Transportation: Moving Forward

            Thinking back to high school, I’m hard pressed to remember anything more exciting than getting my driver’s license.  I had finally reached sixteen, and my mom had agreed to hand over the keys to her old blackberry-colored Saturn.  It wasn’t anything flashy—one of the side view mirrors had fallen off, left to dangle by a few cords on the side, and speeds above 55 mph made it shudder—but it was still an important part of my identity.  I was independent; I was mobile.  No longer defenseless against my mom’s sleep schedule (who goes to sleep by 9pm?) or dependent on the kindness of my friend’s parents, I could zip around to any part of my small, but sprawling, Kansas hometown.  I was fed up with walking and biking—neither protected me from the sub-zero wind chill of the winter or the oppressive heat of the summer in the way my car did.   It became my haven, shuttling me to and from wherever I wanted, whenever I wanted, with whomever I wanted (with the exceptions, of course—my little brother wasn’t going to walk all the way to tennis practice, was he?).  Gas prices be damned, I didn’t want to take the bus—my car was crucial to my way of life, and I didn’t even consider compromising that long-awaited independence for a more carbon-friendly alternative.

Meet the Artist: Tiffany Holmes

darkSky

       Strolling through the Chicago Museum of Contemporary Art, you stare blankly at an art piece titled “Stains,” and ask yourself how in the world different types of fluids, ketchup, dirt, spit, spilled onto a plain white sheet of paper could be considered “art.” You continue on, baffled, and step right up to what seems to be a blank 8 by 8 inch canvas, that is until you spot a strand of long brown hair carefully glued and dangling from the upper right corner. Now fully convinced contemporary art is so not your thing, you are snatched out of confusion and drawn toward the light, literally, emanating from a small room around the corner.  Without thinking you wander into the room and find yourself amongst a table full of salvaged white lamps and gleaming light bulbs. Encouraged by other museum strollers doing the same, you step up and delicately turn the metal knob, switching off one lamp at a time. In minutes, you dance around the room switching off all the lamps, as though turning a light off isn’t the mundane everyday task it usually is. In the darkness you have created, a sleek black monitor on the wall reveals tiny fireflies moving about the screen, joyfully reminiscent of night before city lights and cars. Without even realizing, you become a part of this contemporary work of art by Tiffany Holmes titled darkSky, and instinctually understand the feeling and emotion behind the work through a simple visualization of how we use, and abuse, energy.

Art for The People by People like You and Me

Carolyn Castaño's Dancing Women in Balmy Alley

Buildings, garage doors, trucks, tunnels and various public spaces are our canvas. Public art provides an outlet for social commentary and illustrates our diverse culture in San Francisco. Whether you’re going to a local corner store or walking through neighborhoods like the Mission you see art murals and graffiti. The buildings of San Francisco exhibit public art through paint mediums like graffiti and wall murals, and interactive 3-d displays. 
Before Tiffany Holmes lecture I asked myself, in a city that's moved beyond fossil fuels what are our options for public art? We need to recognize a post-carbon environment excludes petroleum. Our reliance on petroleum to manufacture and distribute paint products like spray-paint and acrylic do not hold hope as an art medium in a post-carbon environment. Not to mention spray paints, aerosol cans, emit toxic chemicals like propellants, adhesives and solvents. So what are our options you may ask? The lovely media artist, Tiffany Holmes, suggests to brainstorm the meaning of your art piece and then tackles the logistics. So lets take a step back and think about what public art means to us. Public art, I imagine, should be done by the people. The art piece should have a purpose, a social message understood by everyone, and visually appeal to the eye. Art should also set an example for the meaning you want it to hold. Since we're envisioning a post-fossil fuel world, mediums like moss paint and reverse graffiti promote environmental awareness through liberating us from our dependency on petroleum today. Also, moss paint and reverse graffiti enable a public exhibition of what we want to say to the public legally! So let your nature dissemble the site through your messages, and try out these mediums at home with this how to below!

