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Another article has popped up about the benefits of separating traffic and neighborhoods, this time on treehugger.com. This is great news for city residents, and perhaps could translate into real results sometime soon. But as a resident of a suburb, I can’t help but wonder, what about the rest of us?
Getting around in the suburbs means getting into a car. Neighborhoods here are separated by heavily trafficked and often narrow roads with little or no sidewalk. If you live near a town center you might be able to walk to some places, but chances are you still get in your car almost every day. Suburbanites drive to work, school, friends houses, restaurants – everywhere that in the city you can walk to, take a bus or subway, or even bike. Biking in the suburbs seems to be restricted to packs of exercise-aholics in spandex.
So what can be done about this? Should we all pack up and move into the cities to reduce our carbon footprint? Hit the gym and start biking everywhere? This may work for a few people, but on the whole we need better, and bigger, solutions. We need to reclaim our sidewalks, walk somewhere with a purpose, and invite our neighbors with us. Change will not simply come to us, but we have the ability to bring change ourselves.
Earthgarage – Greener Car. Fatter Wallet.