Control Urban Growth!

"Perpetual growth is the creed of the cancer cell." -- Paul Ehrlich

John Zeger

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Effecting change in your community -- an example of how it's done

In Santa Barbara, CA the group Preserve Our Santa Barbara (www.preserveoursantabarbara.com) has been organized principally to lower building heights in their downtown and to further general objectives of neighbourhood preservation. They are well funded and running a slate of candidates in the upcoming civic election in which the subject of lowering downtown building heights will be a referendum item (Measure B). This is an example of community activism at its best and demonstrates how individual… Continue

Added by John Zeger on September 27, 2009 at 7:12am — No Comments

Increasing residential densities will yield only modest CO2 reductions, U.S. National Academy of Sciences finds

Urban planners hoping to help mitigate CO2 emissions by increasing housing density would do better to focus on fuel-efficiency improvements to vehicles, investments in renewable energy, and cap and trade policies say some commentators as a recent report by the U.S. National Academy of Sciences finds that increasing population densities in metropolitan areas would yield insignificant CO2 reductions. read the article and the report: http://www.technologyreview.com/energy/23343/?nlid=2323 Continue

Added by John Zeger on September 7, 2009 at 1:30pm — No Comments

Former managing editor of Portland newspaper says that controlling population is the only way to save environment

Jack Hart, former managing editor of the Portland Oregonian says that controlling population is the only real answer to our environmental problems. Cut and paste this link to your browser bar to read his op-ed piece: http://www.populationmedia.org/2009/05/27/treading-on-a-taboo-overpopulation-in-america/ Continue

Added by John Zeger on June 21, 2009 at 4:24pm — No Comments

William Rees calls "smart growth" an "ineffective" solution to mankind's sustainability dilemma

In the recent article in the journal Building, Research & Information "The ecological crisis and self-delusion:implications for the building sector," William Rees writes that, "The world's top ecologists and climate scientists tell us that global civilisation is on a collision course with biophysical reality ... we have 'overshot' long-term carrying capactiy ... staying on our growth-based path to global development virtually guarantees eventual catastrophe for billions of people." Yet despi… Continue

Added by John Zeger on June 13, 2009 at 8:30am — No Comments

"Smart growth" called "a monumental planning failure" in San Diego County, California

Cut and post the following URL into your browser window: http://www.nctimes.com/articles/2009/05/27/opinion/commentary/z1542fd2c43455508882575ac00594897.txt Continue

Added by John Zeger on May 27, 2009 at 6:30am — No Comments

Population-Environment Balance

In an excellent article, the U.S. based organization Population-Environment Balance explodes some of the myths that are used by "smart growth" proponents and concludes that the only real solution to our environmental problems is population growth control. http://www.balance.org/articles/sprawl.html Continue

Added by John Zeger on April 9, 2009 at 6:00pm — No Comments

Study finds an inverse relationship between density and social interaction

A study of 15,000 people done by professors of Dublin City University and the University of California concludes that social interaction declines with increases in urban density. But we already know this intuitively as we have all experience big cities to be less friendly than smaller communities. This is yet another blow to the "smart growth" crowd that wants to cram all of us into high density urban centres. http://www.archnewsnow.com/features/Feature255.htm Continue

Added by John Zeger on April 9, 2009 at 4:30pm — No Comments

"Smart growth" responsible for greater traffic congestion than sprawl

Being curious about the differences in the impact of growth through densification compared to growth by geographical expansion on traffic congestion, I used some data that was organized by Wendell Cox on major U.S. cities to do an analysis. I first looked at those cities that gained at least 10 percent population between 1990 and 2000 for which traffic congestion figures had been collected by the Texas Transportation Commission. I came up with 12 such cities. I then grouped these cities into thr… Continue

Added by John Zeger on December 16, 2008 at 10:30am — 1 Comment

Is the global economic slowdown a blessing in disguise?

I have been musing that the currrent global economic slowdown may actually be a blessing in disguise as it will slow the alarming rate at which we have been gobbling up unrenewable resources and give us an opportunity to reorganize our economy and move from the growth ethic to the sustainability ethic. But before posting my opinions, I checked the web to see if anyone was thinking along the same lines and came upon this article by Dr. Glen Barry: http://www.mail-archive.com/issues@ru.openoffice.… Continue

Added by John Zeger on November 20, 2008 at 8:30am — No Comments

City of Bloomington (Indiana) Environmental Commission addresses the conflict between growth and sustainability

The City of Bloomington Environmental Commission has adopted a position statement and completed a report to increase awareness of growth and sustainable development. The statement, “Position of the City of Bloomington Environmental Commission on Economic Growth in the United States” is modeled on similar statements issued by the United States Society for Ecological Economics and over 40 other groups inspired by the work of the Center for the Advancement of a Steady State Economy (CASSE). The sta… Continue

