ideas

[Forest Pearson]

Hello all,

I know many of us are probably distracted with the election, but summer busy time is drawing to a close.  Transition has been silent, but I'm still interested and don't want to see this go totally dormant.  What I think we need is a starter project, anything, to keep things rolling.

Here is a couple of ideas I'd like to look into.  This probably won't appeal to most, but perhaps a few "geeks" might be interested, and maybe a couple of us could pursue this under the banner "Transition".  I was prompted to write this because I saw the City Environmental Grant applications ad in the paper, and thought maybe that could be tapped to pursue some of the ideas rattling around in my head:

• Idea #1: Understanding Transportation Needs in Whitehorse.  This would be a small research project to figure out the breakdown of fossil fuel usage used by Whitehorse for transportation and what for.  The background is that 65% of fossil fuel usage is in the Yukon is for transportation, but we have no idea what for.  How much of that is used for sub-50km trips?  How much is for hauling food and useless junk to Walmart?  The idea here would be to identify what is the scale of opportunity for replacement by cycling, transit and electric vehicles.  I'm not sure how we could go about this or how far we would get, but it would be very valuable information for anyone who is interested in community resilience in the face of peak oil.
• Idea #2: Calculate Environmental Footprint for the Yukon:  This would be commission someone like Global Footprint Network to calculate the environmental footprint for the Yukon.  Why?  Well, if we start measuring genuine progress as a community (and remember, things that are important are worth measuring) as opposed to just GDP (which is simply a measure of how much we consume), then most of the genuine progress indicators use environmental footprint as a key indicator of environmental impact. So, this would be a starting point to developing and tracking true "progress" as a community. 

Any interest?

-Forest Pearson

“Love is better than anger. Hope is better than fear. Optimism is better than despair. So let us be loving, hopeful and optimistic. And we’ll change the world.” —Jack Layton, August 20, 2011

http://forestpearson.blogspot.com/

[Marlon Davis]

HI Forest (and all),

These look like great ideas! Stephanie and I did meet for the few meetings we had at the beginning of the summer. A few were there and we brainstormed a couple of ideas for more project oriented activities for Transition. Something that more than 1-2 people could get behind.

I would be willing to get behind one of the ideas you mention below. Particularly the one that is tied into Genuine Progress Indicators (re:"The Economics of Happiness). Both seem a bit technologically beyond me and is not where my natural skill lie but I like the outcomes such projects would have, as you so well explain.

The projects Stephanie and I brainstormed with a few others at early summer meetings included:
1) PLanning a Whitehorse Bike Festival for next year. A 1-2 day event that would feature a number of things:
-bike fashion show (with talks on electric and winter bikes, and maybe even unicycles:)
-Bike breakfast in town for those who commmute by bike.
-Family cycle around town.
-Small local business cycle tour (hit some good local service and food shops)

2) Start working on the beginnings of something that looks like a local currency for Whitehorse. Working with the Chamber of Commerce if possible.

The benefit of these two is that they may appeal to those who are wary of climate change and peak oil (ie. don't believe it etc.) but like the idea of resilience. They may choose to participate either in planning or in the final product (bike festival, local currency use, etc).

Shall we schedule a meeting to discuss the options. I am willing to get behind what most of the group (whoever meets) would like.

Marlon

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[Stephanie Starks]

Hi all,

I’d be interested in working on one of these projects.  With respect to the bike festival idea and supporting cycling in general we talked briefly at our last meeting about the possibility of converting the abandoned rail line into a cycling/walking trail.  Since then I have come across a website called Rails to Trails Conservancy  at http://www.railstotrails.org/index.html.  This is a nonprofit organization in the States that assists groups in converting old rail lines to trails all across the country.  What about a cycling trail from Whitehorse to Carcross along the old Whitepass line?  Or even just a trail from where the line intersects the Alaska Hwy to downtown?  I just read an article that describes how the fatality rate for cyclists falls off dramatically when bike lanes are physically separate from car lanes – Portland was cited as an example.

Stephanie

---

[Shannon Clohosey]

Hi gang -

I also like all of the above ideas, especially the transportation GHG assessment and the bike festival. The City's enviro grant only pays up to 50% of the costs; perhaps we could look at CDF as well. Should we meet to breathe some life back into TTW?

Shannon.

