The "blue line" on Center Street depicts where Strawberry Creek may one day flow through downtown Berkeley. Created by Ecocity Builders and friends one night several years ago...with the City's permission.

The proposal for a "green" downtown centerpiece project in Berkeley is taking another step toward what we hope will be a breakthrough in healthy and sustainable economic and ecological development. Last year, working with our allies in Berkeley ("Citizens for a Strawberry Creek Plaza," a working group of Berkeley environmental leaders who have been meeting regularly for over two years to help advance our shared “green” principles for the downtown Berkeley centerpiece location), we were effective in getting the City’s citizen task force in charge of drafting a set of recommendations for the Planning Commission to adopt an impressive number of “green” recommendations for the site where the University has been planning a hotel conference center and museums relocation in the central downtown. The task force recommendations were unanimously accepted by the Berkeley City Council and passed on to the University planners who have promised to take these reccomendations seriously.

Things got complicated, however, when the University announced its Long Range Development Plan (LRDP) and protest immediately ensued in the community. The City even sued the University over the plan, which they saw as unfair. As part of the settlement, the University and City jointly agreed to engage in a more open planning process for downtown, and as a result, a new committee has been appointed to examine and help up-date plans for downtown development. Along with Citizens for a Strawberry Creek Plaza, Ecocity Builders continues to actively promote a "green" and ecologically healthy downtown.

Citizens for a Strawberry Creek Plaza is launching a website depicting our vision, which is centered around daylighting Strawberry Creek through a well designed pedestrian plaza that would be the anchor point for new green buildings with ecological features—hotel, conference center, museums, housing and new retail.

Ecocity Builders' reason for working on this project for so many years is to help create a place that can directly speak to the needs of our times. We are looking for a “postcard breakthrough;” that is, a place where all the pieces of an ecologically healthy city come together in one place, so close and so well ordered that the whole cluster of buildings, creek and associated open space can be seen at a glance. The new downtown planning process embraces several times the area of the two block core north of Center Street between Shattuck Ave. and Oxford St. that we have been focusing on. However, we will remain committed to the smaller area. It is an ideal size for creating a working, real place able to speak to not only the whole downtown, but the whole city, and cities everywhere. Put it on a post card, and—move over Golden Gate Bridge and wiggly Lombard St.—Berkeley’s Heart of the City plaza will be not only beautiful and intriguing but “relevant.” Richard remembers that somewhat pedantic term from the first Berkeley Vietnam Teach-In, 1965. Now, as then, we need more projects that can do us good, so it’s not such a bad word. The idea is to make the world a better place. Why not? Everybody should be doing it.

http://www.strawberrycreekplaza.org

Give it a visit!

Two or three times a year a remarkable invitation is beamed down from outer space into this here computer. Several weeks ago one such missive arrived from Korea: an invitation to share ecocity ideas in the debate on what to do with the DMZ.

The Demilitarized Zone between North Korea and South Korea was established at the end of the Korean War and in the intervening 52 years has, with no people present, turned into one of the most biodiverse landscapes on Earth. Migratory birds including the endangered red crowned crane have returned. Amur gorals, long haired goat-like antelopes able to drink salt water, have returned. Even a few Siberian tigers, according to some reports.

My hosts are Friends of the Earth, Korea. This particular conference, the International Symposium for DMZ Conservation, is also sponsored by Gangwon Province, a local newspaper and the Ministry of Government Administration and Home Affairs.

Judging by the list of speakers, the event brings together government, science and populist environmental advocates and could promise to be important in setting future policy.

I imagine that I’ll be suggesting an experimental city or town with ecocity features facing out on a coast line or a river in the DMZ from adjacent land, or if in the DMZ, ONLY if three or four times the displaced land is secured for future high quality natural habitat. Future rail between north and south should receive much more emphasis than highways and both should travel sufficient distances underground to provide for migration and ranging of animals.

—Richard Register

The crux of the matter is the means to reshape the city. Chief among the tools to do that is “ecological city mapping.”

