, RAIN Journal of Appropriate Technology VOL. 2, NO. 6 APRIL 1976 75 CENTS e Special Poster Issue * Visions of Ecotopia * Good-Bye to the Flush Toilet * Make Where You Are a Paradise * Dollar Power
April Showers 1976 National Composting and Waste Recycling Conference May 12, 13 & 14 at the Sheraton Hotel in Portland. Sponsored by Rodale Press, P.S.U., RAIN Magazine and the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality. Compost toilets, home sewage recycling, Stop the 5-Gallon Flush, sewerless society, Oregon's testing of alternative systems, methane digestion, modifying existing municipal systems, sewage sludge, theater and live music, garbage anthropology- and more. If the waste recycling poster interests you, come to the conference for the real scoop. For registration details contact RAIN, Attention: Waste Conference. Conference on Building Community, April 17-18, at Olympia Community Center: clinics, land use, child care, media, co-ops, etc. Contact Carol Costello, Washington State Energy Office 106 Maple Park, Olympia, WA 98504 206-753-2417 Does anyone know Zeljko Kujundzic, whom we mentioned in RAIN as having a solar-heated kiln. A reader would like to get hold of him and we have no address. Corrections Oops! The error djin struck again last month. How is it that in an article about forgetting to cover our friends ... you guessed it ... we forgot some of our best friends? Gigi Coe is one of the founding members of Tilth, and Jeff Barnes and Howdy Reichmuth of Bear Creek Thunder are responsible for the technology and design of the Tilth/Prag Greenhouse. Apologies all around! Karl Hess (Community Technology) will be speaking at the University of Idaho, the Borah Symposium, March 31. For details, contact Jeanette Driskell, U. of Idaho, Moscow, ID. It is hoped he will also be coming to the Portland area about the same time. AERO Solar Construction Workshop, March 27-28, in Billings, Montana, coordinated by Ken Smith and Lee Johnson of Ecotope/ RAIN Magazine. Starting Saturday morning with slide-film lecture-discussion on the energy crisis; energy conservation and renewable energy sources such as methane, wind and solar, and how to build a solar hot water heater. Saturday afternoon begins a hands-on, workgloves collector construction session which ends Sunday evening with two complete solar hot water thermosiphon systems. Contact AERO, 418 Stapleton Bldg., Billings, MT 59101 (Attn: Solar Workshop) or call 406-259-1958. A "Sierra Club Agriculture Policy" is now being formulated, and "briefs" of their ideas and opinions are requested from interested citizens. Write Sierra Club, Mills Tower, San Francisco, CA 94104 (Attn: Agric. Policy Statement) The Schumacher essay on land speculation was from Think About Land by E. F. Schumacher, $1 airmail from Catholic Housing Aid Society, 189a Old Brampton Road, London, SW5 OAR, England. Our good friend Bill Day, of course, wrote the wood stove article, "Don't Burn Your House." The Johnson Creek article should mention the Metropolitan Service District. Beau Portland Community College classes starting the week of March 29th (call Community Education, 503-244-6111, for details): (1) "Intervention & the Environment" (W781), taught by Lloyd Marbet, successful intervenor in Pebble Springs Nuclear Power Plant hearings; how to improve your effectiveness in public hearings, methods of intervention, pertinent laws and procedures, with special attention to energy hearings, utility rate determinations and the initiative process. Mondays, 5 wks., $6.50. (2) "Home Insulation Special" (W782), taught by Jack Warren of Portland General Electric; how to cut heating costs, options for insulating and reinsulating old and new homes discussed and demonstrated. Thursday, April 8, free. (3) "Energy from the Sun" (W779), Thursdays, 10 weeks, $13; practical instruction in do-it-yourself water and home heating, food drying; "Build Yourself a Solar Dryer" (W764), Sat., April 3 & 15; materials provided, limited enrollment; "Build Yourself a Solar Cooker" (W772), Sat., May 1, $21; materials provided; all the above taught by Ron Warsher. (4) "Land Use Pla11ning-How to Get Effectively Involved" (W780), Tuesdays, 8 weeks, $13, taught by Marie Reeder, Sierra Club. Primer on local land use planning for citizens baffled by planning agency maze or seeking understanding of neighborhood group planning process. National Federation of Community Broadcasters, meeting spo'nsored by WAIF, Cincinatti, Ohio, 2525 Victory Parkway, 45206, 513-961-8900. Held Feb. 27-29 (time lag problem). Among topics outlined: update community radio directory, a training manual, national marathon for fund raising, equipment and bulk purchases, joint programing. In a week we had five people contact us about either working with us or for ideas about other jobs in related (ASE, AT, energy-environment) jobs. What can we do? We'll be glad to start putting in a contacts section in RAIN for people looking for jobs, etc. Or what else? News on the back page is really Bean News. "More Is Less" from Capitol Community Press (Nov. issue, p. 18) is $2.25 postpaid, not $1. And finally, we hope, correct addresses on the Ore Plan should be: Julie Massy, 156-1/2 3rd St., Ashland, OR 97520; Len Casciato, 4241 S.E. Hawthorne, Portland, OR 97215. Will try to do better!
