The power of one to make a change

Talking about thought-provoking reading, if you get an opportunity try to get a copy of Beyond peak oil: Will our cities collapse? by Peter Newman. He has written extensively on city sustainability and this paper appeared in the Journal of Urban Technology, Volume 14, Number 2, published by Routledge.

Newman points out that “nearly all cities have participated in a global economy which has been built around the availability of cheap oil” and poses the question as to how cities will manage in the age of reduced oil availability. He provides various scenarios including collapse,…
..”some cities might easily collapse, most would be able to adapt”; the ruralised city, urban population disperses and creates a more sustainable semi-rural lifestyle, “not a likely scenario”; the divided city, wealthy move back to city centres which offer electric transit and short walkable destinations, suburbs increasingly house the poor; and the resilient sustainable solar city, quality electric transport links city to suburbs and everywhere has genuine walkability.

What should cities be doing to ensure that they fall into the last category? Among a number of lessons he suggests that the threat of massive oil reduction in the not that distant future should be taken far more seriously than is currently the case and that, as a result, we should be planning and building cities with reduced car dependence.

Joburg