Youth Films Demonstrate Commitment to Sustainability

One-Earth-Our-Earth-Contest-Logo2013

by Katie Morris The One Earth Film Festival 2013, organized by Green Community Connections, will sponsor the first ever Young Filmmakers Contest: One Earth…Our Earth.  This film contest is a way in which young people can showcase their abilities in making positive changes for their future.  It is an opportunity to engage our youth, and create excitement around how they can, and do, make a difference in our world and in our local community.

As part of the 2nd annual One Earth Film Festival, the Young Filmmakers Contest invites students in all eligible age categories (from third grade through college) to submit film entries that cover at least one of the following categories: water, waste, food, transportation, or energy.

With this contest, “we want to encourage youth to not just contemplate the issues surrounding sustainability, but to get them thinking about potential solutions,” said Sue Crothers, contest committee chair. “Youth involvement in the sustainability movement is the key to our future, and film is a powerful medium for them to express their concern and awareness. ”

The Rainforest Rescue Coalition (RRC), a Chicago based nonprofit organization, is currently working on a submission for the college-aged category of the contest.  Founded by four OPRF High School graduates among others, the mission of the RRC is to conserve and protect rainforest land around the world and to support sustainable relationships between humans and nature. RRC raises money for sustainability and conservation initiatives through direct action campaigns.  One of RRC’s goals is to help educate the public about conservation and environmental issues - including both the problems and solutions, . . . and what better way than through film?

Rainforest-Rescue-Coalition-148x150

According to Adam Bauer-Goulden, RRC President, RRC is creating their film entry as a way to show that anything is possible, if you put forth the energy and try to make a difference.   Though the film is still in its production phase, Bauer-Goulden reports that RRC’s film will begin with a montage of the terrible environmental disasters taking place in the world today. It will move into the story of how RRC was formed and show footage from its first 350-mile fundraising ride. The audience will have the chance to learn how they can become involved with RRC and other conservation efforts.  The film will close with a final montage of the great and positive things that the environmental movement is accomplishing.

Bauer-Goulden says, “Our inspiration is trying to get as many people involved as possible in our movement. I really believe that energy is the most important thing that we have. I believe that our purpose in life is to use our energy for something inherently good and to make the world a better place…we really just want to show people that we are just normal kids and anybody and everybody has the power to make change in this world, no matter what your situation...Anything counts!”

The deadline to submit a film to the Young Filmmakers Contest is January 25, 2013 at 5 PM CST.  For more information on the contest, please check out our website and facebook page, or contact Sue Crothers, suebillgee@comcast.net or Katie Morris, Katie.a.morris@gmail.com.

Madison Street Makeover Proposal Considered by OP Board

Message from Active Transportation Alliance

On Sept. 18, the Oak Park Village Board will consider a proposal to redesign Madison Street into a three-lane road (two travel lanes + a left hand turn lane) with wider sidewalks and parkways, safer crosswalks, bike lanes, and streetscape improvements. Madison would become less like Harlem and North Avenues and more like two-lane roads such as Chicago and Ridgeland Avenues.

The project would create a safer, greener, more attractive and walkable street, and it would be funded in part with more than $7 million in TIF funds that are dedicated to improvements on and along Madison.

For more information about this project, read Active Trans' Q&A blog post.  send an email to the Oak Park Village Board to let them know that you want a Madison St. that is safer, quieter, more attractive and a better fit for the community.

Why does Madison Street need a makeover?

• Not safe, with 2 crashes every 3 days. Cars speed and weave, and rear-end collisions are common when cars back up behind left-turning cars. A three-lane configuration would be safer because it limits lane changes and traffic flows more evenly and at speeds appropriate for the neighborhood. A narrower street, along with crosswalk improvements, would make it safer for people on foot and bike to cross, including students who cross Madison to reach the four schools within one block of Madison.
• Too wide for the amount of traffic it carries. Four-lane Madison carries the same number of cars (18,000 per day) as Ridgeland (18,000 per day), which is only two lanes and works just fine. Moreover, the improved Madison Street would have a left-hand turn lane at each intersection, whereas Ridgeland does not. Madison would not be narrowed between Home to Harlem and Lombard to Austin, in order to accommodate cars turning onto Harlem and Austin. Traffic engineers say narrowing Madison would not significantly add time to the drive between Austin and Harlem.
• Not good for business and residential development. Four-lane roads work best with big box stores, strip malls and parking lots out front. But the lots on Madison are too shallow and the car traffic too light to attract this type of development. On the other hand, the street is too wide and cars move too fast to attract residential and commercial development that is typical of two-lane streets in Oak Park. Madison’s design doesn’t do either approach well, which contributes to the tired hodgepodge of empty lots, empty buildings and fast food.

