Saving Place 28.3

21 July, 2002

Editorial: Our Place in the World

This issue of Alternatives explores how the built environment – the physical structures making up our cities, towns and villages – influences our relationships with nature and our fellow human beings. The basic insight expressed in the various theme articles is that if we wish to improve these relationships, we will need to transform much of the modern built environment. We will need to (re)construct places so that they reflect and reinforce the values of community and ecology rather than maximize the free flow of dollars, goods and automobiles, as has been the tendency throughout much of the past century. In other words, we have to go beyond the modernist agenda. ...

Editorial: Our Place in the World

The Resurgence of Place
Don Alexander
Modernism is out and building places that fit with the environment and local aspirations is in.

Making Spaces Places
Lauren McColl
Creative activities can make idle public spaces engaging centres of civic life.

Road Rage
Laura Taylor
More lanes and a bigger bridge wrecked the historic identity of a small Ontario settlement.

Future Imperfect
Holly Pearson
The prospects for Seattle’s Belltown neighbourhood depend on how long its diversity and character can persist when there is money to be made on high-rise luxury condos.

Hear Birds, See Stars
Jeremy Lundholm
Most urban areas are overwhelmed by the noise and light of human sensory pollution.

On the Waterfront
Ingrid Stefanovic
Method for exploring people’s connection to the 350-kilometre Lake Ontario trail may help improve design and foster stewardship.

Community Science
Anna Carr
Bringing together social and scientific goals, Western Australia’s Waterwatchers nurture both nature and neighbourhood.

Learning to Ask
Lorne Peterson
An Aboriginal custom for respecting forests brings appreciation and understanding.

Changing the World by Saving Place
Ned Jacobs
When Jane Jacobs and her neighbours defeated the urban renewal project that was threatening Greenwich Village,
they helped inspire a movement that preserved some of the most valued urban places in North America.

In the Burbs
Nik Luka and Leo Trottier
It’s time to recognize that suburbia is a real place too.

Knowing your Place
Kate Davies
Take a quiz to gauge your sense of place.

More Alternatives

Notes
Toxic computers
Honeymoon mine
Bangladeshi farmers
Genetic pollution

Political Science
Stephen Bocking
The failings of Bjørn Lomborg’s Skeptical Environmentalist.

Hot Green Websites
Kelly Loverock

Windmills at Sea
David Gallagher
Energy entrepreneurs are looking offshore for wind power.

Local Control
Airin Stephens
Co-operation between local fishers and government scientists signals shift to greater community involvement in managing the Fundy fishery.

The Route of the Problem
Tamara Levine and Greg Michalenko
Cloudforest defenders want proposed pipeline moved.

Citizens Can Prevail
Franz Hartmann
A personal perspective on how public mobilization defeated the proposal to ship Toronto’s waste to an abandoned mine in northern Ontario.

Reviews
David Rothenberg’s Sudden Music
Robert F. Woollard & Aleck S. Ostry’s Fatal Consumption: Rethinking Sustainable Development
GASCD
This Place on Earth 2002: Measuring What Matters
Wanderlust: A History of Walking

Letters
Vegetarian readers respond to Wayne Robert’s analysis of veggie dogma.

Brain Mulch
Ryan Kennedy and Scott MacKay
Fueling up on chicken grease.