--
Shannon Clohosey
BA International Development
Masters of Environmental Studies
(867) 334-6124

[Forest Pearson]

Continued ideas:

• I've always dreamt of a "cycling coalition" in Whitehorse to promote and advocate for commuter cycling and cycling infrastructure, especially after spending a few winters in Portland Or enjoying thier amazing bike culture and bike landscape.  Maybe we could initiate a "cycling working, group" that would serve this purpose.  I'm know there are a few bicycle commuter fanatics in town, so there might be interest for this.  Perhaps your "bike festival" could kickstart that working group? I'm not a big social kind of guy, but I'd be happy to help / support such an project.  We've done some pretty fun "social/community" ride events in Portland (see http://www.worstdayride.com/ and a little video of ours from the start of the ride I last year) which is a lot of fun.

• On the more "techie" project idea, I'd be happy to lead something like that if I can enlist another techie to work on it to (John Streicker, interested?).  Maybe a "Transition Research Working Group"?  Shannon, if you are keen on the transportation study idea, I'd like to pursue that.  I'm not really sure how we would do it, but I can start doing a bit of looking into it.  I'd love to see if we could fund someone to do the work.  Not sure where the other 50% of the funding could come from (NCE?  Yukon Research Centre?), but maybe someone could work with me on funding proposal?
  

-Forest Pearson

“Love is better than anger. Hope is better than fear. Optimism is better than despair. So let us be loving, hopeful and optimistic. And we’ll change the world.” —Jack Layton, August 20, 2011

http://forestpearson.blogspot.com/

---

From: Shannon Clohosey <shann...@gmail.com>
To: ttwhit...@googlegroups.com
Sent: Thursday, September 22, 2011 8:24:39 PM
Subject: Re: [TTW] ideas

[Stephanie Starks]

Could we plan to get together the first week of October?  What days are good for people?

Stephanie

 

---

[Forest Pearson]

Typically any time but Wednesday evening can work for me.

 

-Forest Pearson

“Love is better than anger. Hope is better than fear. Optimism is better than despair. So let us be loving, hopeful and optimistic. And we’ll change the world.” —Jack Layton, August 20, 2011

http://forestpearson.blogspot.com/

---

From: Stephanie Starks <starks...@northwestel.net>
To: ttwhit...@googlegroups.com
Sent: Thursday, September 22, 2011 11:05:48 PM
Subject: RE: [TTW] ideas

Could we plan to get together the first week of October?  What days are good for people?

Stephanie

 

---

From: ttwhit...@googlegroups.com [mailto: ttwhit...@googlegroups.com ] On Behalf Of Forest Pearson
Sent: Thursday, September 22, 2011 10:06 PM
To: ttwhit...@googlegroups.com
Cc: PaulDavis; JohnStreicker
Subject: Re: [TTW] ideas

 

Continued ideas:

• I've always dreamt of a "cycling coalition" in Whitehorse to promote and advocate for commuter cycling and cycling infrastructure, especially after spending a few winters in Portland Or enjoying thier amazing bike culture and bike landscape.  Maybe we could initiate a "cycling working, group" that would serve this purpose.  I'm know there are a few bicycle commuter fanatics in town, so there might be interest for this.  Perhaps your "bike festival" could kickstart that working group? I'm not a big social kind of guy, but I'd be happy to help / support such an project.  We've done some pretty fun "social/community" ride events in Portland (see http://www.worstdayride.com/ and a little video of ours from the start of the ride I last year) which is a lot of fun.

• On the more "techie" project idea, I'd be happy to lead something like that if I can enlist another techie to work on it to (John Streicker, interested?).  Maybe a "Transition Research Working Group"?  Shannon , if you are keen on the transportation study idea, I'd like to pursue that.  I'm not really sure how we would do it, but I can start doing a bit of looking into it.  I'd love to see if we could fund someone to do the work.  Not sure where the other 50% of the funding could come from (NCE?  Yukon Research Centre?), but maybe someone could work with me on funding proposal?
  
  

- Forest Pearson

“Love is better than anger. Hope is better than fear. Optimism is better than despair. So let us be loving, hopeful and optimistic. And we’ll change the world.” —Jack Layton, August 20, 2011

http://forestpearson.blogspot.com/

---

From: Shannon Clohosey <shann...@gmail.com>
To: ttwhit...@googlegroups.com
Sent: Thursday, September 22, 2011 8:24:39 PM
Subject: Re: [TTW] ideas

Hi gang -

I also like all of the above ideas, especially the transportation GHG assessment and the bike festival. The City's enviro grant only pays up to 50% of the costs; perhaps we could look at CDF as well. Should we meet to breathe some life back into TTW?

