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February 15, 2008

Work-life balance city

Continuing our happiness theme from the previous entry, here's one way to look at work-life balance happiness:

"In their interviews and surveys, Nash and Stevenson learned that successful professionals who were also happy had found ways to 'switch and link' - to switch the focus of their full attention with lightning speed among activities and people in different realms.

David Zelman, a psychotherapist and executive coach, sees this as a crucial skill successful people must learn. "Can you leave the office in the office? Can you give someone outside the office the same attention you gave your CEO? If you can give your children or your spouse 100% of your attention, even for a brief period, it goes way longer than compromising and giving them some time because you think you should." Link

If you agree with this, the key words here are: 'switch and link' with lightning speed. If you live by this, chances are you don't commute to an office park or live in a subdivision, which will take you a little longer than lightning to switch and link between work and home. I know I'm preaching to the choir here, but at least if you know of any unhappy workers commuting from the burbs to your otherwise happy work-life balanced natural cultural district workplace, maybe this will help you empathize :)

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February 14, 2008

enRoute: 'The happy city'

When you boil it down to the basic elements, the metrics of a place's success answers the question, 'Are the people happy?' To some researchers, this is more science than art, as explained in Air Canada's enRoute article, The Happy City. City mayors are making sweeping changes, most of which center on replacing cars with grand public third places.

University of British Columbia economics professor John Helliwell, who studies happiness and social connections, states that frequency of positive interaction is the key, so the more we meet outside of our cars, the kinder and gentler we're likely to become.

Some examples:

Paris: Mayor Bertrand Delanoë founded the Paris Beach, will ban all suburban cars from the city core by 2012 and provided 20,000 virtually free bikes downtown.

Bogotá, Columbia: Its mayor legislated the transformation of roads into parks and pedestrian "freeways."

Mexico City's mayor is also lobbying for investment in urban beaches and bikeways, Seoul replaced downtown freeway with parks and streams, and London implemented congestion charges to limit cars downtown.

Mental well being is also the purpose behind the new car-less city of Mandar, profiled in this recent entry.

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February 13, 2008

Beach in the city

Paris' Mayor Bertrand Delanoë wanted to make summer vacation accessible to people unable to afford leave town, so he brought the vacation to them. Voila! Paris Plage (Paris Beach).

Since 2002, three million people sun themselves along a two-mile stretch along the Seine between late July and August. An expressway is temporarily replaced with two tons of sand, grass, wood decks, lounge chairs and palm trees, creating a pedestrian-only paradise in the heart of a bustling, noisy, non-stop city. Though managed by the city, the operation is financed by corporate sponsors.

Apparently its popularity has spread to other cities, including Berlin, Germany, Brussels, Belgium, Budapest, Hungary; and Saint-Quentin (Aisne), France.

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February 12, 2008

Zero carbon, zero car city in Abu Dhabi

The list is impressive for Masdar, Abu Dhabi's grand experiment (ground breaking was last week) in building a truly sustainable city with:

Zero cars
Zero carbon emissions
Zero waste (converted to energy)
100% renewable energy
70% reduction in energy demand
80% water recycled
water production reduced by 75%

It's the ultimate living laboratory, as the country is investing $15 billion in new energy technologies. Keep in mind this is not some 10-acre eco-neighborhood, but a 2.3 square mile city with a resident population of 40,000 (up to 50,000) as well as 70,000 workplaces. To be completed in 2016, it will feature pedestrian-only streets, paseos, walks, squares, courtyards and piazzas, connected via personal rapid transit. You can view the virtual tour here.

One aspect of the city that should definitely not be overlooked is the presence of a graduate-level academic research center, Masdar Institute, with ties to MIT, since behind a progressive city is often a progressive educational institution.

Granted, it's a bit of a contradiction in that it's being built in the desert, but it will serve as a model for mature communities in other aspects.

Check out what green experts have to say about Masdar here.

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February 11, 2008

What does CoolTown do?

I get asked that a lot.

It's not easy to explain in words, so here's a visual map (larger one here) that can help provide a big picture answer. CoolTown Beta Communities is the implementation entity of CoolTown Studios, this 'weekdaily' newsite blog. The blog itself (and only the blog!) is a free public service (including all 1200+ archived entries) toward building better places to live/work/play. We're also establishing a joint venture with a change management and viral marketing firm to more effectively crowdsource cool places for creatives.

You can get a better look at and description of the illustrated triple loop diagrams here, which utilize beta communities to provide the blueprints and implementation programs for developing real places.

Note that the ultimate goal is the experience and enjoyment of natural cultural districts, filled with vibrant third places.

The diagram uses a couple of familiar icons, such as Keynote from Apple and Grapevine: The New Art of Word-of-Mouth Marketing, two resources with a lot of cooltown spirit.

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