From the Story of Stuff People - the Story of Bottled Water
Another punchy little episode from the people who brought us the Story of Stuff
And good on our "Bundy on Tap" cousins who have taken the obscene waste off the menu. Let's see a few more places do the same!
The debate about preserving Sydney's "Food Bowl"
An interesting example of differing views on the importance of Sydney's peri-urban "food bowl" - the rich alluvial lands in the Hawkesbury and Nepean flood plains to the west and north west of Sydney - was enacted at a daytime seminar run by the Environmental Defenders Office (EDO) last week.
Speakers at the seminar were Lynne Saville, president of the Sydney Food Fairness Alliance, Aaron Gadiel of the Urban Task Force and David Mason from the Dept of Primary Industry.
Each speaker was armed with a lot of statistics about the importance of Sydney's peri urban agricultural lands in the supply of fresh vegetables, eggs and poultry. Naturally there was some debate over whose statistics were the right ones, but that was the side show. (click read more below to continue reading)
Sydney Metropolitan Strategy Review paper released
Last year I posted a note that the Sydney Metropolitan Strategy was up for review in 2010 and that this should be of great interest to those involved in Transition activities in the region.
Now the department of planning has released its draft review and hopefully there will be decent consultation and consideration of input from expert and lay communities alike.
Here's a link to the report. I encourage all to read it and have their say. By all means use the comments facility here to be part of a Transitrion conversation, and perhaps we will submit a composite response.
Western Sydney gets on with creating its vision for 2030
Great to see that the Western Sydney Regional Organisation of Councils (WSROC) has taken a real positive approach to community consultation in its urban planning for the future. As well as involving some leading urban planners it has just launched a website inviting residents and business people who live and work in the area to have their say about what the vision for the west of Sydney should be.
The site is at http://www.westernsydney2030.com.au
Very encouraging to see this style of initiative. I hope the people of Western Sydney become aware of it, go there and have their say. Also hope that other ROCs in the Sydney region follow WSROC's example.
Debate on Land Use in Sydney - podcasts
People thinking about transition to a post-peak-everything Sydney and questions such as "how do we get around if not by car?", "how do we feed ourselves?", "how to we get off the dirty coal-fired energy grid?", "how does Sydney accommodate dramatic population growth in the next 20 years?" and so on, will inevitably form a view about how our precious land in Sydney should be used.
Imagining Transition in the Sydney Region
The attached report (link below) is the output of a full day workshop held in January 2009 by a group of Transition Sydney people and others. The workshop captured many ideas of what Transition might involve in Sydney and also examines some of the background and history of other initiatives toward sustainability in the past.
It has sat too long in the back room of this website and now we invite you to read it and to add your ideas, visions and information. Use the "Add new comment" link below to feed in your ideas and between us lets expand this valuable resource.
Here's the link to the paper "Imagining Transition"