Habitat Issue. The June issue of RAIN will be a special issue related to the International Habitat Conference to be held in Vancouver, B.C., May 29-June 11. It will be a guide to the Northwest that people can use along their way to the conference, with maps like our energy map, places to see, people to visit, sources of information, patterns of settlement, etc. We'd appreciate input. Just up over the Cascade Mountains, and from there clear across the country, white, ice, frozen. Landing at Baltimore airport (Pittsburg looks wiggly from 30,000 feet at night). On my way to announcement of "Horizons on Display" program, a project of HUD and the American Revolutionary Bicentennial Commission. A selection of 200 groups around the country doing representative, working, unusual community projects. I went representing the Northwest Environmental Communications Network- which used to be Robert Stilger's name for what he was doing at the Environmental Education Center before going to Spokane (NW Regional Foundation, Futures Conditional, etc.), and now is sometimes assumed name of some of what we are doing. If you would like a catalog of the two-hundred groups selected for the Horizon on Display program, write to RAIN, Attn: Steve Johnson. Some very interesting programs were represented, though unfortunately the conference was one way, and it was an uphill struggle to make any contact other than random encounters at breakfast, etc. About forty persons attended a meeting on government policy and appropriate technology, hosted by Byron Kennard, National Council for Public Assessment of Technology, in D.C., Feb. 4. Attendance included people from FEA, Public Interest Economics, Institute for Local Self-Reliance, Consumer Action Now, ZPG, ERDA, National Intervenors, Habitat National Center, Community Services Administration, Rockefeller Brothers FoundaRAIN is supported by your subscriptions and a grant from the N.W. Area Foundation, administered through the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry. For subscription prices, see subscription blank on next-to-last page. This blank can also be used to send us change of address messages. RA/N's office is at 2270 N.W. Irving, Portland, OR 97210. Phone 503227-5110. tion .. . discussed was the possible drafting of legislation for monies in ERDA for appropriate technology. Moving right along: I visited with Murry Durst of IDEAS (Institutional Development and Economic Affairs Service Inc.). IDEAS assists groups wanting to start Foxfire type projects, of which there are over thirty in the country. The original Foxfire project in Rabun-Gap, Georgia, is now involved in land use issues as they study the impact of migration in (due in part to·the movie Deliverance) and migration out (absentee landlordship problems, etc.). IDEAS is going to expand their assistance into the area of what they call "Community Based Experiential Learning." In the state of Washington, the Centrum Foundation is coordinating a state-wide Foxfire training program and newsletter, eventually magazine, relating Foxfire type information (Centrum Foundation, Ford Worden State Park, Port Townsend, WA 98368). IDEAS, 1785 Massachusetts Ave., Washington, DC 20036. Ken Bossing, with People and Energy (and Center for Science in the Public Interest), is working on exchanging mailing lists among energy groups in order to facilitate more communication. Also they are compiling a list of people willing to present testimony in energy legislation matters.... The various energy groups in D.C. meet on a monthly basis.... CSPI is completing a new version of the Lifestyle Index.... Wes Thomas (Synergy Access) is getting ready to put out another magazine on communication, working on a book on futures communication, and with Roy Mason (The Futurist) on the "futures option" format for learning and conferencing, which is currently in operation at the Finders headquarters in D.C. Subscriptions With the remainder of our grant running out it is going to be necessary for us to increase the price of new subscriptions to $10 in the near future. We'll give you the details in the next issue. If you haven't subscribed yet, do so before the price goes up! The Institute for Local Self-Reliance. Spent much time with Gil Friend and others. They have received two grants for continued support. Self Reliance, their newsletter, will be out soon. From them, but others as well, I kept getting the feeling the alternative energy self-reliance, a. t. "movement" has reached a certain point: time for more solid evaluation principles. People going back to school to fill in gaps; wantini uniform methods of analyzing independent research developments. Emmaus, Pa. Along with Dave Deppen (a RAIN contributor and assistant to Malcolm Wells, architect) went to see the Rodale Press people. Much more than a press. Warm greeting (thank you again). An impressive readers' service and information and referral operation in addition to their well-known periodicals and books . .. working on a book on on composting privys ... doing fishing in the basement . . . experimenting with bicycle-powered kinds of tools . . . a book on simple homestead plans (sprouter, sauerkraut cutter, cider press, etc.- all of which they build in their shop in order to test). continued next page This special issue is one we've been wanting to do for a long time- since last spring, in fact, when we first started working with Lee and Steve on RAIN. When Meg asked if she could spend her winter work term from Bennington College (in Vermont) with us, it seemed like the time had come. Enough information has surfaced in several areas to suggest strongly that we change the way we do things. We thought it ought to be brought together so we all can see. It feels good to get them done. Cover & Ecotopia Drawing: Diane Schatz Graphics & Layout: Meg deMoll Writing: Tom Bender & Lane deMoll Photographs: Tom Bender RAIN I Full Circle Staff Anne McLaughlin Mary Wells Nancy Lee Tom Bender Lane de Moll Lee Johnson Steve Johnson Typesetting: Irish Setter Printing: Times Litho
Sweat Equity Do it-don't pay someone else to do it for you! Our own work i often the best kind of money possible for financing projects. We don't have to get someone el e' approval, and we can use our eveni~gs, weekends and other normally non-mcome-producing time productively. Building a home ourselves can reduce first costs by at least fifty percent, while using our time recycling materials instead of purchasing new ones can cut costs another 20%. Building a house in sections as money and time become available instead of all at once can avoid costly financing. This is important because financing costs double and even triple what we end up paying for ~ house. An owner-built house costmg $5.50 per square foot for materials would end up costing $33 to $50 per square foot if built as a tract houseonce mortgage costs are added in. . Our own work is also more valuable. When we have s9meone else do work for us, we have taxes taken out of OUR income before we hire them, we have to pay for their profit, and ~v~ are usually limited to union productivity levels. For more details see: The Owner-Builder and the Code, Ken Kern, Ted Kogan, Rob Thallon, 1976, $5 from: Owner-Builder Publications P.O. Box 550 Oakhurst, CA 93664 Credit Unions In ew York City, a six-story, 23-unit tenement at 251 East 119th Street, in East Harlem, has been rehabilitated