Added by John Zeger on August 9, 2008 at 9:00am — No Comments

Mexican government to curtail growth of Mexico City

Forbes reports that faced with the hugh investment required to expand Mexico City's infrastructure to accommodate significantly more growth, officials there have decided to use subisidies to encourage people to move elsewhere. According to Forbes, "'The plan is to curtail the growth of Mexico City (instead of facing it head on), ' says Owen Gutfreund, director of urban studies at Columbia University. That's not a bad approach, he figures, compared with the alternative: seeing the city's populati… Continue

Added by John Zeger on April 2, 2008 at 7:00am — No Comments

James Howard Kunstler on growth

"Growth has been the chief defining characteristic of our industrial economy. In the simpleminded commentary of the news business, growth is good (prosperity) and nongrowth is bad (depression). The more growth, the more business, the more prosperity, and vice versa. ... The boosters of this particular notion of growth -- namely, most mainstream economists -- do not recognize any limits to growth projected into the future. They'd prefer not to think about it because the conclusion is obvious: The… Continue

Added by John Zeger on March 25, 2008 at 8:00am — No Comments

Pheonix, Arizona residents favour population growth controls

Faced with the potential of future water shortages, a majority of residents in Pheonix, Arizona favour population growth controls, a local newspaper has learned. In a survey of 3000 area residents, the Arizona Daily Star found that 55% were opposed to continued population growth. Sixty-seven percent of respondents expressed that fewer homes should be built and 71% favoured placing limits on building permits to conserve water. For the complete survey visit http://growth.azstarnet.com/result/surve… Continue

Added by John Zeger on March 24, 2008 at 9:46am — No Comments

Time to stop the greenwashing

Further to my last post, here is an excellent article by Dr. Glen Barry that addresses the ubiquitous greenwashing of the destructive environmental practices prevalent in our society today. Dr. Barry clearly identifies the environmental crisis that we are in and condemns the half-measures that are being proposed to deal with it as being inadequate. He concludes that "To maintain a livable Earth there is no alternative to less people and consumption..." Cut and paste the following into your brows… Continue

Added by John Zeger on March 21, 2008 at 8:00am — No Comments

The Difference between Green and Sustainable

In many communities such as the one where I live, growth controls are considered to be draconian measures that go against the principles of a free market economy. Residents of such communities that think of themselves as being progressively minded thus eschew such controls in favour of "green" development and advocate measures like LEED certified construction as a means to achieving sustainability. In an excellent article posted on his blog, John Van Doren explodes the myth that such green cons… Continue

Added by John Zeger on March 9, 2008 at 4:00pm — No Comments

Comments on growth and development by James Lovelock originator of the Gaia Theory

"Sustainable development ... Many consider this noble policy morally superior to the laissez faire of business as usual. Unfortunately for us, these wholly different approaches, one the expression of international decency, the other of unfeeling market forces, have the same outcome: the probability of disastrous global change. The error they share is the belief that further development is possible and that the Earth will continue, more or less as now, for at least the first half of this centu

… Continue

Added by John Zeger on February 10, 2008 at 9:00am — No Comments

"the false promises of smart growth"

From an editorial in the North County Times (San Diego North County), Jan. 19, 2008:

"Regional planners have fooled themselves into believing that smart growth, the combination of residential and commercial property built in close proximity to public transit, somehow solves our growth problems. ...

The equation is simple: Smart growth means high-density developments, usually in areas that have been relatively sparse. High density means more people. More people means more traff

… Continue

Added by John Zeger on January 19, 2008 at 5:31pm — No Comments

More recognition being given to the role of human population growth in our environmental problems

More environmental groups are speaking out on the role that human population growth is having in either causing or worsening our environmental problems. Here is an excellent article on that subject from E Magazine: http://www.emagazine.com/view/?4037&src= Continue

Added by John Zeger on January 12, 2008 at 6:38pm — No Comments

Population growth is the major cause of sprawl

One of the major planning concerns in my community is with urban sprawl. Sprawl has devoured hectares of orchards and has pushed development up the hillsides. As most members of the community do not want this to continue, they have embraced the "smart growth" model of development i.e., channelling growth into high density urban centres. One frequently hears the argument that as "growth is inevitable" it is best to "grow up, not out."

However, an analysis done on urban population gr

… Continue

Added by John Zeger on November 6, 2007 at 7:20am — No Comments

Poll shows that most Marylanders think the state is growing too quickly and favour growth controls

A recent survery showed that a majority of Marylanders think that their communities are growing too rapidly and that they would like to see growth controlled. http://www.planetizen.com/node/27791
Continue

Added by John Zeger on October 23, 2007 at 5:45am — No Comments

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