Join One Earth in offering a warm welcome to our new “squad member,” Jillian Patton, Development Director. She is fresh off a thirteen-year stint in New York City, where she was most recently part of the Development team at NYU School of Law. She was also previously part of the team that raised money to develop the storied High Line, a park built on a former elevated train line on the West Side of Manhattan. Established in 2009, it helped provide a model for similar urban greening projects nationwide, such as Chicago’s 606 path that runs along an old rail line here in the city.

Remember back in March, right after the COVID shutdown, and how empty the streets were of cars? It was a biker’s dream; many people took to the empty roads on two wheels. Fast forward to August, and the auto traffic has come roaring back. . . but biking is still a hot topic this summer.

Here are some tools and resources for you to have fun/get around/support equity/save the earth on your bike during August, September and beyond.

A few weeks after much of the world locked down to slow the spread of the coronavirus, the environmental picture looked pretty rosy. Automobile traffic plummeted, causing a big drop in emissions, and images from NASA showed a dramatic drop in air pollution.

For environmentalists everywhere, this was good news. Sadly, it was too good to last.

Dear Santa (Gov. Pritzker):

We’ve been so very good this year! We elected you Governor of Illinois and that is a first!  We think a progressive (fair) income tax is a great idea for all of us worker elves. . . we deserve a raise too, but a fair tax is a great start. . . .

IDOT is asking for 52% of the goods in this gift package for new roads and new highways. Bah humbug! IDOT has not been a good boy for decades. They’ve hired hacks and built programs that give us sprawl and ever more congestion. Their bread and butter puts more carbon dioxide and diesel pollution into everyone’s holiday stew. To choke on their brew is not a gift, it is a curse. Don’t give in to them, Santa!

When most people retire, they kick back, take cruises, and visit the grandchildren. Sally Stovall was not most people. She did, indeed, relish visiting her grandchildren, but after she retired from a career in organizational development, Sally embarked on a new, vibrant career as climate activist and community organizer.

In September 2010, Sally and her partner, Dick Alton, were worried about global warming and decided to hold a community meeting to see if others felt the same way. Out of the woodwork poured a cohort of people with the same concerns --no real surprise in progressive Oak Park.

Visiting friends or family via airplane this holiday season? Don’t forget to bring Mother Earth a present by offsetting the carbon emissions from your flight.

Carbon offsetting involves financially supporting Earth-friendly projects, such as planting trees or building wind farms, which reduce the amount of atmospheric carbon dioxide that your flight generated. Burning jet fuel produces carbon dioxide, one of the harmful greenhouse gases that is causing climate change.