by a street gang-the Renigades-int~ a tenant-owned and managed cooperative. Sweat equity by volunteers to earn their own apartments has allowed projected rents to be $130 per month as opposed to $250 per month for similar one-bedroom apartments done by private contractors. Materials and salaries for 12 gang members who performed most of the work were financed by a loan from the city's Housing and Development Administration. In a similar project on the Lower East Side, in addition to rehabilitating the building, solar collectors have been designed for the roof to supply hot water, and the now-skilled group plans to rehabilitate other buildings and manufacture solar heaters for other locations. For further.information contact: Pratt Institute Center for Community & Environmental Development 240 Hall Street Brooklyn, NY 11205 Almost everyone feels a little uncomfortable about money. We kno for or be equated with a lot of things that are important. Yet we ~s And we often have suspicions that a lot of hocus-pocus is going on i end of the deal. It turns out that there IS a lot of hocus-pocus going *Bankers who control loan policies have the power to determine w form our cities take-without any public disclosure or involvement. public monopoly. *Widespread banking practices such as redlining-where banks deter because it might be less profitable-create slums and replace homeo1 Credit unions are locally controlled savings and loan organizations set up by a group of people to retain control of how their savings are used. They avoid some of the problems with placing your money in a bank where it is then loaned out on the bank's terms to the "best credit risks" (mostly large corporations). Because each member of the credit union has a vote in policy-making, YOU can borrow and loan money for purposes YOU value. *High interest rates on money make all financial calculations discou of our resources and speculative activities-and making a sustainable *Unregulated manipulation of our money supply by banks has been *Although most of the money.a bank uses belongs to depositors, n deposits, banks claim they must make the "most profitable" loansactivities that remove money and jobs from a community rather th economy and create local jobs. Savings are insured by the federal government, members keep for themselves the normal bank profit. Members must have a "common bond"-living within a specific area, working for a common employer, or sharing membership in an organization whose activities develop common loyalties and mutual interests. Although a very beneficial alternative Approval procedures are often difficult -the federal government refused to allow a national prisoners' credit union that was being set up because prisoners' savings are put into a fund whose interest goes into the g-uard's retirement fund fund! The government claimed the prisoners had no common bond! A feminist credit union has been set up in Massachusetts, and local ones are much easier to do. At least two co-ops we know of have recently organized credit unions: Ashland Community F Store 37 3rd St. Ashland, OR Our history of being unwilling to deal with the complexities of the left them open to unchallenged use by developers and speculators. .....1:11111-.. . . . 1 most important element in the deterioration of our cities and the p create our vast, ugly and expensive suburbia. Today more and more people are realizing the power that their mon range of ways to use their money productively while retaining contr The Bankers, by Martin Mayer, Ballantine, 1974, $2.25. Gives a goo system. Talks about how banks are ·used to the advantage of a small The Seven Laws ofMoney, by Michael Phillips, Word Wheel (540 Sa Opens up a lot of new perspectives on how to deal with and withou1 ends. to normal banking institutions, credit unions may have several difficulties. Lack of capable financial management often causes problems, short time limits on loans frequently prevent home mortgages (though at least one credit union set up its own savings and loan to allow home mortgages), and loans cannot be made to non-members or organizations. Many people cannot qualify for affinity requirements and cannot obtain credit union services. And the money belonging to a credit union must be deposited in a normal bank- permitting its use and New Age journal (32 Station Street_, Brookline, MA 02147), $8/yr. New Pioneer Cooperative Society money-credit unions, tithing, businesses. NA] No. 11 (March, 1976 529 Gilbert T1·th1·ng cellence, Bob Schwartz. I9wa City, IA 52240 . . . . . I.::~~~~~~~.:;,,;;---------------~ For more information on credit umons, wnte National Credit Union Administration, Washington, DC 20456, or Edward T. Bernhoft, Director, Regi0n VI, 760 Market Street, Room 809, by the bank despite the wishes of credit union members. San F ancisco, CA 94102. State Banks North Dakotans, fed up with being at the mercy of out-of-state banke~s charging excessive rates for rural credit, set up a state-owned bank in ~919. One of the most profitable banks rn the co~ntry and presently the only one that ,s state-owned, it saved thousands of far.i-,-.1ii11•■ mers from ruin in the depression and now has about $32 million in loans to farmers, $35 million in housing loans and $27 million in student loans. The bank, largest between Minneapol_is and Spokane, relies heavily on depo~1ts o~ -•-••• state funds, avoiding the potential mis- 1 .. J"'•n• dealings resulting fr?m div~ying up state .-.'IIUllll~_,,-:1\ deposits to the profit of p_nv_ate banks and keeping state money ms1de the state. Public disclosure and public control are two obvious advantages of state banks. Moves to set up similar systems are underway in Washington, Oregon, Massachusetts, Colorado, New Jersey and California. See "Banks of North Dakota," by Derek Norcross, Parade Magazine, November 9, 1975. Tithing is a very different kind of banking-it is simply taking responsibility ourselves for what our mont::y does. In the strictest traditional sense, it means giving one tenth of a year's produce or profits away (originally to the Church). Many people are going back to this practice-no matter how little they have-and are finding the rewards great. Tithing can be looked at as an investment-whether time, interest or dollars -:and its most important benefit may be in learning how to invest wisely and soundly. It could be the beginning of getting away from the abstractions and material rewards of money. For-further thoughts on tithing, see the December 1974 issue of New Age Journal 32 Station Street Brookline, MA 02147 ($1, back issue) Many food co-ops have worked out related plans where they have invested their profits in new enterprises. In Minneapolis, the North Country Co-Op seeded other neighborhood co-ops, a bakery, a warehouse and a restaurant. Austin, Texas, and Iowa City, Iowa, co-ops have done similar seeding-starting related enterprises without keeping control of them like the horizontal and vertical expansion of large corporations. Sustaining Fund is a good example of a formalized institutiona tit mgyrc conscientious businesses to support community needs out of their profits. and the funds are used as seed money to start and assist pr • s fossilized Community Fund! ugene Community Sustaining Fund X 340
