Indian Bend Wash – Resilient Safe Fail Urban Green Infrastructure

How can infrastructure protect urban areas from extreme weather, while providing other benefits when weather is non-extreme? Indian Bend Wash in Scottsdale Arizona is a 17 km greenbelt that runs through the Phoenix metropolitan area in the SouthWest United States.  It is "green infrastructure" designed to provide both flood protection and recreation. Indian Bend Wash is a historic floodplain, which was urbanized in the 20th century.  In the late 1960s, development in the floodplain [...]

2016-10-21T00:20:01+00:00infrastructure, United States, Urban, urban ecology|Comments Off on Indian Bend Wash – Resilient Safe Fail Urban Green Infrastructure

Farm Hack: open source technology for small-scale resilient agriculture

 How can small-scale farmers network to share ideas, innovations, and inventions to increase the resilience of sustainable agriculture and rural economies? Before the industrial revolution, low-input agriculture was the norm, but now, farmers must make a conscious choice if they want to avoid large scale mechanization.  Many small-scale farmers in the US are discovering new means of food production and in the process, innovating tools and equipment. Innovations can range [...]

2016-08-02T14:00:42+00:00sustainable living, United States|Comments Off on Farm Hack: open source technology for small-scale resilient agriculture

mySidewalk: internet enabled democracy

How can the networking power of the internet be used to leverage more representative democracy? Imagine having a simple, direct way of informing city planners and local decision-makers of your views about traffic, schools, parks, libraries and other issues that affect your life. What if sharing your opinion on municipal planning was as simple as going online? mySidewalk offers online forums for community engagement. All photos from mySidewalk.com [...]

2016-05-11T14:00:30+00:00Technology, United States, urban ecology|Comments Off on mySidewalk: internet enabled democracy

Center for Ecoliteracy

Can changing what schools serve for lunch help to address deep challenges in the food and education systems, while inspiring ecological awareness in children?  A child in the state of California's public education system will consume around 4,000 school meals between the time of entering kindergarten and leaving high school. With more than 6 million children attending California state schools, the simple question of what gets served for lunch, and [...]

2016-04-20T21:06:41+00:00Food, Food system, health, Project information or update, United States|Comments Off on Center for Ecoliteracy

Heartwood Cohousing

Building a sense of community, stewardship and sharing through cohousing communities: can alternative ways of living and making decisions found within intentional communities scale up?  How? Heartwood Cohousing is one of many cohousing communities throughout the world. There are about 150 in the USA alone. Heartwood's goal is to recreate an old-fashioned neighbourhood where neighbours cooperate to live more sustainably. Heartwood has 100 hectares of land, 25 irrigated, with an organic farm that [...]

2015-11-24T18:58:04+00:00Food, Integrated social-environmental, Social Seeds, sustainable living, United States|Comments Off on Heartwood Cohousing

Urban Designed Experiments   

How can learning and experimentation improve urban sustainability? Urban Designed Experiments are projects that embed ecological research into urban design to study and shape buildings, landscapes, and the infrastructure of human settlements. Designed Experiments are a type of project rather than a specific project, and several have been conducted in the USA.  They combine elements of adaptive management with landscape architecture and urban renewal to co-create new urban landscapes that are sustainable and human-friendly. The projects are adaptable, flexible and are based on connecting educational organizations, grassroots organizations, local Governments, and local Stakeholders. [...]

2015-09-18T13:00:00+00:00infrastructure, Integrated social-environmental, transdisciplinary research, United States, Urban, urban ecology|Comments Off on Urban Designed Experiments   
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