Green Metropolis

Why Living Smaller, Living Closer, and Driving Less Are Keys to Sustainability

(2009)
David Owen

Finished Reading: 01.2010

Most people consider large cities to be the very opposite of an environmentally friendly living situation. When we look at a large city, such as New York City, we see a point source for heavy power and fuel usage and no real concentration of nature for miles. The city is not seen as an environmental goal, but this author argues otherwise, claiming that we are looking at environmentalism all wrong.

Sure, New York City uses more energy than any other city in the country, but it also has a much larger population than anywhere else, and per person actually consumes less energy as each resident of the city has a smaller footprint and uses much less energy than their friends who live in the suburbs. In New York City the population is densely stacked on top of one another, and side by side, and the neighborhoods are set up so that everything one needs for work, entertainment, consumption and living is nearby. Cities are made for people.

The suburbs however, while giving the illusion of a peaceful replication of nature, are doing more harm than good. To live in the suburbs is to live in your car. Where there is more land to spread out homes are generally larger, which means more large appliances and more energy consumption, and a higher use of fertilizers and non-natural cleaners to keep things going. To escape the suburbs and get closer to nature is to perpetuate the suburbs, moving further and further away from the cities but really just bringing a strained out version of the city with you. If suddenly you found yourself without your car, way out there away from things, you would be out of options. Owen says that more nature is destroyed by the low-density development around New York City than by the city center itself. We just don't usually think of it that way.

Of course, the reason the suburbs are so popular is that they give us what we want. More room more independence, and more privacy. This can be achieved by the use of an automobile. The primary stated and unstated goal of drivers and municipalities in every region of the country is to increase traffic flow and get commuters to their destination as quickly as possible, that is, make driving more comfortable and quicker. The author's opinion on this, with the environment in mind, is that we should make driving as difficult, expensive and inconvenient as possible in order to encourage drivers to switch to public transportation, which will probably require people to reconsider some larger aspect of their lives than gas mileage, such as where they live and where they work. Most people would rather make their current living situation as environmentally friendly as possible rather than changing the basic premise of how they live their lives. Who can blame them?

There is a fascinating concept explored in this book about the difference between making cars more efficient and smaller, and getting them off the road all together (not an option for most people). The reasoning goes that we should not be interested in getting people out of cars for the benefit of public transportation, but rather that we need to get people out of cars period - and whatever you do to get around is up to you, whether walking, bicycling, or by public transportation. It is not the car itself that is the greatest concern, but rather the lifestyle it allows and perpetuates. With the automobile we can spread ourselves far and wide, thinly coating civilization over large expanses of land, and the further we go the more we rely on the automobile for the simplest tasks. The author, and he is not alone in this, points out that this way of life may get increasingly difficult in coming years if the cost of cheap, personal transportation increases to more than we are willing to pay. It is not sustainable, so while not change while you have the choice?

I have to admit I feel pretty good about a doom and gloom book like this because it reflects my own thoughts on cities and agrees with the choices I am making every day. But we can always improve. David Owen doesn't have a lot to say about Portland (a few quick statistical mentions) because we are not really the Green Metropolis that Portlanders think they are. Most of the east side of the Willamette river is low density suburbs, and you don't have to go very far in the other directions before you find yourself in a place dependant on automobiles. There are some areas with higher density, but very few people can really get by without a car. Even if they could, they chose not to mostly because of which part of the city they choose to live in.

I would like to see Portland grow to be more dense. In 2010 we have almost 600,000 people within the city limits and that is sure to increase rapidly if the last decade is any indication. Of course there are probably a couple of million people in the "Portland Metropolitan Area," but really, most of those people are not close enough to the dense parts of the city to go without a car. We have the Urban Growth Boundary that disallows most unabated sprawl, and we have transit corridors in the form of light rail and streetcars which are ripe for new denser development. Downtown needs to seep over to the east side, trickling down the already growing mixed-used corridors of Hawthorne, Belmont, Alberta, Etc. Downtown itself is home to far too many empty lots, parking lots and single story dry cleaners. As more people move to the region, we need to make places for them closer to the center of the city, not build more homes out on the frontier fringe.

