what can i do to encourage my town to lower its carbon footprint?

Question

my apologies for forgetting to say the size of my town. that does make an impact on answers. i live in a town of roughly 15,000 ppl, give or take a few hundred.

Answer 1

~Did you know that every time you exhale you emit greenhouse gases?

Have everybody not breath for one day a week for the rest of the year.

Answer 2

Don't ask for mandates. This just makes people bitter to change. Persuasion is better than force. Don't tax the citizens. Show them cost effective ways and they may go along. One problem with bicycling in the US is most cities and towns are not built very compact. It seems if you plant trees or make an environmental change on donated monies and not tax dollars you'll get a better community response. You will see that if they don't care about the the environment as you do they will almost always enjoy a nice bank of tree's where there used to be just wasted dirt and then you both win. Don't even mention Global warming - it's controversial. However, pollution is not. We can see it in most cases. The root of "Global Warming" is pollution. Keep it simple. Stick to pollution which is tangible.

Answer 3

How big is your "town"? I only ask because some of the things that bigger towns and smaller cities might do would just be out of the question for a really tiny town or village, that has almost no budget to spare, relatively speaking.

Having said that, here are two things you can work on *right now*:

--Get more *trees* planted. Trees can reduce a carbon footprint of a community in a big way, but more and more these days they are under attack by a combination of pests that aren't being controlled as the law requires, and *power companies* half-randomly hacking away at any living thing even remotely near a power-line....so just because you *have* trees now, that doesn't mean you will have them later.

So plant trees when you can. Encourage your community to start an Adopt-a-Tree program, similar in nature to the Adopt-a-Highway program. People or local groups or local businesses "adopt" a tree, either one freshly planted or one that currently is there, and agree to be responsible for the well-being of their adopted tree. It really doesn't take much, at least once a tree is growing and getting bigger and already there. It's just a question of keeping things fairly clean around the tree, and making sure people don't strip branches or otherwise. Otherwise including having the Power Company shred the thing....

--Are there a fair number of fences and gates in residential areas where you live? If so, you may want to encourage your towns Zoning Board to let people grow *clinging vine* types of plants to much of the fence so that it can beautify the thing as well as reduce the carbon footprint. What you can grow will depend on what works in the local soil but there are plenty of *non-weed* clinging-vine or runner plants you can use: honeysuckle, tomato, strawberry....

--Finally. Encourage folks to ride bicycles more. This one is a two-parter. First you have to find an inexpensive source of bicycles that people can afford. Simple ones, not mountain bikes or sport bikes. Do a search on "Africa bikes" sometime...whole phrase, not just the words. Those bikes were made to be used by doctors in African nations, and were made to be easy to use (only 3 speeds) and cheap and rugged. Once that is done, start a *recreational* cycling club, including basic *riding* classes. Don't emphasize the sport side--that turns a lot of folks off. Just talk about riding for leisure or fun....and if need be let people learn or re-learn how to ride again, as adults, no pressure, or hassle.

--Once you do that....talk to your City Council about getting *bike paths* set up in your town. This won't really require any major construction--look up "bike paths" and "village of Savoy, Illinois" sometime, again whole phrases, quotes and all if need be. Granted, Savoy is close enough to Champaign and all that people do bring money and resources in, but still....all a bike path *is* in a town is *another line* drawn on the road, establishing a separate lane for bicycles. That is all it is. It's *cheap* to do. And it helps answer the question of whether bicycles go on the road or on the sidewalk once and for all, so folks can ride, and ride *safely* without confusion.

I know, this doesn't seem like much, but every little bit helps, really. ^_^ And I hope I was helpful.

Thanks for your time!

Answer 4

PLANT MORE TREES!

While it's a no-brainer that this will reduce the carbon footprint, the moment you talk about carbon footprints, then the town board will tune out the rantings of the local granola-crunching tree-hugger.

However, they do respond to the evidence that trees increase property values. You might not be able to convince them to do something positive for the environment, but doing something positive for their own wallets and the city's tax base - that's much easier.

Answer 5

Start off by asking schools if you can give a presentation to the teachers and students. You'd be suprised how much of an impact kids have on their parents. Present excitement, and they will too.
Put together groups off people you know & have them bring friends and family members. Have a trash pick up day, start a trading group, trade the things you no longer want or need for things you need.
Send emails to everyone you know & have them send ones to those they know & so on. E-mails spread so quick...Dress up the e-mail so it's catchy, get peoples attenton.
DON'T do fliers & posters. You're defeating the purpose. Do e-mails instead. It costs a lot less to distribute.

Answer 6

Well it's a smaller town, so get people involved, tell them why they should change, and what to change.

You can also encourage people to plant trees, lots of trees. Literally the greener your city is the healthier it is, and the lower it's carbon footprint.

Answer 7

Speak out. Talk with you fellow neighbor, word of mouth, get involved with people who like you are concerned and the more voices the easier it is to be heard.

Answer 8

Vote for the civic leaders that will support and act on conservation. Some good examples are the use of hybrids for city vehicles, change to fluorescent lighting in all city buildings, plant gardens on the flat roofs of city buildings, provide more parks and green space, promote public transportation.

Answer 9

Do like us in france...take car with 4 cilinder, it consumes 4,5 liters for 65 miles!

Answer 10

call your state rep. and ask him to make environmentally friendly decisions, and have a rally to promote awareness