Posts Tagged ‘sustainability’

Last April at the National Planning Conference in Minneapolis, I had the distinct pleasure of attending a green roof mobile workshop.  I had some experience with green roof construction from graduate school, but it was nice to touch and feel different types of materials used and learn how neighborhoods in Minnesota promote and provide incentives green roof construction. This website has additional information about the green roof I photographed above.  It was installed in 2004, and should remain viable for another 15 years or so before it needs to be replaced.  Although you may think of a green roof as being lush and luxurious, this system uses sedum, which is common of European green roof construction.  The sedum, which grows in the tundra, is able to withstand the cold Minnesota winters and hot Minnesota summers. It’s a promising strategy that the neighborhood has to provide plaques for these “demonstration project

In an earlier post, I touched on urban greening and gardening as a key component of a livable community strategy.  From the urban planning perspective (by nature a comprehensive one) any sort of “sustainability strategy” should focus on the triple bottom line of economics, environment, and equity (social justice).  However, it should come as no surprise that in our country we often place the most weight on the first “e” – economics.  And some “down-and-out” communities are using urban greening as an economic development opportunity. In the current economic downturn, and certainly, during the economic restructuring of the past decades, Flint, Michigan has certainly been hard hit.  Beata Mostafi from the Flint Journal tells the tale of the synergy between urban greening and economic development in an article entitled “Project envisions turning urban lot into greenhouse for Hoffman’s deli”. The University of Michigan-Flint is incorporating food systems planning into their revitalization of an historic

The past fifty years have seen the transition from a manufacturing economy to an information and service economy.  Concurrently, market preferences, policy decisions, and economic growth led to the expansion of the suburbs – then exurbs – and the decline of central cities.  Only recently have we again learned to value central cities and urban living. As concepts such has smart growth gained traction in the 1990s, planners, economists, and community organizers developed a variety of revitalization strategies.  Organizations like Smart Growth America and the National Vacant Properties Campaign have been promoting and researching smart growth concepts, and the benefits have been paying off: the Obama Administration’s Interagency Partnership for Livable Communities incorporates many of the concepts of sustainability, walkability, economic opportunity, affordable housing, and transportation choice.  But what role does urban gardening, food systems planning, and public health have in this promising initiative? It seems for now, the partnership is focused mainly