Owen notices that Americans love little cute things, like the Smart car or the Mini Cooper, but we can't seem to just leave them alone in their smallness - we want to make them just a little bit bigger or add on a little more power. I recently read that Mini Cooper is now developing an SUV of all things, just inches longer than their previous model which was just inches longer than the original Mini. As if a smaller SUV is really what we need.

I also recently read about the new Apple store which opened in New York City. It is basically a one-story pristine glass box, where the computers are on display. There is a basement for the clutter of things that are actually for sale. Architecturally, it is gorgeous. Though it is modern, clean, and seems pretty green, Owen would deride it for excessive glass (which means excessive heating, as no glass is as insulating as any standard insulated wall), ultra low density (one story, one use), and unnecessary disposable materials (the glass stair treads on the breath-taking spiral stair, which leads down to the basement, have to be replaced often from scuffs and wear). Kind of makes you think about things differently. On the other hand, we do need parks and open space, so the Apple store is like a new park to browse through, in between the towers. There are some nice trees across the street which can be clearly seen through the glass.

Can we change the world? Should we try? We are usually content to change the little things in our lives (like recycling and driving more fuel-efficient cars - which are important) but the author argues that these little things just maintain our life as it is, making us feel good about ourselves and masks the true costs to the environment. Can I change the world by social engineering, in my practice of architecture? Probably not. I cannot change the way people live or change what they want. We cannot build a bunch of towers which contain smaller apartments if no one wants to live in them. What we can do is to make the city a better place to live, and start actually caring about the environment and thinking about how our actions affect the Earth and the other bazillion people who live on it. I need to do my best and not give up on the big ideas, and hopefully you will do that same.

The Joyful Christian

(1977)
C.S. Lewis

Finished Reading: 09.2009

This collection of short readings is taken from the wide shelf whereon the written works of C.S. Lewis are found and is best read as a devotional. The short chapters are best digested slowly on a range of topics both spiritual and social. Over several months, I picked up The Joyful Christian between my other readings, and felt it was a good forum for a quick discussion in my heart. I have reproduced the section below which seemed to strike me as most important at the time encountered, though it is far from representative of the usual entries Lewis offers a thought on. More often are seen tidings on Morality, Prayer, Pride and Pain. The following reading is found on pages 203-205.

Christmas and Xmas

Christmas cards in general and the whole vast commercial drive called "Xmas" are one of my pet abominations; I wish they could die away and leave the Christian feast unentangled. Not of course that even secular festivities are, on their own level, an evil; but the labored and organized jollity of this - the spurious childlikeness - the half-hearted and sometimes rather profane attempts to keep up some superficial connection with the Nativity - are disgusting.

Three things go by the name of Christmas. One is a religious festival. This is important and obligatory for Christians; but as it can be of no interest to anyone else, I shall naturally say no more about it here. The second (it has complex historical connections with the first, but we needn't go into them) is a popular holiday, an occasion for merrymaking and hospitality. If it were my business to have a "view" on this, I should say that I much approve of merrymaking. But what I approve of much more is everybody minding his own business. I see no reason why I should volunteer views as to how other people should spend their own money in their own leisure among their own friends. It is highly probable that they want my advice on such matters as little as I want theirs. But the third thing called Christmas is unfortunately everyones business.

I mean of course the commercial racket. The interchange of presents was a very small ingredient in the older English festivity. Mr. Pickwick took a cod with him in Dingley Dell; the reformed Scrooge ordered a turkey for his clerk; lovers sent love gifts; toys and fruit were given to children. But the idea that not only all friends but even all acquaintances should give one another presents, or at least send one another cards, is quite modern and has been forced upon us by the shopkeepers. Neither of these circumstances is in itself a reason for condemning it. I condemn it on the following grounds.

