Transition Island Blog

With the support of Ventnor Blog, this new Blog is starting up.

Providing commentary on environmental issues from Climate Change and Peak Oil, through endangered species and human health, to renewable energies and other planet-saving initiatives - to improve resilience on the Isle of Wight and the World.

Transition Island has launched a new Blog to inform local people about the challenges of Peak Oil and Climate Change.

It will offer snippets of news on environmental and ecological issues relating to the Island, to demonstrate the links with all aspects of life. Global issues will also be highlighted where they have a local impact. Short and informative articles will link to sources to give people an opportunity to explore issues further.

Transition Island is part of the national Transition Towns initiative, aims to encourage community action at a local level in response. It promotes the idea that we all need to alter our lifestyle to meet these challenges, rather than wait for a fairy godmother to do it for us.

About this blog

“Meeting skepticism in some and disinterest in many, I felt compelled to present a series of relevent issues to anyone with even the slightest interest. I hope the mixture of good news, bad news and occasional humour will cause some thinking about the future.

It seems that so many people have enough concerns within their own lives, and don’t want to consider the world and the future beyond the next few days/weeks.

The risk of ignoring the future is that we will be ejected out of our present comfort zone into a life we’d never conciously choose… So why let it happen by default?

This stuff isn’t new - a lot of it has been hanging around for 30 to 40 years.

It’s just getting much more important that we do something about it.”

Dave Simon

Put a wind farm underwater.

It would work almost all the time, stay out of sight, and hardly disturb ecology.  The Solent is a good spot for a tidal power electricity generator. The tides are strong, regular and deep. With a chalk bottom, it can be anchored easily.

Bearing in mind we have beached whales from time to time, safety to underwater creatures is important. Turbine blades spin at about 6 mph, and the creators of a large model tested off Devon: “they won’t be a threat to sea life”.

Rural schools, like rural Post Offices, are social centres for scattered comunities.

They provide a venue for meetings, a place for information and a timetable for activities. They are more important in rural environments than in town centres.And yet, because they cost more to maintain, the Government is forcing them to close them. This is done by legislation, budget changes and ‘guidance’ in the name of cost-efficiency.

But is quality of service as important? Not the service provided by the core business, but the quality of service received by the community - a different measure altogether. How much would it cost to replace these ‘peripheral’ services to the community?

The divide between urban life and rural life seems to widen when abstract edicts cut swathes through country life. And yet most towns-people want to experience the countryside at the weekend. It’s not that they hate it - perhaps more that they don’t understand it, a famous biologist once told me. 

Today (8/1/08) Transition Island learned that they have been accepted into the national Transition Towns Network. 

Ben Brangwyn (Co-founder of the Network) said: 

“It looks like you have the makings of a great team there and I’m delighted to welcome you formally into the hallowed ranks of official Transition Initiatives - our first island! “

He was interested to see the way “the uniqueness of an island shapes the initiative there … You’ll have lessons that other islands will benefit from.”

(more…)

It is self-evident that we need one: congestion, parking problems, rush hour, etc.  

We have had previous attempts - WightRide being the most recent. When I tried to find out how many Island people had used it, I could not get any info. Then it emerged that the Rural Community Council had been sponsoring it but had dropped it. The problem I see is that it is a national scheme badged for the Island - unconvincingly.  

With an easy-to-use Island only scheme, it might take off much easier. I proposed a parallel of the Island’s Freecycle scheme - it’s success is inspirational. It would be free to everyone to use. It could accept sponsorship to help pay website costs, group moderators and mailshots to major employers on the Island (though we might be able to get the Chamber to help with that).

To start it off, I feel we need one major employer to tell its employees. … But imagine how well it would do with business managements around the Island encouraging employees.

A meeting to discuss this with Joe Duckworth, Chief Executive of the County Council, was very constructive. “There is no feasible engineering solution to the rush-hour problem in Newport” he said. “We would like to explore a CarShare scheme for the Island.”

Vav Simon went to meet the Town Councillors in Newport yesterday.

Welcomed by the Members, she was reminded that the Council was due for elections in a couple of months. While several Members were very intersted, there was no action that could easily be started at this time.

We hope the information will stay in everyone’s minds and play a part in influencing plans for the future of the town.

From the Financial Times, 29/12/2007When prices rise, it is the poor who suffer most. With this year’s surge in the oil price towards $100 a barrel the greatest threat is to the poorest counties - Africa.