Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
A fourth but more diffuse factor comes from the frustration of many individuals
about their decreasing local influence, their ability to affect, or change the deci-
sions made by ever larger and more distant governments and corporations whose
decisions often negatively affect local communities. This is a consequence of the
social fragmentation in modern society
, due to various factors associated with the
specialization, subordination, spatial flexibility and size of urban places (Davies
and Herbert
1993
; Table 2.1) that Transition Towns seek to counter.
These features have combined to lead to the growth of the Transition Town move-
ment, whose origins, development, major concerns and achievements are described
in the next three sections. However, the last few years have also seen the growth
of other community-based movements devoted to similar ends of creating more
sustainable ways of life, such as Eco-Villages (EV), but these describe projects
in rural areas so are not relevant to this urban discussion. More recently, another
urban-based movement, labelling itself as Eco-Districts, and primarily in inner city
American neighbourhoods, has also developed, which will be briefly reviewed in
the last part of this chapter.
72
Transition Towns Origin and Growth
There seems little doubt that many of the concepts behind the Transition Town
movement, and the policies being adopted in these centres, can be seen in the sus-
tainable initiatives carried out by individuals, corporations and various levels of
government throughout the world. However the pioneers of this movement have
been especially influenced by ideas from permaculture (Holgrem
2002
). This move-
ment drew its inspiration from the recognition that many agricultural practices in
the world had developed a self-sustaining capacity over hundreds, if not thousands
of years. These practices worked within the natural landscape, minimizing waste
and ensuring self-sufficiency without exhausting the land or sea. Moreover, like the
ecological approach which it resembles, it emphasised that the complex ecological
relationships within nature—and between humans and nature—need to be viewed
in total, not by single elements. These self-sustaining ideas spread beyond agricul-
ture, such as from ecological design to engineering, meaning that permaculture has
become an integrated approach to long-lived, sustainable development rather than
just being concerned with historic agricultural practices. However the key role in
initiating and consolidating ideas from permaculture to create the concept of con-
temporary settlements
transitioning
to a new future came from the work of Rob
Hopkins and his Irish students in an energy-lifestyle project developed in Kinsale
Further Education College in southern Ireland in the early years of the twenty-first
century. This project led to a plan to reduce local energy use and start the process
of change to a reduced energy future, a plan which was later accepted by Kinsale
Council in 2005 (Hopkins
2008
). Two of the students, Louise Rooney and Cath-
erine Dunn are credited with inventing the term, 'Transition Town', one that came
to define the subsequent movement of change, in which towns try to transition to a
new and less dependent future. This movement has not been simply concerned with
