Fwd: Sustainable Urbanism Summit - Join the Conversation!

Begin forwarded message:

From: "CNU New England" <newengland@cnu.org>

Date: March 26, 2009 8:20:46 AM EDT

To: "Cliff Dowd" <Eelaj@aol.com>

Subject: Sustainable Urbanism Summit - Join the Conversation!

Reply-To: newengland@cnu.org

Just one week left until the Sustainable Urbanism Summit on April 2 & 3. Be a part of the conversation.  Join Summit participants for a day of thought-provoking discussion and critical thinking about the state of the natural and built environment. Together we can move forward a more progressive planning agenda in New England!      Check out our Blog for interviews with Summit speakers.  What inspires Juli Beth Hinds?  "The good that can happen in our communities and watersheds when creative people are willing, as Benjamin Franklin put it, to 'trust a bit more in their own fallibility' and forge new solutions."   What does Mike Lydon feel is most needed to help create more sustainable places?  "We have very low-tech technologies ready to go. Things like form-based codes and understanding how to build walkable communities are about as basic as it gets, yet there is little else harder to do in this country. We must use these technologies."   Also view the Summit web site for additional speakers and sessions, including those highlighted below.   Keynote: Self-Sufficient Urbanism by: Jaime Correa, Jaime Correa and Associates In response to the emerging economy, New England towns and cities will again need to achieve Self-Sufficient Urbanism, marked by the contraction of urban centers, the re-localization of resources, and the development of technologies that will reduce fossil fuel dependency and our current rate of carbon emissions. Self-Sufficient Urbanism will result in the return to sustainable urban villages and rural settlements where production districts function in closed economic loops and where almost everything needed for daily life is found, produced, created, used, re-used and recycled at walking distance from an identifiable center. Towns and cities now have the opportunity to actively embrace Self-Sufficient Urbanism, one of the most comprehensive mitigation and adaptation strategies in today's transitional market. Coding For The Future by: Robert J. Sitkowski, Robinson & Cole LLP & FBCI Like New Urbanism itself, Form-Based Coding has had difficulty making the sort of progress in New England that it has made in other regions of the U.S. However, as the real estate industry undergoes rapid restructuring in all segments and markets to focus on smaller, centrally-located projects, the conditions appear increasingly ripe for both New Urbanism and Form-Based Coding to gain rapid acceptance among both private and public sector development participants here in New England. As states and municipalities reassess their tolerance for new, more compact, and efficient development in light of falling tax revenues and reduced public budgets, Form-Based Codes may finally become accepted as the regulatory device of choice for enabling traditional patterns of development across the entire region. The "New Rural": Strategies for Small Town Sustainability  by: Armando Carbonell, Lincoln Institute of Land Policy With particular reference to small New England towns in the path of exurban commuting and amenity migration, this talk will examine the difference between "faux rural" and "new rural." I will talk about ways to integrate food production, landscape protection, urban design, and appropriate infrastructure to create communities that are complete in themselves, yet connected to the world. Specific examples and illustrations will be drawn from Cape Cod, Southeastern Massachusetts, and recent work of the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy. Strategies that would support these new rural communities include adjustments to zoning, conservation easements, ecosystem services pricing, rural transit, new information networks, decentralized energy systems and the smart grid, and community land trusts for affordable housing. If you no longer want to receive emails from CNU New England please click the link below. Click here