Lookiing to the Future

[ohareward]

I read this in a weekly mag. It's about people doing their own thing.

Rob Hopkins spends much of his time gently turning people around to face the future; asking them what they see there. As the founder of Transition Town Totnes, he has placed a wake-up call with the citizens of this ancient south Devon centre, rousing them early for their appointment with "Peak Oil".
"The concept of transition towns," he says, "is based on the simple idea that a future with less oil will be better than a present with lots of oil."
Four hundred people crammed into the first public meeting to consider the post-peak-oil future. And one of the first ideas they came up with was to ask older residents how they coped with an essentially identical scenario - fuel rationing, food shortages, constraints on travel, a stop on imports - during World War 2.
Turns out it was simple: they got by on less. They hunted and grew their own food ("Dig for Victory!"), gathered firewood, read by candlelight and got plenty of early nights. Most important, says Totnes Mayor Pruw Boswell Harper, who remembers it, "We became closer as a community - we helped one another out."
Now, Totnesians are attending night classes; a sort of Future Shock 101. Local businesses learn how to reduce their dependence on fossil fuels through “oil-vulnerability auditing workshopsâ€

[glenniedragon]

What a fantastic idea, the whole town pulling together with a forward thinking Mayor, wish it was more like that here,

kind thoughts
Deb

[Wombat]

Love it!

Nev

[red]

happening to be a local to this... can say, not surprising for Totnes as it is a hippie town, with alot of environmental aware folk. and there are lots of 'what can we do about it' type meetings going on in the area.

do wonder why the article kept referring to Totnes as a village, and its villagers though.. as Totnes is definitely a town (albeit a town with a high proportion of veggie restaurants/cafes, an ethnic clothes market and two shops you can buy multicoloured hand made leather shoes ! several places to buy crystals, and wholefood/organic shops galore, as well as the more standard shops.)

[revdode]

Rob's website is good reading

http://transitionculture.org/

A nice mix of theory, thought, practical solutions and HOPE.

I'd recommend the Earth Care Manual, or anything else by Patrick Whitefield, although I'm sure there are other texts more suited to local conditions to those of you south of the equator in Permacultures original home.