Citizens Climate Lobby Launches Local Chapter

By Kenneth O’Hare, Green Community Connections On a sweltering Saturday morning in July, eleven citizens gathered in the basement of the Maze Branch Library in Oak Park to launch a new local chapter of an international movement to combat climate change.  Some of those present were old friends and neighbors, with roots in the environmental and civil rights movements. Most had attended a presentation on the science of climate change the week before at Oak Park Public Library. They were in the basement at Maze now to take the first steps in organizing locally to become the newest chapter of Citizens Climate Lobby (CCL).  www.citizensclimatelobby.org

Meeting organizers Rick Knight of Brookfield and Ken O’Hare of Oak Park sketched the origins, purpose and strategy of the Citizens Climate Lobby (CCL) and invited the group to join in forming the newest chapter, the second in the Chicago area,  which encompasses Chicago’s West Side neighborhoods and the near western suburbs. An international movement that now has 63 chapters in the U.S. and Canada, CCL is dedicated to creating “political will for a livable world.”

The current primary strategy of CCL is to build support for a national fee (tax) on fossil carbon, with the proceeds of the tax to be rebated to the citizenry. An article on the fee and rebate concept is available on the Green Community Connections web site, under the title “The Case for a Carbon Tax.”  See also the links below for more detailed information on the fee (tax) and rebate concept.

CCL chapters around the country have been active in educating the public on climate change, and education on the growing crisis is a core activity of the new, local chapter here. Rick Knight, a chemical engineer, has presented his talk and slide show titled “The Science of Climate Change” to highly receptive audiences around the Chicago area. The presentation is available to local groups upon request (see contact information below).

Citizens Climate Lobby chapters seek to create a close relationship with their local U.S. Congressional delegation, positioning CCL as a knowledgeable resource on climate change. Here in the Chicago area it means getting to know and working with two U.S. Senators and ten or more U.S. Representatives.  Creating that relationship is a gradual process of meeting with the officials, soliciting their views on the subject, pointing out how climate change intersects with the officials’ other interests, providing resource materials, and promoting effective legislative solutions such as a carbon fee and rebate law.

Dedicated to creating the political will for stabilizing the climate, the Citizens Climate Lobby works by engaging individuals in a wide variety of life situations to exercise their personal and political power. The underlying belief is that ordinary citizens, with education and support, can become highly effective advocates on behalf of the climate.

If you are interested in a public education and legislative approach to combating climate change, the Citizens Climate Lobby may be a movement for you to consider. To learn more, first look over the CCL website  http://www.citizensclimatelobby.org, then contact Ken O’Hare (kohare@consultmillennia.com) or Rick Knight (Citizen99@comcast.net) to get more details. The next meeting of the local chapter, dubbed the Chicagoland Citizens Climate Lobby—West, is scheduled for August 4, 2012, at 11:00 a.m., at Maze Branch Library, 845 Gunderson Avenue, Oak Park. The meeting will include participation in a national conference call with other CCL members around the country, and will include a report on CCL’s recent Lobby Day in Washington, D.C., in which several local chapter members participated.

For more detailed information on the fee(tax) and rebate concept from Citizens Climate Lobby:

• See an interview with CCL Executive Director, Mark Reynold on the need for a tax on fossil carbon http://citizensclimatelobby.org/MilwaukeeVideo1211.
• For a synopsis of federal tax and rebate legislation proposed by the Citizens Climate Lobby, go to http://www.citizensclimatelobby.org/files/images/FeeAndDividendLegProposal081811.pdf

Other related articles:

• Bill McKibben's article in the current issue of Rolling Stones Magazine:  http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/global-warmings-terrifying-new-math-20120719

Say "No" to Inevitability and Speak up for Sustainability

Comments to the OP Village Board on the Expansion of the Eisenhower Expressway by Jenny Jocks Stelzer I know that there are many complexities to dealing with the Eisenhower Expressway reconstruction, so I attended the recent village board meeting to speak up for the three complexities that are important to me, as a person who is invested in sustainability. Here’s what I said to our Village Board:

1. Watch your language. “The potential widening of the Eisenhower” very quickly becomes “the eventual widening,” and then “the inevitable widening” in the public’s mind. The language of inevitability bulldozes those who are less informed than you are and, for better or for worse, the public is less informed than you are. So, it’s up to you, Village Board, to manage the discourse.
2. We live here; we don’t just drive here. While the IDOT solutions may alleviate congestion or road safety problems, remember that myopic solutions often trigger the law of unintended consequences. It is not okay for us to accept the perceived inevitability of “more cars” when we live in an EPA-designated nonattainment area for the pollutants lead and particulate matter under the Clean Air Act. It’s actually not a controversy: breathing IS more important than driving.
3. Don’t forget true sustainability. The widespread acceptance of the inevitability of more cars goes in one direction, fast. It is up to us to alter that trajectory of community disinvestment. Let’s support a plan that doesn’t incentivize the hours-long commute and makes possible a community’s development of its own economy. We want people to live and work in Oak Park, not just drive past.

These may be concerns you have, but you might be thinking, “She should have said ___, or focused on the very important point ___.” So, what can you do? Whatever you do, don’t sit back and accept the language of inevitability. Write to our local papers. Email our Village Board. Attend the board meetings and use your 3 minutes of Public Comment to speak up for sustainability.

Lighted Crosswalks Debut on Roosevelt Road

Making our Community Safer for Walking and Biking

Crossing Roosevelt Road at Lombard Avenue, Gunderson Avenue and Home Avenue should be a little safer now that lighted crosswalks have been installed. In-roadway warning lights, as they are officially known, were installed as part of the Roosevelt Road streetscape improvement project.  In-Roadway Warning Lights (IRWL) were developed to reduce crosswalk accidents, improve pedestrian safety, and decrease the number of pedestrian injuries and deaths caused by driver inattention or limited visibility conditions. 

In addition to the fl ashing beacons and enhanced signage erected for most mid-block pedestrian crossings, the new In-Roadway Warning Light crosswalks include solar-powered LED lights placed within the roadway pavement along the marked crosswalk. They are activated by pedestrian push-buttons located on each side of the crosswalk.The fl ashing lights warn motorists in advance of the crosswalk to brake to a full stop for crossing pedestrians.

Even though state law requires motorists to stop for pedestrians in marked crosswalks, officials say pedestrians can have difficulty getting the right of way without traffic signs or signals, a situation the warning lights may help to remedy. Pressing a button activates a signpost beacon and flashing, in-pavement lights, giving the pedestrian about 30 seconds to cross before the system automatically turns off. The energy-efficient LED lights are solar powered.

Officials caution pedestrians to be sure vehicles are stopped before proceeding into the crosswalk. The crosswalks selected for the lighted crossings had the most pedestrians and pedestrian incidents, officials say. For more information regarding these and other enhancements as part of the Roosevelt Road streetscape project, visit www.rooseveltroad.com..

Bicycle Repair Classes

Start the year off right.  Work on your bike on those cold winter days. 

We have a four day bonanza schedule of our most popular offerings! 

• January 12 & 13 - Derailleurs, Chains & Cables
• January 14 - Wheel Building
• January 15 - Open Shop for Bikes

You can take one class at a time or save by signing up for the whole Park Tool series (attend the classes at your convenience). For details and the complete schedule click here.

Moving Planet -- Acting Locally and Globally

Submitted by Doug Burke

The Green Community Tour in Oak Park and River Forest was one of over 2000 actions in 180 countries around the world on September 24.  Moving Planet Day, initiated by 350.org, mobilized people in nearly every country from Afghanistan to Zimbabwe to demonstrate the ability and the need to move beyond fossil fuel.  You can learn more about Moving Planet at http://www.moving-planet.org/.

The day of action embodies the challenging truth about fighting climate change:  to win, we need local action everywhere, and to win, we need at the same time to have a global movement.

Photo is one of the 2000 events held as part of Moving Planet Day -- this one in Kathmandu, Nepal:  Monks from the Namo-Buddhist Monastery outside Kathmandu and members of Small Earth Nepal pose with a Moving Planet banner on Sept 24, 2011.