re Jmow in our own dealings that money cannot substitute we ;ilso tend to believe that money can solve our problems. r1g on inside the money business that leaves us on the short s going on: tine who succeeds and who loses in our society and what :ment. And this within a banking system that is actually a s determine that they won't make loans in a part of town 1omeowners with absentee landlords and speculators. discount the future- justifying and encouraging rapid use ainable society virtually impossible to attain. ts been a repeated factor in inflation. ors, not stockholders, and in spite of interest limits on such loans--meaning that they end up supporting profiteering her than ones that deal fairly at low prices, support the local • Jf the financial marketplace that our savings support has ttors. This reticence on our part has probably been THE the power of speculators to devastate our farmlands and fr money has and are developing an increasingly versatile ~ control of the conditions and purposes of its use. s a good overview of the manipulations inside our financial t small number of people. 540 Santa Cruz Ave., Menlo Park, CA 94025), $3.95. vithout money and use our resources creatively to good $8/yr. NA] No. 2 ($1) is an excellent issue on dealing with 1, 1976) is an interview with new age entrepreneur par exed 1int. Lrtng nd Redlining Easy financing and our patterns of changing jobs, cities and re idences every few years have resulted in the vast majority of our homes and neighborhoods being under perpetual mortgages- to the profit of financing institutions and at great cost to our communitie . Financing co t on a $10,000 house that lasts 100 year and i paid for five times at 6% interest amounts to $86,000! Cooperative community financing as propo ed by Joe Falk (see "Greenlining" section) eliminates such mortgage pyramiding, saving alma t 70,000 per house! Branch banking and non-enforcement of charter regulations allow banks to take money from one area and loan it el ewhere- making loans unavailable in the local communit and making the saving of poor people in the city pay for developing rich suburbs. The Central Seattle Community Council Federation hawed that for every dollar placed in savings institutions by Seattle city residents, about 30¢ is reinvested in the city, while for every dollar inve ted by suburbanites, about $2 is reinvested in suburban growth. A group called the Committee to Challenge Savings and Loan Association Policies is working now on anti-redlining and related actions. Redlining is the practice whereby bankers quietly determine that they won't make loans in a part of town where it might be less profitable to them. They thus effectively draw a red line around a neighborhood, creating a self-fulfilling _nrophecy of deteriorating and vacated slums. The problems these practices generate for our neighborhoods are very real. Excellent studies of the Adams-Morgan District of Washington, D.C. are available Money, A,1o11ey, Who's Got the Money?, William Batko of I LSR, $1 from: Institute for Local Self-Reliance (ILSR) Gives a brief overview of DC banking practices that remove money and profits from the District and their effects on economic activity in D.C. 1717 18th Street, N.W. Washington, DC 20009 The Adams-Morgan Business Sector: Redlining: Mortgage Disinvestment in the District of Columbia, by ILSR, the D.C. PIRG and the Institute for Policy . Studies, $1.50. a....,._ Paying for Otber People's Development, Batko, Connor and Taylor, ILSR A fine study of the detailed economic, employment, environmental and social effects of different banking practices upon a neighborhood. Comparisons show, for instance, that supporting local non-chain stores instead of franchises and shopping centers keeps more money circulating in the community and produces significantly more employment per dollar of sales. Provides detailed documentation by zipcode of loan practices of local savings . institutions and the failures of regulatory agencies, as well as the actions that can be taken to remedy the problems. '-1 reenlining redlining and to make money available for velopment have been successful in several The .U.S. Congress has finally passed a bill (S-1281), which the President has signed, requiring disclosure of lending practices by financial institutions, which will assist individuals and community groups researching redlining practices. It won't help, however, with more subtle variations of redlining such as discriminatory interest rates, excessive downpayment re- \rquirements and unusually short loan periods, or with rer:llining practices by insurance companies. Write your Congressperson for a copy of the law. ~ I Cin Chicago the problems of redlining became visible some tnree years ago, and, after many unsuccessful.attempts to ~et , banks to change their practices, the city council finally passed an_o~dinance re_quiring ful) ~iscl_osu~e b_Y banks of their loan practices. The city government has been persuaded to deposit its money 111 non-redlmmg mst1tut1ons, and more_ than $2 million was withdrawn from those banks and reinvested in other institutions who had formed agreements with the community coalition. Chicago now has over $100 million in pledges to move savings from redlining lenders, five of ·whom have signed greenlining agreements. State, church and retirement funds, or other large blocks of savings can produce powerful leverage on banks in this way. _J "Redlining: Problems and TacticsThe Chicago Experience," Gail Cincotta, Street Magazine, Summer, 197 5 Pratt Institute Center for Community and Environmental Development 240 Hall Street Brooklyn, NY 11205 A summ_ary of redlining challenges in Chicago. Homeowners' Federation 10234 Washtenaw Avenue Chicago, IL 60642 and Housing Training and Information Center At the end of 1972, our collective savings amounted to the following: Savings and Loan Mutual Savings Banks Commercial Banks Credit Unions Life Insurance Reserves TOTAL $207,300,000,000 $ 91,300,000,000 $276,100,000,000 $ 21,700,000,000 $203,600,000,000 $800,000,000,000 The figure above does not reflect our personal or commercial checking accounts, shares of stock or cash equity in our homes or personal property but only individual or corporate savings which can be invested for long periods of time. 4209 W. Division St. Chicago, IL 60651 Good contacts for further informaLion The greatest majority of these savings are owned by individuon technical aspects of redlining and als, but, conversely, most of the funds are used to finance what can be done at a neighborhood -...-.....,,._.,. commercial activity only because we are not organized to use ').level. In Kansas City, Joe Falk and the Future Associates have 1 worked ou~ a very c~m~re~ensive program of leveraging com- • muntty sav111g~ held 111 life 111surance companies, various kinds of banks, pension funds and individual savings to secure funds for neighborhood improvement rather than commercial development. They show that more than $210 billion of our savings is available from those so1,!rces. ooperative Community D 5 from: he Future Associat 0. Box 912 If we loaned the above sayings to 40,000 potential developing neighborhoods of 5,000 people each, which would cover the entire country, this would provide each neighborhood with $20,000,000 and each family of four people with about $16,000 in funds with which to finance a place to live. With this kind of capital base and a little leverage we can go a long way towards making our neighborhoods better places in which to live. The point we are trying to make here is that we are collectively very wealthy, and, if we use our wealth wisely, we can make our country even better than it is. We have no one to blame but ourselves for our situation, since we have the money, but we have not organized ourselves so we can use our savings. Instead we have turned them over to others to manage for us. (From Cooperative Development) © April 1976 RAIN Magazine 2270 N.W. Irving, Portland, OR 97210
