Colin, the carfree Moses, thinks about his people.
Where can someone who does not wish to use cars go and not feel like an outcast?
Where can someone who believes the consumer culture is destructive go and feel good about what s/he does?
Where can someone work who wants to believe in the work s/he is doing?
What if someone has all three of these attitudes and was born and raised in the suburban United States?
The culture in which this person lives s/he sees as ugly.
There is no place for her there.
Where can my people go?
I have sometimes thought, since these people are in the suburbs, perhaps we need to transform the suburbs.
What if these people could become part of a tribe and have their own reservation?
We are not satisfied to be placed in a cordoned off area, while the rest of the world continues in its madness.
But if we had a reservation where the carfree could flock to, would that solve our problem?
Water, Shelter, Food, Freedom From Cars, Meaningful Work.
Why should these people not join the Peace Corps or something similar, and go off to where there are no cars?
Why can't these people be happy living among the cardrivers?
What are we to do?
Should we convene a tribe in the United States of carfree, earth-culture people, who somehow stake out their own reservation?
How will these people find Water, Shelter, and Food, and Meaningful Work?
Can they be content in an area separate from the car?
Can they be content in one area, or is Nomadism the answer?
Sitting around complaining about cars for the rest of our lives sounds unpleasant.
Should I just start walking, and find others who will walk with me, until we find the place that will be our carfree reservation, if we ever do?
How will we feed these people?
The Carfree Ecovillage in the United States
Ok then, so we'll be starting a car-free ecovillage in the US. In a warm place where it doesn't rain much.
The principles:
All mechanical work done by live human or animal power. Anything not so powered is not allowed on the EV grounds, ever. This will constrain the kind of construction that can be done, among other things.
What about electricity/internet/computer useage?
What about reproduction?
How will village feed, water, shelter itself, pay off the government?
How will the
Other scenarios:
What if the cars go away on their own?
--- ???
Issues.
To buy land, need money. Making money often involves paying taxes.
How do we handle the non-profit side of things?
Do I want to work with David C.?
What if we build a car-free city?
City vs. Ecovillage?
City vs. Ecovillage
| City | Ecovillage |
|---|---|
| 12,000 people at least. | Less- though Auroville plans for 50,000 |
| No strict environmental goals. | Ideally 100% sustainable, e.g. constructed from and consuming only resources from the land on which it is built. |
| No limit on child births. | possible limit on childbirths/ population growth. |
| More land, bigger organization needed to start it. | Could be just a few people on a small bit of land. |
| Following David's/ Gus' (Joel's) plan, would be a neighborhood of an existing city centering on a (presumably rail) transportation link. | No such requirement, though proximity to shopping might be needed/desired. |
| Making a car-free city would catalyze the creation of other carfree areas, including ecovillages nearby and around the world. | A small car-free ecovillage would have less of an effect, perhaps. |
City issues:
Land and rents will become high as population grows, or if the development proves successful and a popular place to live.
Relevant links:
http://www.carbusters.org/magazine/no15.php
http://lists.riseup.net/www/info/carfreeecovillages
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/arcology/
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/BuildaCarFreeCity/
The next american city ? need to add that.
What other approaches should be considered?
Carbusters is fostering grass-roots organizations in many cities. Could you be content working in that way?
Wouldn't it be nice to forget the carfree problem and just live an enjoyable life?
What would I do in that case?
Run around in the wilderness practicing primitive skills perhaps. Or focus work on population control.
Carfreeness as a spiritual practice.
That was the title. But this is about being a carfree person and trying to find a way to live a joyful life. For me that may mean working on a carfreecity in the U.S.
Will working on carfreeness make me happy?
Carfreeness is not a timeless problem. I used to wish to only focus on timeless problems. Or on the question of why it is that some people are interested it carfreeness/other good things while others are not. But now, I think it is time to work on this problem of this time.
What other things can we work on? Learning primitive skills, learning how to make ecovillages. What else? Dance? Violin?
If the world is going to be overrun by reproducing humans and destroyed, would you still wish to work on carfreecities?
The only other kind of work I'd wish to do is primitive skills to subsist, or work building an ecovillage.
What work on carfreecities can you do that you will value doing?
We need non-profit status.
We need money to buy land and to build.
We need lots of people to know about this project.
Related: the Freestate Project has 5,000 people by August, with a goal of 20,000...
We need smart and influential people to help us.
What else?
Will this project only benefit rich white people? Probably, in the US, rich white people could benefit the most (as with computers and most everything else), but poor whites and others should derive benefits as well, eventually. Of course, car infestation is a rich white problem. If I were an aborigine of some kind, I'd be fighting oil companies, not car infestation.