Meet a city community that combines high-density living with open space.

SIX years ago, Jo Thomas moved into Adelaide’s CBD – but not into a lonely, city shoebox. She moved into Christie Walk, a residential development on the site of an old bottle-recycling depot. On land the size of about three suburban blocks, there are now 27 apartments and townhouses.

“I work long hours in my job as a doctor and when I first came here my daughter was still at school,” she says. “Her grandparents lived here too and she really liked being close to them, but she also had a lot of other people around, with diverse interests. It was good company for her.”

Christie Walk is included in a new book by American architect Ross Chapin, called Pocket Neighbourhoods: creating small scale community in a large scale world.

In a pocket neighbourhood, Mr Chaplin says, houses or apartments are grouped around shared open space, which can be a courtyard, a lively pedestrian street, or even conjoined backyards. There, residents will meet by chance and children can play safely.

Dr Thomas believes living at high density would be much more difficult without that kind of design. “We can stop and chat if we feel like it, or share a meal in the community room,” she says. “We know each other, but we have our own private space and dwellings. It’s the best of both worlds.

Despite a narrow, awkwardly shaped block, the layout of Christie Walk feels open and lively. There’s no driveway through the site. Instead, plants cover about a third of the space, including a deep rooftop garden and a vegie patch. The buildings also far exceed the minimum efficiency standards; residents’ utility bills come in at one-third to one-half of the state’s average.

Urban Ecology, an advocacy organisation founded by Christie Walk residents, has just released a short film and information pack, a decade after they ran their first site tour.

The project’s architect – and a former resident – Paul Downton, says the group set out to inspire better cities.

“We wanted to build something that recognised the city as a positive thing: not a problem to run away from, but a solution to walk towards,” he says.

“In terms of making great places to live, conventional development has missed the point completely. The pocket neighbourhood idea is a way of putting people back in touch with each other without rubbing their noses in it.”

Mr Downton says the idea of “connection” was a key to the design. “You can do it anywhere and everywhere. It comes back to recognising what humans are all about: we are not consumers,” he says. “Development should be about making us better able to enjoy life and connect with each other and the natural environment. Those are big aspirations, but they’re achieved through tweaks at the immediate, local level.”

The scope for this kind of change isn’t limited to new projects. In existing neighbourhoods, a good way to remove social barriers is to keep our physical barriers low.

“If you’ve got a six-foot fence out the front and you can’t see the street, you’re not going to make much connection there. Or compare backyards that are sealed off with ones where the kids can still see each other and ask each other to play,” he says. “Little changes can make a big difference to relationships.”

Read this article at The Age online

Why cycling will get you fit and green

BRUNSWICK resident Rosy Strong rides her bike to work in Richmond. “It means I don’t have to think too much about exercise or going to the gym out of hours,” she says. “My ride to work becomes my hour of daily activity.”

Around the offices of Bicycle Victoria, says Bart Sbeghen, they call this “the extra Tim Tam factor”.

“A lot of people ride for convenience and then they realise they’ve got the health benefit. An extra Tim Tam a day – it’s all justified,” he says.

Mr Sbeghen says there’s been a steady rise in commuter cycling numbers around Australia. “Riding to work just keeps going up and up, especially in the capital cities. Melbourne’s inner-north has almost one in five people riding to work. And the number of cyclists on Swanston Street lately is equivalent to more than 40 trams a day. It’s getting to be like a European city.”

If climate change is a diabolical policy problem, then cycling is one of the saintly solutions. Pedal pushing is an antidote for several modern ills, from greenhouse gas emissions, air and noise pollution, and traffic congestion, to obesity and social isolation.

“It’s a big cost saving too,” Mr Sbeghen says. “In some cases, people can give up the second car, or their monthly public transport ticket.”

But while inner-city residents can cruise on easy streets – especially in Melbourne’s north, which has a web of bike lanes – the roads are rougher for cyclists elsewhere.

Mr Sbeghen is working on design guidelines for new housing estates to make sure developers consider the needs of bike riders, such as direct links to shops, schools and public transport. With smarter planning, he says, cycling can fit in with local errands or make up one leg of a longer commute for people in middle- and outer-ring suburbs.

“Not all jobs are in the city, and shops and schools are always local,” he says. “Trips of between two and five kilometres are in the sweet spot where riding beats any other way of getting about.”

To find out about cycling in your area, contact your local Bicycle Users Group. On its website, Bicycle Victoria has a long list of BUGs and cycling clubs. “They’re popping up everywhere,” Mr Sbeghen says. “BUGs are independent and they talk to local politicians about what they want. It’s making for a much healthier city.”