1. It gives on the whole much more pain than pleasure. You have only to stay over Christmas with a family who seriously try to "keep" it (in its third, or commercial, aspect) in order to see that the thing is a nightmare. Long worn out by weeks of daily struggle in overcrowded shops, mentally worn out by the effort to remember all the right recipients and to think out suitable gifts for them. They are in no trim for merry making; much less (if they should want to) to take part in a religious act. They look far more as if there had been a long illness in the house.

2. Most of it is involuntary. The modern rule is that anyone can force you to give him a present by sending you a quite unprovoked present of his own. It is almost a blackmail. Who has not heard the wail of despair, and indeed of resentment, when, at the last moment, just as everyone hoped that the nuisance was over for one more year, the unwanted gift from Mrs. Busy (whom we hardly remember) flops unwelcomed through the letter-box, and back to the dreadful shops one of us has to go?

3. Things are given as presents which no mortal ever bought for himself - gaudy and useless gadgets, "novelties" because no one was ever fool enough to make their like before. Have we really no better use for materials and for human skill and time than to spend them on all this rubbish?

4. The nuisance. For after all, during the racket we still have all our ordinary and necessary shopping to do, and the racket trebles the labor of it.

We are told that the whole dreary business must go on because it is good for trade. It is in fact merely one annual symptom of that lunatic condition of our country, and indeed of the world, in which everyone lives by persuading everyone else to buy things. I don't know the way out. But can it really be my duty to buy and receive masses of junk every winter just to help the shopkeepers? If the worst come to the worst I'd sooner give them money for nothing and write it off as a charity. For nothing? Why, better for nothing than a nuisance.

The Great Gatsby

(1925)
F. Scott Fitzgerald

Finished Reading: 06.2009

Such a happy time, the decade between the two World Wars. The time is ripe for a love triangle.

Jay Gatsby is in love with a married woman named Daisy. Her husband Tom has a mistress named Myrtle. She, in turn has a fool of a husband named George. But Gatsby is no fool, only a man in love, and that circle comes back to him in a bad way.

Until recently Jay Gatsby was quite poor. But over the last few years he has accumulated vast amounts of money, perhaps in a shady way, and is now considered among New York's elite. He has created a life for himself to reflect this accumulation, with a big house, nice cars, and a crazy pink suit. Most summer nights he hosts a big party at his grand home on the bay. Lights sparkle brightly and hundreds of strangers pass through his doors and drink his liqueur, listen to his music, and swim in his pool. They are thoroughly impressed with this man whom they do not know, but take what they can get from him, and say impressive things about him. The name of Gatsby becomes great very quickly, but Jay Gatsby quietly hopes only to attract sweet Daisy, whom he has lost after many years of secret love and rejected attraction.

So as to not ruin the plot, I'll skip to the end and make my point. Gatsby is gone and no one cares about him in the least. Dust to dust, and all. His memory is forgotten by all those who thought him so great due to his great accumulation of wealth. His possessions now sit quietly in an empty mansion and are now meaningless to those who would use him only as a means for access to his things.

Gatsby isn't even his real name, and he didn't get the girl. It all goes to show that in the end it isn't what we have, but who we are, and if someone wants what I have he will take it and then he won't need me any longer. But if he wants to know me for who I am, then I might be greater than Gatsby.

Green Martyrdom and the Christian Engagement of Late Capitalism

(2008)

Rodney Clapp

Clapp, Rodney. "Green Martyrdom and the Christian Engagement of Late Capitalism." Cultural Encounters - A Journal For The Theology Of Culture Volume 4 / Number 1 (2008): 7-20.

Finished Reading: 02.2009

Rodney Clapp asserts that consumerism is desire for desires sake, and we are addicted to centering too much of our life on obtaining our desires, which are unfulfillable. Consumer capitalism demands that we make consumption our way of life, our ritual, and our spiritual satisfaction. It pretends to be a comprehensive view of life, where there is nothing beyond obtaining and acquiring.

