officer commanding the police response said that a hard core of protesters
was intent on storming buildings and provoking violence.
“Everything is up
for grabs. That is the aspiration, to get in and clog up these City
institutions as best they can,” Commander Bob Broadhurst, of the
Metropolitan Police, said.
“We are seeing unprecedented planning among protest groups. Some of the groups of the late 90s are coming back to the fore and there is a coming together of anarchists, anti-globalisation groups and environmentalists. They are plotting and planning what they are going to do and the picture is changing almost every minute. They have some very clever people and their intention on April 1 is to stop the City.”
There's a palpable air of crisis to this story, a mood of circling the wagons, very 1789. It's hard to tell if this is for real - if the protests really do pose a danger to G20 politicians - or if this is a story manufactured by government PR, with the aim of providing cover for a massive crackdown.
Also interesting is how the Times chose to accept without question the police view, and play up the "violent disorder" angle. But there are other, deeper, angles to this story:
Are the protests driven by popular anger over the inability of politicians to respond effectively to global crises, like the near collapse of the financial system (and the greed and incompetence of financiers) and the threat of climate change?
To what extent do the protests reflect a general loss of confidence in politicians, and how widespread and enduring is this likely to be?
And has the Met become the defender of an ossified power system and those who benefit from it (a global elite of politicians, financiers and corporate executives)?
When I think about the times we are living through, two big questions grip me. Firstly, can our national and international institutions do what's needed to ward off economic and environmental crisis and collapse? Answer: probably not - the track record to date hasn't been flash, and our politicians seem to lack the skills, inclinations and imagination to tackle the problems.
And secondly, is this an epoch of transformation in the way we organize ourselves politically, economically, socially and in relation to the natural world? Answer: probably - and if so, what are the key areas of transformation, and how will change come about? Through violent upheavals, grassroots organization, re-invigoration of existing institutions, and new forms of networking and organizing - or all of the above?
This wasn't quite what I had in mind when I wrote recently about urban farming: Eric Vergne's skyscraper farms. According to Inhabitat...
"Eric Vergne’s Dystopian Farm project envisions a future New York City interspersed with elegantly spiraling biomorphic structures that will harness cutting-edge technology to provide the city with its own self-sustaining food source."
There are obvious advantages to centralizing urban food production in skyscraper farms. These include economies of scale and efficient use of space. But this approach would be ripe for abuse, as oligarchies, corporations and criminal gangs could seize control of the food supply for their own benefit. And skyscraper farms would be vulnerable to catastrophic events, like earthquakes, fires and terrorist attacks, which would cause major disruptions to food supply.
A better approach is to have a mix of skyscraper farms and small-scale urban cultivation - backyard, rooftop and communal gardens (the latter on "inner wasteland", e.g., vacant lots, old industrial sites, parking lots, disused factories, offices, apartments). This would build resilience into urban food supply by distributing production throughout the system, rather than concentrating it at a handful of vulnerable nodes.
Hydroponic greenhouse in Iran (photo: eshare).
One of the great challenges of the 21st century is feeding the burgeoning populations of world cities. Global population keeps rising, as does the demand for food, but water supplies are drying up and arable land is being lost to rising seas, salinization, and advancing deserts. Where's the food going to come from?
Urban hydroponics may be part of the answer. Hydroponics is a way of growing plants using mineral nutrient solutions, without soil. This article (h/t: The Oil Drum) looks at the prospect of urban cultivators using hydroponics to grow food for city dwellers:
"In a New York City schools program run by Cornell University, students grow lettuce on a school roof and sell it for $1.50 a head to the Gristedes chain of supermarkets.
Cornell agriculturist Philson Warner, who designed the program's hydroponics system, said his students harvest hundreds of heads of lettuce a week from an area smaller than five standard parking spaces by using a special nutrient-rich solution instead of water.
The numbers have some researchers imagining a future when enough produce to feed entire cities is grown in multistory buildings sandwiched between office towers and other structures."
One of the things that I find striking about my own city and its suburbs is the large amount of inner wasteland. This can range from vacant lots and grassed or concreted backyards to old industrial sites and empty rooftops. The impact of economic recession will increase the area of this inner wasteland, with empty parking lots, building sites, offices and apartment floors.
It's not hard to imagine a time when we use these spaces productively: for growing food (with hydroponics or in the soil), generating electricity with solar panel arrays and micro-turbines, and collecting and storing rainwater.
The outposts (photo: Kotare).
Do suburbs have a future in an era of economic crisis and oil scarcity? Jeff Vail is writing a series which seeks to answer this question. I'll be following it with interest, as it involves practical thinking about the future and avoids the usual post-Peak Oil extremes of TEOTWAWKI or agarian hippie utopias.
Many argue that suburbia was a terrible idea — a giant waste of land, capital, and culture. I largely agree. But there you have it: suburbia happened, with no refund available....it is time for the discussion to shift from "suburbia sucks" to “what are we going to do about it?”
Jeff asks "Is it possible to build a vibrant, sustainable, and self-sufficient civilization on the framework of existing suburban development?" I agree with his key idea - that we need to adapt our suburban lifestyles to new economic, energy and transport realities. But some suburbs are going to be more resilient than others.
Any suburb that was built before the 1950s - before the age of the automobile and cheap oil - is going to have a future. These suburbs are close to urban centres, and connected to them by good public transport. They have some degree of built-in self-sufficiency - community amenities, like halls, small shopping centres, theatres, and schools. They were designed so that people could walk and cycle about. They have modest houses on large land sections - useful for vegetable gardens and chicken runs. Because they are compact, it's easy and cheap for local authorities to maintain and upgrade infrastructure - roads, water and wastewater systems, and power lines.
Any suburb that was built during the automobile age is going to wither. These were designed on the principle that oil was cheap, and that people would drive everywhere - to the local shop to buy the paper and the milk, and to the city to work and play. They are distant from urban centres, and lack public transport links. They have limited community facilities, and large energy-hungry houses on small sections. Because they are spread-out, it is difficult and costly for councils to maintain infrastructure.
So, what's going to happen to those outer suburbs? Are they going to become weed-infested wastelands, filled with derelict houses, rusting cars, and rotting refuse, useful only for materials can be salvaged and recycled?
Better to take a planned obsolescence approach, and over time move to regenerate the land for useful purposes. These purposes could include market gardens and orchards to supply the cities with food; coppiced woodland for sustainable supplies of timber and firewood; forests to soak up carbon emissions and hold soil; and small-scale wind and solar farms, to make electricity close to the point of demand.
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