If you’re hesitant about getting into the saddle, consider cycle safety training. Ms Strong’s business, Bikes@Work, runs regular courses for the Darebin, Booroondara and Whitehorse councils, as well as for individuals.

She says the idea of riding in traffic can be intimidating. “One rider said to me, ‘In a car, you’ve got metal wrapped around your skin, but on a bicycle, it’s skin wrapped around metal.’ People feel there’s a lack of protection.”

But that sense of vulnerability can become a strength, if you ride with it in mind. Ms Strong advises bike riders to use lots of lights and reflectors. “And you need to be looking around you all the time, observing and anticipating what could happen,” she says.

“Position yourself in a predictable, visible place on the road. Keep a metre out from the kerb or from parked cars – never assume drivers will watch for cyclists before they open their door.”

Read this article at The Age online

Too much light is damaging to our nights

ON Thursday, Friday and Saturday evenings, when the sky is clear, Jack Mack lugs his telescope, computer, card tables and folders to the front of his Abbotsford home. He positions a sandwich board, which reads: “Welcome to Footpath Astronomy”.

He’s been doing this for four years, on Nicholson Road, next to the Retreat Hotel. “It gives people an opportunity to see the moon, a planet or a star cluster through a telescope,” he says.

Most city-dwellers notice the moon and nothing more. “People walk past and I say: ‘Sit down here and look in the eye piece’. And they’re absolutely blown away. Saturn is the crowd favourite, because you can easily see the gap between the planet and its rings.”

In 1610, when Galileo observed for the first time that the Milky Way was made up of individual stars, our galaxy was so bright it cast shadows on the ground. Now, from where we live, most Australians can’t see the Milky Way at all.

Mr Mack is a member of the Astronomical Society of Victoria, which has a dark sky viewing location near Heathcote in central Victoria. Even from there, the glow from the city encroaches upon the sky.

“It’s light pollution,” he says. “At least in the bush you can see the Milky Way with the naked eye. As you get closer to the city, the light gets denser and you see fewer and fewer objects.”

That’s not the only adverse effect of light pollution. Mark McDonnell, director of the Australian Research Centre for Urban Ecology, says it’s a threat to biodiversity and alters animal behaviour and feeding habits.

“Night-flying insects cannot resist the light. Research from Europe has shown a dramatic reduction in the number and diversity of insects, particularly moths, in cities when compared to the village-farmland edge. They estimate billions of insects are dying,” he says.

“It not only reduces food sources for animals, but also it reduces the number of pollinators. Light pollution also affects when plants flower and when they go dormant for the winter.”

The International Dark-Sky Association website carries useful guides on light pollution and residential lighting. Mr McDonnell believes householders can take a lead in reducing its harmful effects.

“We shouldn’t have lights that shine up. Some homes are lit up like landing fields around doors, paths and garages. We can shield lights so they’re only directed downwards. We can use motion detectors and timers to switch lights off when no one’s around.”

All our lighting also sucks energy. Last year, the Municipal Association of Victoria launched the Give our streets the green light campaign, aiming to secure state and federal funding towards the up-front cost of more efficient street lights.

It estimates that better globes and fittings would cut lighting energy use by over two-thirds and cause three to four times less light spillage.

Mr Mack, flanked by two freeways, the city and the MCG, says light pollution is bad and getting worse. Even so, he can still summon wonder among passers-by. On a good night for seeing, he shows the moon. “I do it from a low magnification first, then I put in a higher power and they’re looking inside a sea pockmarked with craters,” he says. “The moon is just as fascinating as anything in the solar system.”

Read this article at The Age online

Plane travel is the forgotten baggage on the green-home carousel

The carbon footprint of a return flight to London is about the same as the average household’s yearly carbon footprint, according to Moreland Energy Foundation.

When Helen O’Shea, from North Fitzroy, first heard about the greenhouse impact of flying, the information stopped her in her tracks. “Like many other people, I’d changed the light globes, got solar panels and reduced my driving,” she says. “But I realised you can’t take a holiday from that once a year and virtually double your carbon emissions.”

So, four years ago, Ms O’Shea decided not to fly.

She retired recently, after a career in academia in which she had worked around Australia and overseas. “I have friends on the other side of the world who I’d dearly love to see every year, but if I’m serious about adapting my lifestyle to the needs of society and the planet, then I think I can’t do that,” she says.

“Like every resolution, it stands to be broken, but I’ve set myself a goal – and it’s a journey in itself.”

