G'day,
Meeting with Penny Pyett and Sue Mossman of Permaculture North & West (Sydney) respectively yesterday, Sue raised the issue of our Western suburbs – and by extension, the question of suburbia generally.
Sydney basin has an expanding ring of suburbia that lies mostly to the West, because of geography (the basin is ringed by mountains and forests) and the history of development along rivers and radial train lines out from Sydney city itself, which lies on the (east) coast.
The suburbs are a concern. Business as usual for people who live a long way from their jobs & public transport (and further than walking or biking distance from shops and social amenities) looks a worry. But then the transition model doesn’t depend on business as usual.
‘McMansions’ are rarely energy efficient – often with quite a lot of internal space and with large inefficient windows because they are not oriented north or, if they are, are not shaded in summer. They probably don’t have useful thermal density because they are not very solid (or as someone who builds passive solar houses said to me, they have thermal mass, insulation and reflective surfaces exactly where they shouldn’t, or are even ‘inside out’). Retrofitting them would be an interesting challenge.
But the suburbs are not doomed for lack of space to grow food, generate energy, collect and recycle water and produce goods. They have plenty of space, if not always in their own gardens. Many in suburbia here still belong to unions and may well belong to decent churches, so there are communication channels and community ideals.
Many of them will actually be within easier reach of farms than inner city dwellers – and only a generation away from living on the land. People in suburbia may even live at the right density to grow & produce enough locally but close enough to co-opt their nearest mall as a distribution centre.
Those of us who want to bring about transition for the Sydney Basin need to support communities to develop a powerful and attractive vision for their suburbs.
Anyone else already developing such a model?