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A bicycle is probably the most efficient means of transpo~tation for humans. It requires less human energy than walking, and it feels good- it's fast, too, when the distances aren't too long and the streets are safe. ·consider the cost,; this way: it takes 1500 hours of our time to travel and pay for traveling our yearly average of 7500 miles by car, including time to earn money to pay for car and repairs, time walking to car, parking it and waiting at stop lights and traffic jams. It takes only 750 hours of time to travel and pay for traveling the same distance by .bi~ (averaging 10 mph). See Ivan Illich, E11ergy and Equity (Harper and Row, 1975, $1.25). Our current road system in most places is designed for motor vehicles and actually discourages bicycle use. A number of states and communities have begun to establish bikeway programs, hut we still have a long way to go to even measure up to the Scandinavian systems. Interesting variations on bicycles are bicycle-powered vehicles. There is a very successful pedicab business for tourists in Seattle's Pioneer Square, and Asian cities such as Hong Kong and Bangkok have had Appropriate Teclmology IT Publications 9 King Road London, England t)uti-a~ $7/yr surface, $10. 50 airmail, quarterly. Often has excellent articles on bicycle ambulances, carts and other simple transport. "Bicycle Transportation," S.S. Wilson, Scientific American, March 1973. For more information on bicycle efficiency. The Philadelphia Bicycle Coalition c/o John Dowlin 3410 Baring Street Pl•iladelphia, PA 19104 . . . They are compiling a list of active bicycle organizat1ons-wnte them for price and availability. Cooking in woks the Chinese way and using the traditional cooking methods of other nations greatly decreases energy use- chopped food at higher temperatures for a sho,i,k~ give you a wide variety of excellent meals in 30 seconds! Better than MacDonald's by far. For a good wok cookbook, see Regional Cooking of C!Jiua, by Margaret Gin and Alfred Castle (101 Productions, 1975, $4.95). See also the January 1976 issue of RAIN for an overview of low-energy ooking, "Eatin Hi hand Lightly." ~ 'ftt~p:,rtatlon. . . _acc':mnts for 25% of the total ~.S. e~e~gy use. The best option for simpler, cheaper and lower energy patte~ns _is ehmmat1?g the need for transportat1on-hvmg near your work, or spending more time at home growing food or enJoymg your neighbors. Recent studies have clearly shown that increasing the density of areas substantially reduces the need for transportation-and zoning regulations which allow intermixing of businesses and residences can reduce the need to travel any further for daily necessities. ~t t~e same time, communities should provide viable a~ternatives to the increasingly unaffordable automobile. One opt10n 1s for a low-cost rent-a-car system for local use. Bemg able to get a car or van or pickup cheaply and easily when wanted can eliminate the expense and bother of owning a car (or several for different purposes) for people who have no use for a car in the city for weeks on end but do need some kind of vehicle occasionally. If buses (let alone trains) were to replace totally the automobile for transportation within our cities, that alone would create a 5% national energy savings. School buses can be built to allow their use as pib1ie tt'8fWl)O~ ~swell, o_r we c~n simply give the school children passes that allow th_em to rid: ~he (improved) public sfstem. !hts m_1ght provide a ~ne solution to some of the busing/desegration hassles m many c1t1es. You rarely see Japanese children m school buses they r_ide all over the city on public transit to different schools. Many Middle East and Latin American cities have intermediate systems of shared taxies, light buses and shut~le services. Some communities in this country are now instituting programs where a computer routes cars as people call m. Others are setting up cooperative shopping shuttles to various neighborhoods. A lot of energy and transportation costs could aiso be saved by clell~ ~ Bread, milk, fresh vegetables, c~uld come daily, or a centralized service would deliver phoned-m or~ers to gr~cery stores,;>department stores and the hke ~ .. a mort> c0.mmonl) used, localized U.P.S. Why not start on m your neighborhood. City gardens are important too- urban families can become a lot more ...... '-:l"Q:llfttJt; by growing vegetables on the roof, in window boxes, in the back yard, or even between the street and sidewalk when there's room. Take a look at: "the City People's Book of Raising Food Helga and Bill Olkowski Rod ale Press, J 97 5 Emmaus, PA 18049 $4.95 The Olkowskis are directors of the Farallones Institute Integral Urhan House (1516 5th Street, Berkeley, California), where on a tiny city lot they are raising enough food- including chickens and rabbits (and soon fish)- to feed the six people who live there. They also compost all their organic wastes to put on the garden, using a Clivus Multrum compost toilet and a normal leaf/vegetable compost pile. There's an important controversy going on about the amount of to~~~micals, like lead, in G c_..,,-,P'OW1\ ~ lfweclean up the air and cut way hack in our use of cars, the problem will he soh·ed. In the meantime, wash your lettuce! Other good folks to talk to: Institute for l.ocal Self-Reliance 1717 18th St., N.W. Washington, DC 20009 A lot of small cha future can be. Dia when put togethe we see now can he The bucolic atmos other streets, cree cities. The Ecotop1 see a charming sert There even seem t guess. ne-half of the land area of some cities is devoted to the care ~d use of the automobile. Consider freeways, streets, service stations, parking facilities and used car lots. One of the nicest visions of Ecotopia is the ~ of all that structure as autos become more expensive to operate. The Swedish Building Research Council has put out a report that deals with designing parking garages to permit later conversion to offices and apartments: Parking Facilities for Alternative Uses (R41-1975), by Jan Dyfverman and Jan-Erik Hollander, Svensk Byggtjanst, Box 1403, S-111, 84 Stockholm, Sweden. Available in English Synopses and Summaries, June, 1975 In many towns there are streets and alleyways which are not main traffic arteries and whose elimination would not be sorely missed in terms of parking, access to homes, garbage removal or fire lanes. Many of these • • 'eXU'a:~ if - converted to neighborhood greenspace, bicycle paths, or community gardens, would provide valuable land for the common good. We may see the day when cars are banned from cities all together-who can forget the charm of Venice? In the meantime, cities are beginning to establish disincentives for drivers, such as high parking fees in downtown areas, toll roads and fuel taxes. In many cases, such measures are being combined with graduated fees or special highway lanes to enourage car pooling.