Find the centers of the city, its downtown and its major and minor centers: district centers down to the most intimate neighborhood centers.

Also, find the areas farthest from those centers. These are the least accessible in transportation terms, and also in terms of social equity. It costs from $7,399 per year (Knoxville, TN) to $11,844 per year (Detroit, MI) just to own and operate an average car in the US, according to the respected survey company Runzhiemer International. So poor people need not apply for full membership in the city of cars. That’s a social injustice.

Also, identify the ecological features most crucial to regenerating a healthy natural environment, such as creeks, and best places to restore biodiversity. In addition, evaluate carefully the landforms, including the soils, wetlands and marshes, ridgelines and hillsides to determine the best places for building and the places that would be better left for natural or food-raising purposes.

Put all that on a map and you have guidelines for reshaping the city for long term health and for a civilization based on renewable energy, land conservation and an ethic of biodiversity forever.

Certain other tools follow, such as transfer of development rights (TDR) and supportive zoning. Workshops are needed for simultaneous education, community participation and decision making. But with the map project underway, there is a chance a city can reshape itself for people and away from the form that has been all the rage over the past 100 years, the form designed for the automobile.

As we are moving into this project, Ecocity Builders' Program Director Kirstin Miller is taking the lead. We recently met with Arthur Monroe of the Oakland Museum of California seeking the encouragement of his art department in particular and the involvement of artists in the whole process. Randy Hayes, head of sustainability strategies for the Mayor’s Office of Oakland has indicated support. We have also approached Ella Baker Center and the International Council on Local Environment Initiatives—their Cities for Climate Protection project is also based in Oakland.

Another promising potential partner in this process is the University of California’s GIS Mapping Center. We’ve had several meetings to discuss collaboration, and we are currently exploring ways to partner on the project in order to utilize their expertise and extensive database for the community mapping and exploration of layers of data we will need to evaluate.

As soon as we raise the basic funding to launch the project we will begin. If you are interested in contributing financially or as a project facilitator, researcher or on the ground explorer, please contact Kirstin: kirstin@ecocitybuilders.org.

Project Agastya (Bangalore, India), Ecocity Builders and our international partner organizations are launching The Sixth International Ecocity Conference, "From Theory and Planning to Development—Transforming a City into an Ecocity," August 5 - 12, 2006, Bangalore, India, as part of the International Convention of the Cities of the Future.

Founded by Richard Register in 1990, Ecocity Builders is the keeper of the International Ecocity Conference Series, which brings together the world’s best innovators, educators, administrators, designers, planners and concerned citizens working for ecological urban solutions.

The Sixth International Ecocity Conference follows five pioneering conferences, the first held in Berkeley, USA (1990); Adelaide, Australia (1992); Yoff/Dakar, Senegal (1996), Curitiba, Brazil (2000) and Shenzhen, China (2002).

As with the preceding five International Ecocity Conferences, we will present a world-class line-up of international speakers and experts in their fields. The Program will be posted on the Ecocity 6 Conference Webpage hosted by TCI Travel Corporation, which will also be handling registration and accommodations: http://www.tciconferences.com/ecocity2006/ecocity2006.htm and Ecocity Builders’ website: http://www.ecocitybuilders.org

Topics to be addressed include: whole systems ecological city planning and implementation, best practices and case studies from around the world, sustainable transportation and healthy non car dependent living, global warming abatement through ecocity development, energy issues including peak oil and gas, re-localization of economies, ecological design of buildings and integrated building programs, urban villages and eco-villages, bioregional planning, urban agriculture, local food, edible landscaping, delivery of goods and services, healthy watersheds, waste water, rainwater, solid waste, zero waste, flood and disaster prevention through ecological design, cultural sensitivity and celebration through ecocities, reclaiming agricultural land and open space from sprawl, equity and fair trade, healthy lifestyles, community, identity, safety, quality of life for both people and nature

Project Agastya, an initiative of the 25/Bangalore Foundation, is a citizens’ initiative with active support, co-operation and participation of the Central and Karnataka Governments, industry, educational and research organizations, NGOs, residential associations, community based organizations, facilitators, and experts for transforming Bangalore into a sustainable eco-city by 2025.