As a part of its Zero Carbon Moreland project, Moreland Energy Foundation coordinates activities and retrofitting deals to help people go green. In the last few months, the campaign has focussed on transport, encouraging residents to take public transport, walk, ride and car-share.

Asha Bee-Abraham, from the foundation, says that if we’re serious about reducing our emissions, we must also think twice about long-haul travel.

“Flying does matter. It’s a difficult issue, because it’s become more and more accessible. And as we’ve globalised, our relationships have spanned the world.

“We’re not asking people to give up the air cold-turkey, but encouraging them to pause and think before they book a flight. Can you have a similar experience more locally, or travel by train or bus instead?”

In the office, she says, workers can try video conferencing instead of scheduling interstate or overseas meetings.

The foundation compared the greenhouse emissions of a journey between Melbourne and Sydney by plane, bus and car, with different passenger numbers. For just one person, driving came out worst, followed by plane and bus. But with a full car, driving was the most efficient.

Ms Bee-Abraham says that although offsetting your flights can be worthwhile, you must do your research. Costs and calculations vary widely, depending on the kind of offset and its assumptions about the aircraft’s load and efficiency, and the effect of emissions at high altitudes. The Carbon Offset Guide website recommends making sure the offsets are independently verified and comply with recognised standards.

(For an alternative take on offsets, visit Cheatneutral, a satirical website which allows cheating partners to balance their infidelity by sponsoring the celibate or monogamous.)

Throughout May, Ms Bee-Abraham is running a local adventures campaign. “Travelling broadens our perspectives, but there are ways we can travel that don’t involve flying. In Melbourne we’re surrounded by beautiful scenery and national parks, as well as places where people can pamper themselves and see things that are very different to our day-to-day lives,” she says.

Likewise, Ms O’Shea says her resolution hasn’t meant foregoing all fun. “If I want to visit friends or have a trip, I take the train and turn holidays into a time where the travel itself is a big part of the adventure.”

Read this article at The Age online

For extra inspiration, obey gravity with short story writer Laura Jean McKay. She’s blogging about a year without flying.

Why big households are better than big houses

OVER the last century, Australians have lived increasingly alone. When the first national census was conducted in 1911, an average of 4.5 people lived in each home. By the most recent census, the number had nearly halved.

But at the same time, we’ve been building bigger houses – a report by CommSec in late 2009 found our new dwellings were the world’s largest – and affordability has fallen.

As permaculture founder David Holmgren summarises: “We’ve got bigger houses, with more stuff and fewer people in them.”

Proportionally, smaller households use more energy and create more greenhouse emissions than larger ones.

“As you get down to double- and single-person homes, the efficiency of the household economy falls,” Mr Holmgren says. “Food preparation, food wastage, heating, cleaning and maintenance all become a bigger load for less benefit.

“And when it comes to more self-reliant living, in a small household you can’t do as many things, like growing and preserving food, keeping animals, or your own building and renovation.”

He notes that not only are fewer people living together, but we’re also spending fewer hours at home. The combination forces ever-more development, jams our transport systems and exacerbates social isolation.

“Our cities are crowded by empty buildings under lock and key, with people racing between them – whether it’s to work, the gymnasium, the restaurant or the childcare centre,” he says.

Given the spare capacity in existing housing stock, he argues the case for “higher density living”, not higher density building.

Bigger households, where people are home more often, are likely to be consuming less, producing more of their own needs and contributing to the vitality of the local area.

So how can we live in larger numbers? Mr Holmgren says the two most common ways are to take in boarders or share with extended family.

“From a hard-nosed, self-interested perspective, if you’re a homeowner with a mortgage, renting the spare room out to a boarder is the best thing you can do to reduce your debt burden,” he says.

Likewise, Ed McKinley, of the Groupwork Institute of Australia, argues young people should consider the financial, social and environmental plusses of teaming up to buy a house.

“It’s one way younger people can enter the market and still live in the groovy parts of the city,” he says. “There are big blocks around with enormous scope to be cleverly reconfigured to meet individual, family and group needs.”

From this Friday to Sunday, the institute is running a short course on living and working well together. Mr McKinley draws expertise from nearly three decades living at the Commonground community, near Seymour.

“People are frightened it won’t go well and they won’t get their own space. They’re real concerns, but you can make agreements upfront,” he says. “You can be clear about what is going to happen when someone leaves or if people get into conflict. You can set up good processes and expectations to deal with those things.”

And while the concerns are real, so are the benefits. “It’s about having one block working a lot harder,” he says. “You might need to work less to afford that location. Your utility costs drop dramatically and you may have more capacity to install things like solar panels or solar hot water.”