Over 30 people came to the 491 Gallery in Leytonstone to watch The Power of Community on 27th September. The sofas and large screen made for very comfortable viewing.
The discussion after the film was very animated, and in order to capture the many ideas sparked off by the Cuban community’s response to the oil embargo, people were asked to write down their thoughts about what they would like to see change locally, and what they would like to get involved with.
The 3 main themes to emerge were:
Food
Transport
Community
Other themes were:
Energy
Waste and recycling
Population
Open spaces
People were asked to form groups around the theme they were most interested in, and to decide what their priority actions would be.
The food group (the biggest) felt that food growing should be encouraged, and many ways were suggested to do this (see below). They felt especially that children should grow food at school and learn how to do this from an early age.
The transport group wanted to:
· Expand cycle networks greatly
· Lower speed limits
· Have more timed buses, running on electric dynamo power
· See more goods (and bicycles) transported by rail
· See more road closures
· See traffic lights default to green for pedestrians
The community group wanted:
· To bring different community groups together
· To be an example in the community, show people what we’re talking about
· To find ways to meet our needs for community, identity and meaning, without using up the earth’s resources
The full list of ideas is below. There are a lot (people got very enthusiastic!) but it’s worth reading through as something might inspire you to get a group together and take some action. Even on a very small scale.
Transition Leytonstone
We were happy to meet some Leytonstone residents who were interested in starting a Transition group in Leytonstone. We hope to meet some more people who would like to join us at the next film showing on 25th October.
What people would like to see change locally, or get involved in:
Food
· Pick apples from elderly people’s gardens (presumably with their permission!)
· Growing food in front gardens, on windowsills, just outside Leytonstone tube
· Using free land to grow food
· Get local schools to all include growing veg in the playground
· Teach food preparation to people lacking these skills
· Encourage farmers’ markets
· More locally produced food
· ‘Local food’ shops
· Bake bread for others on a rota
· Idea of forest garden
· The market to have more local food
· Moving out to farms
· Agricultural training
· Use fruit and veg (e.g blackberries) instead of letting it rot
Transport
All the points above, as well as:
· More people on bicycles
· More cycle parking
· Real bicycle facilities on London overground services
· No parking hour rather than expensive to run no parking zones
· Bike safety
· More cycle paths
· Discouragement of short car journeys
Community
· Change perspective – not fuel crisis, crisis with our society
· Less work, more time to do community stuff
· Spirit of community
· Build up relationships
· Encourage sense of sharing
· Attitude of the authorities (Council) towards people with ‘green’ initiatives
· Bringing different community groups together
· Housing co-ops
· Human relationships, not technology
· More evening like this where community comes together ‘cos that’s how we change things
Energy
· Insulate all homes
· Turn off lights
Waste and recycling
· Street recycling facilities – encourage people to use them
· Encourage people not to use plastic bags
· Refuse, reuse – greater emphasis on these and only then on recycling
· Better recycling systems (?community systems)
· Free-cycle as global as ebay!
· Teach mending clothes
· Get local shops to stop using plastic bags – gets people talking and acting together
Population
· Depopulation at all levels: local, national and global
· Less humans everywhere!
· 2 child policy
Open spaces
· More local support for threatened sites (open spaces, allotments, trees, etc)
· Increase open land space – stop building on every available piece of land
· End the concreting of front gardens
On Sunday 25 October, we will be showing our next film at 491 Gallery, Leytonstone - A Crude Awakening. Compelling, intelligent and highly entertaining, the film looks at how our society, built on cheap and readily available oil, must be completely re-imagined and re-created.