Samso for the Win!

Samso, Denmark is doing a lot of things right. In the video featured in Tuesday's class, we learned about their community-wide effort in becoming a sustainable community, with special focus on reliance upon renewable energy sources. Wouldn't it be incredible to see Salt Lake City make a similar transformation? I genuinely believe it's possible to bring about this kind of change. However, I also believe it's a different type of project than that of Samso, considering the size of community at question. Whereas Samso is relatively small, Salt Lake is considerably larger. This is difficult because it requires more people to get on board with sustainable development, but also beneficial because there are potentially more resources and creativity available to experiment with. (After all, successful planning really does seem to be one giant experiment.) I brainstormed a small list of ideas that could help Salt Lake City enact changes along the same vein as Samso's.


1. Community meetings: as evident in the Samso video, there must be discussion between constituents. Not only does this offer a chance to persuade those who are on the fence about making changes, it also allows people to share their ingenuity and desires for the community. I think it would be a good idea to hold these meetings both on the micro and macro scale.
2. Key figures changing the status quo about what's trendy: what's "in style" holds a lot of sway with public action. I believe that if we can make social edits regarding what's considered cool, we will see big changes in how people behave. We see this a little bit already with the trendiness of buying local and organic, using reusable water bottles, and biking, but it would be powerful to extend this to more stigmatized things like public transportation, composting, consuming less, traveling abroad less, etc.
3. Some sort of incentive: if I remember right, Samso was part of a contest of some type. I think competition (the friendly kind) goes a long way in encouraging action. I would propose a type of competition between neighborhoods with a reward for who successfully implemented the most sustainable changes.
4. Reliance on local experts: Samso utilized a lot of local talent in making their community changes. Not only does this contribute to the local economy, this also contributes to a concept mentioned in the video-- "make everyone feel like they're part of the project." I think when people feel needed and included, they're more inclined to make genuine efforts toward change.
5. A visual representation of the severity and urgency at hand: similar to how students are using SCIF to integrate an air quality display in the library, I would love to see representations of this type around the city. I think it could be really neat to convey the passion and anxiety many of us feel via sculpture,  art installations, etc. Using this method of communication over cut and dry facts and reports may appeal to a new demographic.