Our Town: Pictures and Music
This morning I read once again an article that highlighted a reporter’s misperception about new urbanism. He explained how new urbanist communities are the ideal communities for those who want to live the green lifestyle but that “most people” can’t afford to live in these communities. Every time I read this I have to sigh.
New urbanism communities are not just new constructed high end communities or re-developments in costly areas of the city. New urbanism is also a lifestyle and a mindset. It is about examining how we live together in community with one another and how we can adjust our city or town policies and guidelines to enhance our social and physical environments. If anything, new urbanism is about making communities more accessible to a variety of income earners. Many new developments are specifically designed to give opportunity for healthy, green living to low and middle income residents.
Yesterday we celebrated our annual village festival which actually started out almost 40 years ago as an act of protest and activism against development that would have torn out the soul of our old community and made us a useless bedroom community with no purposeful commercial or artistic center to encourage residents to work and play where they live. These guiding objectives help to cut environmentally costly commutes and encourages people to be engaged and supportive of green living, small business and safe community initiatives. We all benefit from that.
Thanks to our act of protest decades ago we now have a thriving social and commercial center that supports safe and healthy lifestyles for families and and makes it easier for people who want to work at home or close to home.
Yesterday’s festival attracted upwards of 50,000 people from our outlying rural areas and the huge metropolitan city to the south of us.
It’s an event that just about everyone looks forward to because of the friends we’re able to connect with in the community, the activities for the kids and the fabulous food, arts and crafts that are available for purchase or barter!
Rather than ramble on about how great the Unionville Festival was I thought I’d just show some pictures from our event and remind you once again what a benefit it is to our families, our businesses and social life to celebrate and make a big deal about where we live – that attitude transformed our sleepy bedroom community into a vital new urbanism center.
Here’s a picture to give you an idea of the size of the crowd filling our Main St. during the festival. The street is closed for the day.
This festival isn’t just about browsing it’s about entertainment too. Click on the video link below to get a small taste of an amazing teen named Rob Christian. Rob performs all over the country but he’s a native of our region and it was a thrill to have him again at our annual festival. I’m sure we’ll hear more about this talented musician in the years to come:
Young Jazz Talent at Unionville Festival 2008
One of my husband’s favorite activities is buying food–especially his favorite hot sauce from a vendor who is also at our weekly farmer’s market.
On our Main St. we also have beautiful heritage homes so garden and house gazing is a nice activity too. Here’s a friendly home owner waving at this paparazzi!
A Little Inspiration
When you feel uninspired and unenthusiastic about your work or life priorities at hand, what do you do? Do you read inspirational literature or maybe put on your favorite CD?
Being the community obsessed person that I am I often get inspiration from travel and when I can’t travel (which is most of the time) I visit my favorite locales in a virtual sense by looking at pictures either on the computer or in my albums. It’s a good thing the virtual trip can do the job for me when needed othewise I’d be in debt buying plane tickets!
Join me on my trip today.
Southern Ohio (Yellow Springs/Dayton area): The 9 hr. drive for us is worth it since we visit my husband’s childhood favorites like delicious Young’s Dairy farm (excellent ice cream!).
Another reason we like southern Ohio is the softly rolling hills that shape the landscape. Our travelling music for these rural trips is usually Simon and Garfunkel… “Slow down you move too fast, you got to make the morning last just kicking around the cobble stones; looking for fun and feeling groovy…”
And finally for a slightly different pace my other little escape I love returning to is Negril, Jamaica. Nothing like community life in this beach town. Sunsets on the beach really do look this.
What Is So Special About Where You Live?
Today’s brainy quote that I found on the web:
“A great city is not to be confounded with a populous one.” Aristotle
I like this quote because it is so true about so many cities. Sure New York is great with its 9 million residents, but so are many smaller cities in the U.S. and elsewhere. What makes a city great is the mix of people and ideas, not the size.
I was born in a great old city London (U.K.) then moved to a much smaller but still pretty interesting city on it’s own (Toronto). When I was about 7 my parents moved us way out to the suburbs and for many years after that I really missed the cozyness and familiarity of my old city neighborhood.
I’ve had a hard time shaking that infatuation with old, vibrant neighborhoods–the kind that define so many cities.
How can you not enjoy the mix of cultures, lifestyles, businesses and ideas that make a city so interesting? Today I read an article in the Cleveland Plain Dealer about that city’s efforts to continue its transformation from a dieing rust belt city to a new millenium city – one that is proud of its industrial past but aggressively reaching out to the creative and passionate people who are looking for a city with potential.
Here’s their idea: Cleveland has a concentration of top consumer product design companies and product manufacturers (like Moen faucets) so why not designate a section of the city as the District of Design.
Not only does Cleveland have it’s eyes set on attracting consumer product and furniture designers but it is also focused on reaching the college students who are also attracted to the city’s world class Museum, Art and Music institutes.
This is an example not just for grand old cities but for struggling communities, villages and towns everywhere. Find what is unique and distinctive about your region and engage residents and business owners in a discussion about what your community can become.
Sure these are uncertain economic times but it is also a time to regroup and determine how best we are going enhance our communities to support our lifestyles, our businesses and our childrens’ future.
Shaping our cities and towns into destinations that reflect the unique characteristics and goals of the people that live there is a way to help boost our local economies. With the high cost of gas, more people will be travelling locally and that could be good news for your community.
I encourage you to read this article and see how it might apply to your efforts to build your business, community, or career.
I’m Also Here…