Workshop to Address Housing & Transit-Oriented Development

Information from the Village of Oak Park

Workshop on housing & transit-oriented development

Residents, business owners and stakeholders are invited to participate in an interactive community visioning workshop on the future role of housing and transit-oriented development in Oak Park, including a possible cap for portions of the Eisenhower Expressway.

In addition to community wide challenges and opportunities, the group will discuss the Madison Avenue corridor and the future of Oak Park Avenue as it intersects I-290 (including IDOT proposals to widen the expressway).  You can offer comment and input at an important meeting on Thursday, September 8th.

Participants will use keypad electronic polling

The workshop is scheduled for 7 – 9:30 p.m., Thurs., Sept. 8, at the 19th Century Club, 178 Forest Ave.  Participants will use keypad electronic polling on factors that may influence future decisions. Representatives from the Village, West Cook Housing Collaborative, Metropolitan Planning Council, Metropolitan Mayors Caucus, Chicago Metropolitan Agency for Planning and nonprofit lender IFF will lead the discussion. For more information and to RSVP, call 708.358.5410 or e-mail housing@oak-park.us.

Green Connections Tour -- discovering sustainable Oak Park & River Forest!

On Saturday, September 24, 1:00-4:00pm, Green Community Connections, along with other organizations will sponsor a self-guided tour of selected green sites in Oak Park and River Forest. The event is scheduled in conjunction with 350.org’s Moving Planet day,and is designed with cyclists and pedestrians in mind.   Public, commercial and residential destinations will showcase green buildings, sustainable landscaping, community gardening, urban chicken farming, biodiverse open space, and other features of sustainable, low-carbon community life. Each site will feature a tour or demonstration to introduce visitors to the story behind the initiative and how it contributes to sustainability in our community. This is a great opportunity to showcase the great things that real people and organizations are doing already and exchange ideas for what we might want to try in the future.

Information on how to register for the event and get your map, site descriptions, and all the details will be coming soon.

If you have suggestions for sites to be included in the tour (including your own home, business, school, etc.), please contact us and let us know.

Why the Proposed Expansion of I-290 is a Bad Idea

By: Dan Knickelbein, OPRF High School Class of 2010 In the 1950s, President Dwight Eisenhower had a bold plan to unite America using federally built interstates. What resulted from his plan is now the largest highway system in the world, and one of Chicagoland’s largest expressways, I-290, is named after the President who had the vision to transform America’s transportation system. However, after capably serving America’s transportation needs for more than 50 years, it is time to focus our energy and resources on public and sustainable forms of transportation, like buses, trains, and bicycling, and away from the traditional system of moving cars. That is why the proposed extension of I-290 from six to eight lanes between Mannheim Road and Austin Boulevard is a misguided idea, and should not be carried out. Instead the Illinois Department of Transportation (IDOT) should focus its time and money on public transit projects, such as extending CTA Blue Line service to Oak Brook, or adding an express bus route from Austin Blvd direct to the Loop.

The Village of Oak Park, after conducting a special report on the effects of adding a lane in each direction on I-290, has rightfully come out against the project. The report identified numerous problems the project would cause in Oak Park, including increased air and noise pollution, the potential need for property acquisition along the edges of the expressway, the disruption of freight and passenger rail service during the time of construction, and a decrease in property values.

But the reasons for opposing this project are more than just the traditional costs of expanding a highway. For all the progress the Chicagoland area has made in the past 10 years in public transit (creation of the Pink Line, creation of several transit terminals, including in Oak Park), expanding the Eisenhower expressway would significantly hurt the future of transit in the area, and would not solve the problem of crowded interstates. Expanding I-290 is a solution for the 20^th Century, but it is 2011, and it is time to focus away from moving cars and instead focus on moving people. At a time when gas prices are above $4, and the effects of climate change are becoming more and more obvious every day, expanding I-290 sends the wrong message. Instead, IDOT should partner with the CTA, Metra, and Pace to create sustainable transit options for people looking to travel to and from the western suburbs.

Now is the right time for Illinois to become a leader in public and sustainable transit. With several Amtrak routes that go through Illinois having recently gotten millions in federal dollars for upgrades, expanding the Eisenhower would be bad for both the future of sustainable transit as well as the future of Oak Park.  Illinois has been famous for some well-known yet never started transportation proposals, (remember “Cap the Ike”, or the Circle Line?). Let’s hope that this project is another example of IDOT simply blowing hot air.