le_.,.-- ,-._ / ' ...,, , --· I .J i ~' ,1 I I , I . I I In the past 30 to 40 years, Americans have separated work from home so that we have in effect doubled the amount of space, heat, light and sewage facilities we need. We have also greatly increased transportation needs for commuting to work and shopping, while needing police to watch over the places we just left. Curren~ ~,:iilu,,e and other multiple uses of land and buildings. Yet, serving local needs provides local jobs and income. The establishment of offices and light "cottage industry" in presently primarily residential areas-as long as it does not pollute or otherwise burden the neighborhood-should have substantial benefits in terms of energy savings, livening up neighborhoods and in family life. You don't need day care if either or both the parents can work at home. lie ~~~~ are an important aspect of changing land use-the old "Mom and Pop" grocery stores which had just about everything you needed, next to the thriving small bakery, the wooden furniture studio, and the town ~a,ll and library. How much more alive and vital it would be tf each neighborhood had its own particular flair and c~aracter due to its localized, largely self-reliant economy. Thts can be true of the inner city neighborhoods or the small r~ral towns_. We have so long relied on driving to ide~ti~al-)o~kmg shopp_mg centers to buy identical brands that 1t 1s d1fficul~ to dtstmguish different parts of the count:Y_, much less d1ffe:ent parts of a city, from each other. In addttton, those franchises, as opposed to locally-owned businesses, drain money out of the community into the larger financial centers-usually out of state. ,. ; •• --~:-;~- ... ":.------: ' ~.._, es are happening today in different places that add up to a good and POSSIBLE vision of what our Schatz's drawings, like Ernest Callenbach's Ecotopia, show what some of these ideas could be like Our future will obviously be different from this, but being able to visualize some of the possibilities focus our energy onto bringing good futures into being. ere of the new San Francisco can perhaps best be seen in tbe fact that, down Market Street and some no-zp run. Tbese had earlier, at great expense, been put into huge culverts underground, as is usual in ns spent even more to bring them up to ground level again. So now on this major boulevard you may of little falls, with water gurgling and splashing, and channels lined with rocks, trees, bamboos, ferns. be minnows in the water-though how they are kept safe from marauding children and cats, I cannot From Ecotopia, Ernest Callenbach, Banyan Tree Books, 1975 1517 Francisco Street, Berkeley, California 94703, $2.75 ,. Have you ever thought how much it .... , • would change things in a city to let ~ '11.1111. ..__ _ ■lo■o■s■e■a-ll ■th■e-p■a■ve■d■•■o■v■er-c■re■e■k■s■?--_,• { ,Ct~~ ,~- ' '\' • '"'--'-- '<" ' ~ • ' :c " .. ' ' ' • ~~# I ) Q C b 'schools don't have to be in big, red bric)( buildings! The Philadelphia Parkway program has classes taught by chemists in professional labs, bankers in conference rooms, and ;.~~~~mh h li iflft'Y on th se~ilities- making public facilities less specialized- can save energy and materials in countless ways and help make the city more vital. If, as we hope, much more business happens on a smaller scale out of houses and neighborhoods, there may well be scores of high-rise offices where learning activities can be scattered in among residences and manufacturing uses. There's also the whole important area of ~ )£atltlislg - productive instead of consumptive learning- for all ages. It can work with a carpenter or an architect, for an eight-year-old or an octagenarian. Yellow Pages of Learning Resources, Richard Saul Wurman, Editor, 1972, $1.95 from: Group for Environmental Education 1214 Arch Street Philadelphia, PA 19107 Philadelphia Parkway Program Information Officer Parkway Program c/o Franklin Institute 20th Street and Parkway .._ Philadelphia, PA 1910 3 II non-renewable resources we do not recycle are a loss of our material wealth. We cannot afford to waste anything or throw it away. Remember, there is no "away"!! 50% of the total energy cost of new products can be saved when paper is recycled, and 98% of the total energy cost of aluminum could be saved. If the entire U.S. were to switch to returnable bottles and cans, as Oregon and Vermont have, it would add 130,000 jobs, cut consumer costs by $1.4 billion and would reduce national energy use by .05%- eliminating the need for three nuclear power plants. *It'simportantto ~--~- -"~has possible. Just as old clothes can be handed on till they make nice patchwork quilts and rugs, old buildings can be turned into exciting spaces for living and working. If buildings have to be torn down, there is much in them that can be recycled. Most cities have places where you can buy salvaged materials. In some cases, zoning, code and/or insurance regulations and lending practices make it difficult to recycle old buildings, but they represent a vast resource in cities and rural areas alike. * As energy and material costs rise, urban solid waste programs dependent on high amounts of energy and machinery are becoming uneconomical to operate, while those based on human skills are beginning to have an advantage. Labor-intensive systems are also more easily able to adjust·as different materials change in value. Many materials which do not have much market value at any one time (like now!) can be stockpiled until prices rise. ~attheSOIIIIOO - the household or business- is the most efficient and economical means of recycling. lt is a process that only takes a few seconds at that small scale, yet it also makes it possible to compost organic matter for reuse on the family or office garden. Multiple-section trash bins for home use are now being designed and marketed, while the Ore Plan type of neighborhood collection system pro,·ides a good model for labor-intensive recycling (see January 1976 RAIN). • Another good idea, which has been successfully tried in Minne.:folis. is to establish lea' U)tll • operations. In 1972, Hennepin County began depositing all the leaves they had collected from their regular fall street clean-up in a large unused lot. In the sprin~ the resulting compost was given away to residents free of charge. emember how nice it is to sit in a Sidewa1kcat~ in Europe and watch the people go by? Take a look at Bernard Rudolphsky's Strl'ets for People (Doubleday, 1969) to sec how citv streets can be used. Beautiful photographs from Italy, Japan and the Middle Eas~. In many cities the regulations affecting these practices need to he changed- fewer cars will hdp make the tmosph<.'r<.' more pleasant, too. © April 1976 RAIN Magazine 2270 N.\V. ln-ing, Portland, OR 97210
I People travel for many reasons, yet very few of those reasons can best be satisfied by travel. Entertainment, rest and "getting away" can all take place in our own communities. Wise travel requires that we first minimize unnecessary travel by improving the places where we live and our relationship with the people with whom we live. We must then develop patterns of transportation, accommodation and recreation that require less energy and money to operate, create more direct and personal contact among people, and cause less damaging impact on the environment. • © April 1976 RAIN Magazine 2270 N.W. Irving, Portlan'\ OR 97210