Shannon .

On Thu, Sep 22, 2011 at 8:35 AM, Marlon Davis <marlon...@gmail.com> wrote:

HI Forest (and all),

These look like great ideas! Stephanie and I did meet for the few meetings we had at the beginning of the summer. A few were there and we brainstormed a couple of ideas for more project oriented activities for Transition. Something that more than 1-2 people could get behind.

I would be willing to get behind one of the ideas you mention below. Particularly the one that is tied into Genuine Progress Indicators (re:"The Economics of Happiness). Both seem a bit technologically beyond me and is not where my natural skill lie but I like the outcomes such projects would have, as you so well explain.

The projects Stephanie and I brainstormed with a few others at early summer meetings included:
1) PLanning a Whitehorse Bike Festival for next year. A 1-2 day event that would feature a number of things:
-bike fashion show (with talks on electric and winter bikes, and maybe even unicycles:)
-Bike breakfast in town for those who commmute by bike.
-Family cycle around town.
-Small local business cycle tour (hit some good local service and food shops)

2) Start working on the beginnings of something that looks like a local currency for Whitehorse . Working with the Chamber of Commerce if possible.

The benefit of these two is that they may appeal to those who are wary of climate change and peak oil (ie. don't believe it etc.) but like the idea of resilience. They may choose to participate either in planning or in the final product (bike festival, local currency use, etc).

Shall we schedule a meeting to discuss the options. I am willing to get behind what most of the group (whoever meets) would like.

Marlon

 

On Wed, Sep 21, 2011 at 9:55 PM, Forest Pearson <fkpear...@yahoo.com> wrote:

Hello all,

 

I know many of us are probably distracted with the election, but summer busy time is drawing to a close.  Transition has been silent, but I'm still interested and don't want to see this go totally dormant.  What I think we need is a starter project, anything, to keep things rolling.

 

Here is a couple of ideas I'd like to look into.  This probably won't appeal to most, but perhaps a few "geeks" might be interested, and maybe a couple of us could pursue this under the banner "Transition".  I was prompted to write this because I saw the City Environmental Grant applications ad in the paper, and thought maybe that could be tapped to pursue some of the ideas rattling around in my head:

 

• Idea #1: Understanding Transportation Needs in Whitehorse .  This would be a small research project to figure out the breakdown of fossil fuel usage used by Whitehorse for transportation and what for.  The background is that 65% of fossil fuel usage is in the Yukon is for transportation, but we have no idea what for.  How much of that is used for sub-50km trips?  How much is for hauling food and useless junk to Walmart?  The idea here would be to identify what is the scale of opportunity for replacement by cycling, transit and electric vehicles.  I'm not sure how we could go about this or how far we would get, but it would be very valuable information for anyone who is interested in community resilience in the face of peak oil.
• Idea #2: Calculate Environmental Footprint for the Yukon :  This would be commission someone like Global Footprint Network to calculate the environmental footprint for the Yukon .  Why?  Well, if we start measuring genuine progress as a community (and remember, things that are important are worth measuring) as opposed to just GDP (which is simply a measure of how much we consume), then most of the genuine progress indicators use environmental footprint as a key indicator of environmental impact. So, this would be a starting point to developing and tracking true "progress" as a community. 

Any interest?

 

- Forest Pearson

[Stephanie Starks]

Hi Forest,

I haven’t heard back from anyone but you regarding a suitable meeting time.  I’m reluctant to choose a random time and simply hope that more than two people show up.  What do you think?

Stephanie

 

---

From: ttwhit...@googlegroups.com [mailto:ttwhit...@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Forest Pearson
Sent: Sunday, September 25, 2011 10:16 PM
To: ttwhit...@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: [TTW] ideas

 

Typically any time but Wednesday evening can work for me.

[Marlon Davis]

I am good for Mondays or Wednesdays after 7pm!

[Forest Pearson]

Wednesday's at 7:30ish (after Georgi gets home from yoga) would work for me.

 

-Forest Pearson

“Love is better than anger. Hope is better than fear. Optimism is better than despair. So let us be loving, hopeful and optimistic. And we’ll change the world.” —Jack Layton, August 20, 2011

http://forestpearson.blogspot.com/

---

From: Marlon Davis <marlon...@gmail.com>
To: ttwhit...@googlegroups.com
Sent: Tuesday, October 4, 2011 2:14:49 PM
Subject: Re: [TTW] ideas