“Some is not a number, and soon is not a time” – Andrea Reimer, Deputy Mayor of Vancouver, speaking in Dublin 24th of May.
IGBC co-hosted a morning presentation, where keynote speaker Andrea Reimer talked about the ‘greening’ of Vancouver. Vancouver has gone from ‘zero to hero’ in green spheres in recent years. Previously not even in the top 500 world’s greenest cities it now finds itself sitting pretty at 4th. And they’re still not resting on their laurels.
Vancouver aims for the number 1 spot by 2020. Reimer’s talk (available in slide format here, footnotes included), emphasized the need for direction, buy in and targets. There were certainly many take-away lessons. Programmes put in place may have been top-down, but only subtly so. “They need to feel like they own it”, stated Reimer. This makes intuitive sense, as people respond to feeling empowered to act, and not pontification. “People need to feel like it is their plan, so they will implement it”.
Public consultations were aimed towards actionable outcomes. She even reported that when people were asked if they could act on an initiative, such as neighbourhood composting, tree planting, allotments etc, often the response was “we can do that today!” The City of Vancouver engaged people in many ways. They even made a list of 50 possible green initiatives and with public online voting. It was promised that the top three would be carried out.
Though Vancouver’s litany of actions culminating in success stories is impressive, Reimer remains grounded. She did not neglect to mention the Canadian tar sands, and that they, like us, are still living above the ‘one earth’ mark. Furthermore, the commercial transport sector remains a challenge. However, attaining impressive results quickly are neither unattainable nor quixotic.
John O’Hara Senior Executive planner with Dublin City council closed with his presentation on making Dublin City ‘a compact green and liveable city’. For those interested in either the HPI, or the future plans for Dublin City, these presentations are also available at the same link from above.
IGBC’s ‘Home Performance Index’ (HPI) was also launched at the event.
Tom Seaver
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