Wise Travel Though tourism has become a major element in many economies, its costs are causing many second thoughts and a search for better alternatives. The United Nations Environment Program is now studying the impact and costs of tourism in developing countries, and several cost-benefit studies have been completed by other agencies and academic institutions. Environmental damage from tourism is often major-Spain has converted the most beautiful parts of its coast to a tawdry vacationland with monumental pollution problems. Freeroaming Land Rovers in East African wildlife parks have destroyed large areas of the savanna. Extremely limited agricultural land in Hawaii and other areas has been converted to golf courses, parking lots and hotels, forcing local dependency upon costly imported food. The influx of tourist money is obvious, but it is highly fluctuating according to season and the world-wide economic climate. Even in the best of times little of the income from tourism ever reaches the local populace. From half to two-thirds of it is re-exported to metropolitan areas or countries for petroleum, materials and supplies and as profits for large corporations controlling resorts, transportation, entertainment and financing. Much of the remaining money is retained by a limited number of local developers, while expenditures of local tax money on roads, water supply, telecommunications, airports, sewage systems and police are often designed with tourism primarily in mind and amount to direct subsidies of tourism by the local population. Increased local employment is frequently promised by the tourist industry, yet the employment provided by tourist services often fails to offset the loss of previous self-support by local people or the higher prices caused by dependence on imported goods, land speculation or inflation of the local economy by tourist dollars. Cultural impacts are even greater. The yearly influx of 30 million tourists to Spain outnumbers the entire population of the country-so many that Spaniards often feel like strangers in their own country. Catering to the demands of pleasure seekers rather than the needs of the indigenous people creates communities unable to fulfill their own needs-whether Aspen, Colorado, Waikiki Beach or Tahiti. Destruction of indigenous values and culture has brought resentment, anger and violence from both sides, loss of autonomy, dignity and social cohesion among host people as well as their prostitution (in both the direct and general sense of the word). Impacts on tourists themselves include dependence upon commercialized merchandising of mechanized "enjoyment" and substitution of superficial visual experience for deep, intimate interaction with places and people. More people and fewer resources ensure that the economic surplus that supports our tourism patterns will soon be a thing of the past. Dependence upon tourism-already a relatively unsteady economic base-as a mainstay of any economy is increasingly foolhardy. New patterns of travel and of dealing with the real needs and desires underlying tourism are needed and are possible. The Premier of Prince Edward Island, Canada, has instituted a re-evaluation of tourism there. Write to: See also: Keith Worncll, Secretary Treasury Board Box 2000 Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island Canada "Tourism and Development: The East African Cause," John S. Marsh, Vol. 5, No. 1, December, 1975 of Alternatives ($4/yr, quarterly) Traill College, Trent University Peterborough, Ontario Canada Tourism & Socialist Development, I. G. Shivji, 1973 Tanzania Publishing House Dar Es Salaam Tanzania BED AND BREAKFAST Motels are becoming less and less desirable solutions to travel accommodations. Although they provide low hassle, easy access and predictable places to stay, that same predictability means no experience worth traveling for- if you've tried one you've tried them all! • Guest houses or "bed and breakfasts" provide the varied experience and the human contact that standardized motels lack. Whereas an investment of $7,000 to $13,000 per room is required for motels, it requires almost no capital investment for people to rent out one or two extra rooms in their homes. At the same time, such accommodations cost travelers less and spread out the income within the community. Guest houses allow better off-season use of the facilities, more individualized accommodations and entail much less risk and impact where tourism levels are likely to decline or fluctuate. In almost every European city travelers arriving at the railroad station will find an information booth that directs them to the kind of accommodation they want in the part of town they . wish. Guest house switchboards operated successfully at Expo in Montreal and Spokane. The small town of Inverness, California, at the edge of the new Point Reyes National Seashore, has proposed a bed and breakfast switchboard as an alternative to ugly and expensive commercialized accommodations that couldn't be supported by local water and sewage conditions. Guest house guidebooks are another way to give people access to what is available in an area. Present ones, such as Europe on $5 a Day, have been very profitable as well as useful to thousands of people. Another long-lost joy of traveling is staying at inns rather than hotels. Inns are not quick stop-overs for hurrying travelers but are to be enjoyed themselves! Often in beautiful settings, always with unique, cozy, personal rooms, fine home cooking and personalized hospitality, small inns treat guests as guests. Distractions such as TV and telephones are usually absent, but you may be treated by the owner's violin instead. For a listing of places in Northern California see "The Friendly Inns of the Mendocino-Sonoma Coast" in Sunset Magazine, October 1975. There is also a new book coming out on old inns and eating places of the Northeast: The Inn Book, Kathleen Neuer, Vintage Books, 1976 Random House 201 E. 50th St. New York, NY 10022 In Scandinavia dormitories at universities are frequently turned into low-cost hotels during summer tourist seasons. Hostels for all ages with simple dorm space provide extremely cheap and low-impact ways of travel. Both are beginning to appear in the U.S. Campgrounds are often even less expensive, although few exist yet in the middle of U.S. cities as they do in Europe. For membership information and guidebook to youth hostels write: American Youth Hostels National Campus Delaplone, VA 22025 TRANSPORTATION Because of extremely low fuel costs of the recent past and our resulting dependence on automobile and air transportation, we have tended to give in to the urge to spend whole vacations traveling between places rather than spending time in one place. Slower, simpler and cheaper transportation systems, such as boats, trains, buses, hitchhiking, walking and biking, put us in closer contact with the people and places we visitoften making the travelers' lives less different from their hosts. Most Americans find it difficult to imagine traveling without a car-yet it can be a blessing. We traveled all over Japan for two months by train-never planning ahead, not knowing the language or the geography well, yet always arriving at the station to find a train going where we wanted to go within ten minutes. It's simply a question of developing the systems. See Not Man Apart, October 1975, for a good article called "Let's Get the Railroads Moving Again." Slower travel also means we can find "far away," uncrowded places closer to home. Why not establish a bus system convenient for rural work and recreation? This could be done on a regular basis or as the needs arose. During the winter in many places ski buses operate on weekends taking skiers up to the major ski areas. The same could happen for fishing, hiking, apple picking or going to the beach. New systems are being tried, such as identifying arm-bands and bumper stickers, to make hitchhiking more safe, while rideboards on campuses and radio stations help people get where they want to go. For a $10/year membership (obtained by sending two valid IDs, one with picture) the People's Transit has a toll-free number to hook people up with rides all over the country. People's Transit P.O. Box 8393 Portland, OR 97207 800-547-0933 MAKE WHERE YOU ARE PARADISE PLANTING HAPPINESS 1913 in'Provence. Barren, colorless land. Most villages were abandoned, their springs gone dry. In one village, people made charcoal and it was an uphappy life: greed and rivalry among rl,eighbors, everyone trying to escape the area. Hot, dry winds blew through the treeless landscape, which was turning to desert from lack of vegetation and water. In the hills, through the valleys, walked a shepherd with his flock. In a bucket each day he carried 100 acorns soaked the night before in water. With an iron rod as thick as your thumb he would poke a hole in the earth, carefully plant the acorn, and walk on. 100 each day. Jean Giono came across the shepherd, Elezard Bouffier, when hiking in the Alps that year before WWI. In three years' time the 55-year-old man had planted 100,000 acorns. 