Registration Details: Normal Participant - USD 250; Student - USD 125; Author - USD 187.5. The registration fee includes conference fees, meals and Bangalore excursion arranged during the conference. Note: (a) Authors are eligible for special discount (25%). (b) Delegations with 6 members & above are eligible for special discount (25%). (c) Authors / Delegates are allowed only one of the above 2 discounts (whichever higher). For more information, visit: http://www.tciconferences.com/ecocity2006/ecocity2006.htm

Make a World of Difference, Become a Conference Sponsor! Company sponsors will receive appreciative thanks and proper public credit for their important help. We are actively seeking partners in funding and facilitation for Ecocity 6. Contact Rajeev Kumar, Chief Organizer, or Kirstin Miller, Ecocity Builders’ facilitator in the United States, if you would like to discuss the benefits of becoming a sponsor.

Rajeev Kumar, Chief Organizer of Ecocity 6, is Co-founder/Chief Executive Officer, Project Agastya. He can be reaced by email and telephone. E-Mail : ecocity6@gmail.com Mobile : (+91) 98861 94776/98801 07467.

If you are interested in joining a delegation from North America and receiving a discount on registration, please contact Kirstin at kirstin@ecocitybuilders.org.

http://www.tciconferences.com/ecocity2006/ecocity2006.htm

by Richard Register

We just experienced the worst hurricane season in US history, with the earliest hurricane on record, more named tropical storms (26), more hurricanes (13) and one of them, Katrina, destroyer of much of New Orleans. Together with Rita, Katrina dealt a staggering blow to the US oil and gas industries, driving drivers crazy over $3.00 to $4.00 per gallon gasoline. But will we wake up to solutions to global warming and learn something about how to deal with coming peak oil?

We in Ecocity Builders believe the far and away largest piece of that solution is the far and away largest thing people create: cities. And despite what could have been a wake up call after Katrina, we seem to be doing very little while grumbling that government is further reducing services to pay for shifting some aid to storm victims while we are asked to tighten our belts to help out. But over where the real action is, oil companies are raking in the largest profits in history - staggeringly high profits! - and the war for oil grinds on with thousands of deaths and tens of thousands of injuries.

There is encouraging news, though. Some ecological sophistication actually became mainstream with major media running articles on the relationship of Mississippi sedimentation to local health and wealth: millions came to understand that natural overflows of the muddy river into the bayous create a build up of soil and fertility that supports mangroves and other plants that buffer the surge and waves for New Orleans. They also serve as home and nursery for countless species at the base of the human economic and local cuisine food chain. People by the millions now know that the oil and natural gas industries are contributing to subsidence in the region by sucking out the substance of that delicately balanced earth, water and ancient underground geological sea of fossil chemicals. They have heard that global climate change is causing a steady rise in sea level and increasing the frequency and ferocity of hurricanes. Katrina has made all that a little more convincing, even visceral. Many people have even come to understand that the lack of sediment laden fresh water overflow is killing off the natural species in the Mississippi Delta as saltwater replaces fresh.

Whether Katrina will turn out to be a real tipping point, who knows? Will the storm motivate anything effective for climate stability? Will the economic realities of the damage sink in just as we are finding energy surprisingly expensive and getting more expensive - from now on?

The next steps in ecological thinking were not taken by Big Media, nor for that matter by the mainstream environmental organizations. The follow up question was never asked: Could Katrina be the avenging angel of suburban sprawl, the collective conspiracy to drive ever more cars without end? Forget urban design, hop into your Prius and drive on? The connection of New Orleans’ travails with suburban, automobile-based city structure was left to us. So was the notion that Everytown, USA, as well as New Orleans, needs to be rebuilt.