In America, every single day of the year is a consuming holiday, and the day after an actual holiday is the first day leading up to the next holiday. The day after Thanksgiving kicks off the Christmas shopping season with huge sales! (buy! buy! buy!) Later, when we have settled down to our normal lives after the holidays, Valentines Day populates the countenance of our storefronts, screaming red and flowers and candy! Valentines Day wouldn't be anything to speak of outside the consumerist structure which has been created to take advantage of, ironically, the ancient celebration of St. Valentine, a Christian who was killed and martyred for his faith oh so long ago. We have made consumerism important because we want it to be important, perhaps subliminally covering up what these ancient holidays were really about.

A martyr is someone who endures great suffering on behalf of a belief or principle. If only St. Valentine knew what we were suffering for him. There are no martyrs in consumer capitalism, just as surely as there is no crying in baseball. Baseball players are supposed to be tough as nails, and consumers are supposed to spend money on things they don't need. That's how it goes. Subsistence living is viewed as inferior to the vision of the good life depicted in all desire-based advertising, or as you might call it, "advertising." Theologian Kevin Vanhoozer asks, "Could it be that we do not understand martyrs in our postmodern era because we cannot fathom what it is to be convicted of and committed to the truth?" Too often truth is whatever sells. Does Jesus sell?

Consumerism has been incorporated into American Christianity, and Rodney Clapp argues that, "Christ is not a pleasant add-on or option to an unending array of consumerist products and experiences," as many have come to believe. Christ is often seen only as a way for me to get what I want.

Clapp suggests a society, specifically within the church, that purposefully moves away from consumerism, thinking on our consumption of the environment, our finances, and time. This is green martyrdom: to sacrifice our apparent entitlement to obtain, which we have been reaching for as much of as we can get our hands on, at whatever the costs. We first need to be able to understand martyrdom, which starts with thinking outside ourselves.

I know we used to have martyrs around because now we have a lot of holidays to forget them by. There used to be heroes, too. Now we have celebrities. Celebrities exist for our consumption. We don't want to be like them, the real them, we just crave their attention and their phat rims. Heroes are to be honored and revered for some great deed, but they are far above the common people and we don't really try to be like them, we just look up to them.

Conversely, martyrs are to be emulated, but not for something they have done or something they have, but because the life of a martyr points to something greater than themselves, unlike every other instance of fame, which points inwards at itself. The martyr lives outside himself, and Rodney Clapp makes five strong points to illustrate what a green martyr is, comparatively less committed to the cause as the red martyr who has died for his strongly held beliefs.

1. Green martyrdom means laying the bodies of ourselves and our own on the line for our way of life, rather than making others suffer for it. We should support local economies rather than fight consumptive, distant wars to support our "consumerist way of life," even at the cost of adjusting our standards of living and energy consumption.

2. Green martyrdom means working toward an economy that includes and does not exclude and separate or hide the poor from the rich. We should establish ties with the less economically well off, and integrate rather than get as far away from them as we can. The church needs to involve itself with churches that are less economically well off as well.

3. Green martyrdom means committing our whole selves, body and soul, to church, community, and place for the long haul. We are a society in transit, consuming and moving on. We should commit to a certain place to cultivate relationships and community rather than following consumptive rewards.

4. Green martyrdom means challenging idolatry and naming greed as an acute form of idolatry. We should have conversations about where to draw the line with our greed, which is a sin just as sexual sin is surely wrong.

5. Green martyrdom means admitting the reality of death and living as if we will one day die. We can't take it with us, so we shouldn't try to get more than we need before we die. We shouldn't live our lives for the ultimate end of averting our suffering, for that is futile.

A life lived in this manner doesn't necessarily point to God, as some people can find other reasons for their moral choices, but Christians should recognize that we cannot possibly turn fully towards the good God of the Bible unless we turn fully away from consuming ourselves.