For carbon-neutral cities, there are things worth talking about in how our consumption patterns can change - sharing goods, etc. - but those are a fraction of the impacts of transportation and building energy use. If we need to choose priority actions, the most important things are to densify, provide transit, and green the buildings.

Alex Steffen

Categorized in : Talking Cities Impact

Deep walkability describes a city that is built in such a way that you can move from one area to another on foot, on bicycle, on transit and have an experience that remains a pleasant one, that you feel you are welcome not just in the neighborhood but moving between neighborhoods.

Alex Steffen

cities feet moving

Urban retrofitting: creating different sorts of spaces and uses out of places that are already there.

Alex Steffen

creating motivation inspiration

We get so little news about the developing world that we often forget that there are literally millions of people out there struggling to change things to be fairer, freer, more democratic, less corrupt.

Alex Steffen

news struggle people

Optimism is a political act. Those who benefit from the status quo are perfectly happy for us to think nothing is going to get any better. In fact, these days, cynicism is obedience.

Alex Steffen

optimism political thinking

To be young and aware is to know you’re being lied to; to know that a bright green future is possible; to know that we can reimagine the world, rebuild our cities, redesign our lives, retool our factories, distribute innovation and creativity and all live in a world that is not only better than the alternative, but much better than the world we have now.

Alex Steffen

innovation creativity cities

Clean air and water, a diversity of animal and plant species, soil and mineral resources, and predictable weather are annuities that will pay dividends for as long as the human race survives – and may even extend our stay on Earth.

Alex Steffen

race air animal

Cities generate most of the global economy, and most of its energy use, resource demands and climate emissions. How we build cities over the next decades will largely determine whether we can deliver a bright green future.

Alex Steffen

climate energy cities

I think there's a gigantic generation gap in terms of how people understand the Internet and how much they think technology is an important factor in social change.

Alex Steffen

technology people thinking

You don't change the world by hiding in the woods, wearing a hair shirt, or buying indulgences in the form of 'Save the Earth' bumper stickers. You do it by articulating a vision for the future and pursuing it with all the ingenuity humanity can muster.

Alex Steffen

humanity hair inspirational

It's not just enough to survive. We've got to make something better than what we've got.

Alex Steffen

something-better enough

Carbon zero simply means that the emissions you are releasing either are zero or balance out to zero.

Alex Steffen

balance zero mean

There is no such thing as garbage, just useful stuff in the wrong place.

Alex Steffen

garbage stuff

By looking at climate change as a clean energy generation problem, we're setting ourselves up not to solve it.

Alex Steffen

climate generations energy

We have to craft new political realities, not only in places like India, Afghanistan, Kenya, Pakistan, but here at home as well. Another world is possible.

Alex Steffen

political home reality

The denser places get, the lower the amount of energy people use to get around it.

Alex Steffen

energy use people

Cities are responsible for the vast majority of the creation of the economy. They're also places into which we pour the vast majority of resources, the vast majority of energy and the places where a huge percentage of the decisions about how systems are built and how products designed, etc., happen.

Alex Steffen

energy decision cities

For most people, using the Internet broadens their sense of who 'we' is and actually ends up leaving us in a place of greater compassion and understanding. It leaves us more connected to a larger group of people and more at one with a lot more people in our community.

Alex Steffen

community compassion people

I think we're going to start to see a new model of civic advocacy where people get together once in a while to protest, but it's more about an ongoing, sustained engagement in issues, networks and communities about which people care.

Alex Steffen

issues people thinking

If mass media, social isolation in the suburbs, alienating workplaces and long car commutes create a bunker mentality, the Internet does the opposite.

Alex Steffen

media opposites long

There's no law of physics that says we have to be an unsustainable society - in fact, quite the opposite. The planet's ready to work with us if we're ready to think differently, but we do have to make that jump and start to do things in new ways.

Alex Steffen

law opposites thinking