Local journalists and more distant writers and radio talk show hosts in our network were asking us for ideas on rebuilding New Orleans. Grist, the internet magazine, published some of these on October 24. Yes Magazine asked for illustrations of such ideas for an up coming article authored by Van Jones of Oakland’s Ella Baker Center for Human Rights. Congress Member Earl Blumenauer’s office in Washington, DC asked for a briefing on ecocity solutions. Our friend and sculptor of the Green City Visions conference Joell Jones put us in touch with her brother Blake Jones who is a lawyer in New Orleans working on reconstruction issues.

Local journalists and more distant writers and radio talk show hosts in our network were asking us for ideas on rebuilding New Orleans. Grist, the internet magazine, published some of these on October 24. Yes Magazine asked for illustrations of such ideas for an up coming article authored by Van Jones of Oakland’s Ella Baker Center for Human Rights. Congress Member Earl Blumenauer’s office in Washington, DC asked for a briefing on ecocity solutions. Our friend and sculptor of the Green City Visions conference Joell Jones put us in touch with her brother Blake Jones who is a lawyer in New Orleans working on reconstruction issues.

As to some of our specific suggestions for New Orleans, we have basically three, all of which make sense for the pedestrian city, none of which are possible in the city designed around cars.

1.) build on constructed mounds, 2.) create a pattern of streets and buildings that slows the wind and 3.) create a “shell” for the whole city.

The “mound” idea is anything but new. It goes back to the earliest city of any scale on the planet: Ur, of the Sumerian Civilization, with 50,000 inhabitants. Almost 5,000 years ago that city was constructed on an artificial mound of earth that, in the floods of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, turned the city into an island in the majestically passing water. When the flood subsided, a thin layer of fertile soil had replenished the agricultural land and the life in one of the world’s earliest civilizations went on.

More to the point in New Orleans, that’s how the Indians of the region built many of their buildings and whole communities: on constructed mounds of earth. Very basic! If they were smart enough to do it, why not us?

For another particular local solution for New Orleans, we can look to a number of European cities, such as the old city of Nice, France. Its curving streets slow the wind greatly, creating a pleasant environment in the otherwise frequently hot and windy climate. “T” shaped intersections also deliver that service, creating a good layout for hurricane country. The wide straight streets of the city built for cars can become wind tunnels of catastrophic force. Instead, make streets generally narrow, cozy, winding, with “T” intersection and even dead ends here and there. The “labyrinth” street layout works in high winds to create a calm urban “interior.” If in addition, the city is a dense pedestrian design, only the “outside” taller buildings that face the winds need to be reinforced with extra strong glass and siding. This is idea number three for New Orleans: the shell. Inside, at street level several feet above the flood, there is no need to evacuate at all.So for New Orleans, think mound, labyrinths and shell - and for every city, pedestrian city.

Q: Where can one get in-depth knowledge of the history, theory and practice of ecological city activism, design, planning and building? A: Right here in the Bay Area at a class being taught for the University of California Extension in San Francisco by Kirstin Miller with Richard Register and others as occasional guest presenters.

“Ecological Cities—Sustainable by Design” will emphasize the organizing principles of ecologically healthy cities, taking into account land uses, eco-zoning and sustainable development strategies, restoration of nature, watersheds and agriculture in the city, and integration of natural design, inside and out.

The class starts in the Spring Semester, and is one of several new classes in UCB Extension’s Sustainable Design Programs in Sustainable Interior Design and Sustainable Environmental Design and Stewardship. For more information, contact kcontreras@unex.berkeley.edu, or call 415 284-1070. To request a course catalog, call 510 642-4111. www.unex.berkeley.edu

The reverse order, Richard teaching and Kirstin supporting, prevails in late May in a three week course at Schumacher College in Devon, England, but that’s another story and far, far away. Still, if you are interested in travel to an in-depth class on the subject visit www.schumachercollege.org.