It is time that we lower our impact on the world.  We need to do long-term planning and be willing to reconsider how we live.  If we do not succeed at living within our means , "the world as a whole within the next few decades will face a declining standard of living or perhaps something worse" (from  Jared Diamond's "Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed".)   Earth is a beautiful place filled with good people; therefore we need a better future for them.  The following discussion is about our future village, Wilshire Center.   We as workers, business owners and residents in Wilshire Center can be part of the solution. 

This is a work in progress by Gary Russell, AIA , to be added to over time.  If you have comments please email me at gary@wilshirecenter.com.

First the big picture - global warming and how societies choose to fail or succeed.  One of the most current books on this subject is "Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed"  by Jared Diamond.  “The lesson of “Collapse” is that societies, as often as not, aren’t murdered. They commit suicide: they slit their wrists and then, in the course of many decades, stand by passively and watch themselves bleed to death.” ““Collapse” is a book about the most prosaic elements of the earth’s ecosystem—soil, trees, and water—because societies fail, in Diamond’s view, when they mismanage those environmental factors.” “--we can be law-abiding and peace-loving and tolerant and inventive and committed to freedom and true to our own values and still behave in ways that are biologically suicidal.” - Malcolm Gladwell, book review in the New Yorker.   I highly recommend reading this book.

For more information on stopping global warming and what you can do,  go to www.stopglobalwarming.org. To better understand the global impact of this warming trend go www.architecture2030.org/global_impact/index.html. Yes, one person can make a difference by taking the following steps, go towww.wilshirecenter.com/future/FutureLink.html, and by encouraging family members, friends, neighbors and fellow workers to take similar steps.  Some more thoughts -"The Next Green Revolution".

Help stop increasing global warming and the need for the war in Iraq - buy a flex fuel vehicle that can use ethanol.  A message from your President: " Ethanol is good for the environment""and it means we're less dependent on foreign sources of oil”.  For information on the use of ethanol in automobiles log on to E85.

"Global warming, caused by a man-made blanket of greenhouse gasses (mainly carbon dioxide) that surrounds the earth and traps in heat, is well underway and if allowed to intensify over the coming years will seriously threaten our planet.

Unknowingly, we are chiefly responsible for these gasses and we have a unique and historic opportunity to reverse that for which we are responsible The scientific consensus is that we must limit the rise in global temperature to less than 2° C above pre-industrial levels to avoid disastrous impacts. At 2° C, it is likely millions of people will be displaced from their homes. Impacts do not end there. Food production will decline, rivers will become too warm for trout and salmon, snow pack will decrease threatening urban water supplies, weather will become more extreme, sea level will rise inundating coastal areas, the world’s coral reefs - home to 25% of all marine species - will be destroyed, a quarter of all plant and animal species on earth will become extinct and the Greenland ice sheet will begin to melt.  ( "Greenland's glaciers are melting into the sea twice as fast as previously believed, the result of a warming trend that renders obsolete predictions of how quickly Earth's oceans will rise over the next century, scientists said yesterday." By Shankar Vedantam, Washington Post Staff Writer, Friday, February 17, 2006)

At 3° C the impacts are projected to be catastrophic. We can only imagine what the socio-economic and political consequences will be given this scenario. If we continue on our present course of burning fossil fuels, the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change projects that we could reach 2° C by 2050 and 3° C by 2070. We are running out of time."   Edward Mazria AIA.

Another good informative video on global warming:  http://www.stopglobalwarming.org/features/?leo

See the film: "An Inconvenient Truth"

For more information read the "Time" Special Report Global Warming, April 3, 2006 issue.

Closing comments on the big picture.   If we could significantly reduce our defense budgets, we would have more than enough money to solve global warming, erase poverty, hunger, many diseases, and ignorance. By solving these problems we create many new jobs. People would not be desperate, undernourished, without hope, and would not need to kill each other. Government’s role than would be to help people solve problems and improve life for all.  People would become more skillful, understanding and caring/compassionate.

It is critical that we acts now for our own well-being and for the well-being of our world.  Join Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and 205 mayors in the U.S. to reduce global warming pollution by striving to meet or beat the Kyoto Protocol targets in their communities.

Recent scientific predictions are that the world has just 10 years to reverse global warming or a tipping point will be reached beyond which it cannot be stopped.  Scientists warn of ecological catastrophe across Asia as glaciers melt and continent's great rivers dry up.

As to the local picture, the following will be an attempt to discuss some ideas and current activities towards building a better future for our community, Wilshire Center.  Over tme I will add material to this section.   Some of the current activities consist of a new park at the old Ambassador site along with the new school that could act as a community center, WCBIC's clean and green program, working with CRA to find solutions to our local traffic issues, and the WCK Neighborhood Council election.  I will add more information over time, comments are welcomed, gary@wilshirecenter.com.

How we shape Wilshire Center’s growth is crucial to making our community economically, socially and environmentally healthier, safer, and more livable.   We can enhance our livable of our community by increasing the quality of life, encourage multi dimensional land use patterns that ensure a mix of uses, minimize the impact of cars, and promote walking, bicycling, and transit access to employment, education, recreation, entertainment, shopping, and services. Economic development and transportation investments that reinforce these land use patterns, and the ability to move people and goods by non automobile alternatives wherever possible.

For more on what could happen in Wilshire Center to go our Cool District site.

Challenge -- for our community to be running on 100 percent zero-carbon electricity by 2020 by using renewable energy such as solar power and wind power to make electricity for our homes and businesses, and where our vehicles use electricity also by these renewalbe energy sources.

Consider the words of a scientist, Rajendra Pachauri, who in 2007 accepted the Nobel Prize on behalf of the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which he heads: "If there's no action before 2012, that's too late. What we do in the next two to three years will determine our future. This is the defining moment."

We need to move from a high carbon producing economy to a zero carbon, sustainable economy, and become “one planet living” individuals, companies, and communities. If everyone in the world lived like an average North American we would need five planets to live on.   We need to reduce our ecological footprint to live within a fair share of the Earth's resources.

TRANSPORATION IDEAS