Growth

Structural Adaptivity, Rebalancing by Watersheds - Part II

Thu, 2014-10-23 19:32 — WDS1200-Columbus

Here is the second part of my Rebalancing by Watersheds Exercise. I presented the background work recently in my Part I post. Part II contains a Concept Plan Map and a discussion of the more particular information and data that led me to the Plan.

Both Parts I and Part II are only a condensed version of the full text I prepared. Within the portions I left out for this version is a considerable amount of technical information that some readers may want to see. I will provide more of it upon request.

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Structural Adaptivity, Rebalancing by Watersheds - Part I

Wed, 2014-10-22 16:57 — WDS1200-Columbus

One of the applications of structural adaptivity that I have presented is re-balancing our nation by major watersheds. The benefits would be two-fold: (1) growing our nation into urban regions where each would have resilient economic and adaptivity capacities; and (2) tying the regions to ample sources of fresh water by linking them to regional U.S. watersheds.

Because it would be such a large departure from recent trends and because I could discover no literature showing its possibility or desirability, I sought to perform an exercise to demonstrate its possibility. In doing this, I am setting aside my own considerable shortcomings. I am assuming that criticism of my arrogance in attempting such an exercise is less important than taking a step in a much-needed new direction.

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Structural Adaptivity Facilitation Examples - Part III

Fri, 2014-10-10 13:12 — WDS1200-Columbus

Here are my last three Facilitation Examples, proposed activities by planners and others to influence the development of the built environment toward structural adaptivity and resilience as we progress into an ever more uncertain and unpredictable future.

Rethinking Homeownership. Conventional owner-occupied land and buildings in the US many times tie the owners into long-term tenures. It makes moves, to other locations, overly cumbersome even when such moves are in the occupants’ best interests. Adaptivity requires the ability to make quicker changes than in the past, including the self-initiated movement of people and businesses to other locations when beneficial. Alternative types of ownership or tenure must be facilitated, types which are more adaptable to quick change.

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Some Examples of Structural Adaptivity - Part II

Fri, 2014-08-22 19:36 — WDS1200-Columbus

Here are some more examples of how I propose that structural adaptivity could be applied as a leading principle for resilient development in the US over the next 20-50-100 years. These are intended to support my conviction that structural adaptivity is the only logical approach to advancing our built environment for a rapidly changing, uncertain, unpredictable future. I am hoping that others will review these concepts and propose their own personal and team-researched applications of the principle.

In re-balancing our nation, do so by major watersheds. I propose that the re-balancing of our nation’s urban development (as I discussed before) should be based on the locations and characteristics of our major watersheds. All major urban development regions should have a long-term dependable natural source of fresh water.

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Guardian: Maps and Lists of Occupy Everywhere Sites

Mon, 2011-10-24 07:42 — mdmcdonald

The below Guardian article provides a map and lists of where Occupy Everywhere protests are emerging. They are primarily, but not exclusively in the U.S. and Europe, in countries where the economy is in significant decline and inequities are significant. In most of these places, the youth fear that their future will be worse than their parents, due to the greed of a global elite insensitive to the destruction they have caused economically and environmentally.

The list includes 951 cities in 82 countries.

To see the story and full list, go to:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2011/oct/17/occupy-protests-world-list-map

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IT and Information Sharing Environments for Community Health Resilience

Thu, 2011-09-29 09:44 — mdmcdonald

Information Technology (IT) and Information Sharing Environments (ISEs) are crucial to the evolution of community health resilience. Most people working to improve community health resilience do not understand the nuances of Information Sharing Environments, and how the rapid shifts in IT, mobile devices, social media, cloud computing, peer to peer parallel processing, smart grids, and the linking of millions of people, mobile devices, computers, and sensors are creating a societal mind, which is transforming community health resilience and the health and human security of Americans.

If you have thoughts on these topics, please comment within this collaboratory thread.

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Social Innovation in Venice California

Tue, 2011-09-27 10:26 — mdmcdonald

Venice, California has long been a center of innovation within Los Angeles. Its boardwalk is a spectacle of creativity and entrepreneurship in an open community setting, where the LA megalopolis meets the beach and the Pacific Ocean. This combination attracts millions of visitors a year in a very small area.

As a result, Venice -- in addition to its opportunities, also struggles with significant and growing challenges with homelessness, drugs, and crowd control, amongst the other problems that all communities face in an economic downturn within a time of energy descent.

The result? Both the opportunities and the problems now require creative energy from the Venice community itself to shape what Venice wants to be in the early 21st century.

Please place your comments on how Venice community members might think about shaping their community to enhance it during the challenging years ahead.

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When Capitalism Converges With Resilience

Tue, 2011-08-30 12:08 — mdmcdonald

It is hard to argue against that fact that the U.S. and even "Communist" China, for that matter, have great influence in global markets and on health and human security -- for their own people as well as human populations world-wide. The power of capital within global, regional, national, and local markets has been transforming the world since the growth of the industrial revolution, which has only accelerated since the broad introduction of global communication and computing in the 20th century. That said, there has been growing criticism of the destructive nature of market fundamentalism and laissez faire economics in the face of a growing awareness of ecosystem carrying capacities, and the problems inherent in growth economies in decline. So what happens when capitalists become aware of the destructive nature of growth economies, where populations are exceeding the carrying capacities of ecosystems and mass consumption economies begin to collapse?

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