20,000 had taken, and he expected to lose half of these. "There remained 10,000 oak trees to grow where nothing had grown before." Seven years later, Giono returned to the area and went with Bouffier for a walk amongst ten-year-old oaks," ... beech trees as high as my shoulder, spreading out as far as the eye could reach ..." and birches planted where there was moisture in the valleys. In 1945 Giono returned again: Everything was changed. Even the air. Instead of the harsh dry winds that used to attack me, a gentle breeze was blowing, laden with scents. A sound like water came from the mountains; it was the wind in the forest; most amazing of all, 1heard the actual sound of water falling into a pool. ... The old streams, fed by the rains and snows that the forest conserves, are flowing again. Their waters have been channeled. On each farm, in groves of maples, fountain pools overflow onto carpets of fresh mint. Little by little the villages have been rebuilt. People from the plains, wh•;re land is costly, have settled here, bringing youth, motion, the spirit of adventure. Along the roads you meet hearty men and women, boys and girls who understand laughter and have recovered a taste for picnics. Counting the former population, unrecognizable now that they live in comfort, more than 10,000 people owe their happiness to Elezard Bouffier. The Man Who Planted Hope and Grew Happiness, Jean Giono, 1967, 16 pp., $.75 from: Friends of Nature c/o Miss Ellen R. Riggs 92 Arlington St. Winchester, MA 01890 INSIDE Start with furniture- or maybe without! Many people would laugh at us, filling our rooms with big furniture to bang ourselves on. The Japanese live elegantly on reed-matted floors and can change the use of their rooms in seconds. Persians furnish their rooms with beautiful carpets and pillows. Plains Indians made folding backrests for floor sitting, and your local guru can show you how to sit quite comfortably on the floor. The easiest way to make a room seem spacious is to take out the furniture! If you want furniture, make it! Take a look at: Nomadic Furniture, James Hennessey and Victor Papanek, 1974, $4.95 from: Random House 201 E. 50th St. New York, NY 10022 The things in that book are easy to construct and easy to move. For fancier, more far out stuff, much of it chain saw wood carving: Creating Modem Furniture, Dona Z. Meilach, 1975, $6.95 from: Crown Publishers, 197 5 419 Park Ave. New York, NY 10016 URBAN HOMESTEADING Several cities are now experimenting with urban homesteading-selling abandoned houses for a buck to people committed to fixing them up. In most programs taxes and increased assessments are waived for up to ten years. Urban Homesteading: Process and Potential, 1974, $2.50 from: National Urban Coalition, 2100 M Street, N.W. Washington, DC 20037 How to Rehabilitate Abandoned Buildings, Donald R. Brann, $3.50 from: Easi-Bild Pattern Co., Inc. Briarcliff Manor, NY 10510 CDC's All our earth was once a paradise ... and paradise begins at home. The words and sketches of early travelers and settlers are filled with amazement at the beautiful, life-filled places -some of the same places which now stand as barren rubble and pavement. Energy and money spent traveling to good places to escape the ugliness of our cities is energy and money enjoyed once and used up, in the process often destroying these good places. Energy and money spent making where we live beautiful gives us a paradise we can enjoy every day and one which remains for the enjoyment of our children and others. BUILDING Want to turn an unsightly vacant lot Renovating an old house or building a new one can be an especially valuable learning experience- and an inexpensive way to have your own kind of paradise. The best seller, Handmade Houses, has lots of beautiful examples of places people have built to reflect their own spirits, often scavenging and recycling materials: into a playground or vest pocket park? Want to help in the planning for your neighborhood? Many communities now have community design centers who will provide architects, landscape architects and planners free of charge to people who could not otherwise afford them. Kind of like legal aid. Call the local chapter of the American Institute of Architects for the CDC nearest you or write: Community Services Department American Institute of Architects 173 5 New York Ave., N.W. Washington, DC 20036 Handmade Houses, Art Boerike and Barry Shapiro, $5.95 paperback from: The A&W Visual Library 95 Madison Ave. New York, NY 10016 Ken Kern has some valuable insights on owner-building: The Owner-Built Home, Ken Kern, 1975, from: Scribners 597 5th Avenue New York, NY 10017 Eugene Eccli's new book can get you well into energy-conserving ideas: Low-Cost Energy Efficient Shelter for the Owner-Builder, Eugene Eccli, Ed., 1976, $10.95 from: Rodale Press Emmaus, PA 19049 GARDENS If our homes themselves were more pleasant and peaceful perhaps our needs to "get away from it all" would be lessened. It has always seemed a shame that our culture didn't follow the European or Latin American tradition of building our homes around courtyards. The outside walls buffer the noise and smells of even the most urban areas so that the inner garden or court-no matter how simple- stays peaceful and private. Many old buildings can be adapted with additions or gutted to include courts. Where it is difficult now to add them high hedges, walls or bushy trees planted along the road in most suburban areas would effectively turn useless front lawn!; into secluded spots. Talk to your local nursery person or someone in the horticulture department at the community college for ideas and information on good species for your conditions and purposes. A good beginning book on landscaping is, Landscape Architecture, John Simonds, 1961, from: McGraw Hill 1221 Avenue of the Americas New York, NY 10036 Gardens are an important part of makany place a paradise! And as everyone knows, the Japanese are masters at feasting the eye and the soul, making the commonplace seem beautiful and turning even the tiniest of spaces into flowering gems with the merest of means. Take a look at: The World ofthe Japanese Garden, Loraine Kuck, 1968, from: Walker & Co. 720 Fifth Ave. New York, NY 10019 Vegetable gardens are taking over many tiny urban back yards and suburban vistas- fun, healthful, economical and profitable. Most varieties are beautiful enough to be considered worthy of the front lawn! Beans and peas or grapevines can climb up your south wall, shielding it from the sun- natural airconditioning that pays for itself! If you don't have any space of your own (not even a window ledge for a box of spices and lettuce?) try to find a community garden in your area. Most cities seem to have them these days. There's nothing like fresh broccoli for dinner. CITY TREES Trees and vines shade, cool and soften any environment. They help clean the air too. Here's a useful book for greening up urban environments: Plant a Tree, Michael A. Weiner, 1975, $6.95 from: Macmillan Publishing Co. 866 Third Ave. New York, NY 10022 Many communities that now enjoy beautiful, cool, tree-shaded streets owe them all to a single Arbor Day- one weekend when the whole community got out and planted trees! Those who plant trees now will have similar streets twenty years from now, leaving a lasting legacy for our grandchildren. If we plant fruit or nut trees there will always be a food source handy- as well as blossoms in the spring. For detailed information on the values and how-tos of planting and plants, see Tom Bender's "Free Tree Energy," RAIN, Nov. 1975 (Vol. 2, No. 2). e April 1976 RAIN Magazine 2270 N.W. Irving, Portland, OR 97210
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