Learning Wisdom

           Imagine a world where children everywhere attend school because they look forward to learning their daily lessons, where people rely on books to gain knowledge instead of Wikipedia, and where a college education in the liberal arts is considered a timely investment rather than a luxury. A post-carbon world will not only require lower dependence on energy resources and the growth of the global economy to foster independent prosperity, it will also cultivate education of all people as a step toward community development and wisdom. Since education is one of the most significant factors in changing culture and behavior, post-carbon education’s foundation will be environmental limits, and recognizing how those limits coincide with human life and aspirations. This type of knowledge must become the basis of the transition from adolescence to adulthood, and from rashness to wisdom and maturity.

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Shoplifting, Globalization, and Why You Never Walk to the Store

As American's, we face many different problems every day. An unstable economy, growing cost of living, and a breed of politicians who seem utterly out of touch with their constituents. Yet what about the other smaller issues which plague our lives? The problems that don't make the 5 o'clock news like our fragmented family life, our boredom (despite the endless distractions provided by technology) and the angry teenagers giggling and shoplifting at Barns and Noble. What possible connection could exist between globalization and the epidemic of shoplifting in one of the world’s wealthiest economies?

Living on Two Legs

Right now in America about 40% of our carbon emissions come from transportation. We are a country which depends on personal vehicles for most of our transportation needs, and this is not an accident. GM, along with several other companies bought and dismantled street car systems across the nation.
But, as Guy Span states in his article "Paving the Way for Buses - The Great GM Streetcar Conspiracy, "Clearly, GM waged a war on electric traction. It was indeed an all out assault, but by no means the single reason for the failure of rapid transit. Also, it is just as clear that actions and inactions by government contributed significantly to the elimination of electric traction." If we are going to rebuild our cities to support a sustainable lifestyle, we will need to give up the comfort and convenience of private vehicles. Now no one likes the idea of sacrifice, and everyone loves their car. But most of us don't like sitting in traffic for hours, or for what feels like hours, in order to do the most basic things. Truthfully, we have a lot to gain as individuals and as members of a community when we step out of our cars and start living the pedestrian life. It's not as mundane as you think!

I come from an average midsized city, plenty of suburbs, a floundering downtown, and a public transportation system most people would rather not talk about. When I first moved to San Francisco almost four years ago I was excited about the prospect of a 'real' transit system that could actually take me where I wanted to go. However, after the novelty of taking the bus wore off, I realized that not only could I get to many nearby spots faster by walking, I also started to see how much stuff was going on in my neighborhood that I had been missing, even on the meandering bus. Since then I have become a walking fanatic, and not because it helps the waistline, although it really does.

I love walking around my neighborhood because I can always find something new to see or do. You will discover that any neighborhood has its own personality, if people start engaging in pavement life. I am lucky to live in San Francisco with its mixed use neighborhoods. I have everything I need right at my finger tips, I just have to walk out the front door and go get it. I walk to school, the store, my local coffee shop, the book store, the library (I'm an English major so books are a big deal to me), friends houses, the pub, and if my mother is reading this, church. But no matter where you live, if you park the car and take a stroll down the street, you will be amazed by how many things you've been missing behind the wheel. Not the least of which being a conversation with your neighbors.

Last night my friend Ariel and I took a stroll down Clement Street. We live seven blocks away from each other in a neighborhood perfectly suited for pedestrian life. Ariel and I love our neighborhood because everything we need is within walking distance. We are very lucky. Usually we go to Clement to buy groceries from the asian grocery stores. They sell produce for about half the price chain grocery stores charge, and they have all the best rice selection I have ever seen. We spend a lot of time on Clement, going to our favorite ice cream shop Toy Boat Dessert Cafe, going to the bank, and stopping by the Richmond library.

We made it over to Clement just as the sun was beginning to set. It was a surprisingly warm night for San Francisco and the streets were full of couples and young people headed home from work or going out to dinner.

We cruised by my favorite bookstore, Green Apple Books. It is spread out over two buildings, with lots of stairs, and nooks and crannies. A book lover can easily get lost in this store. We tried not to go inside, but were seduced by the bargain bins out front and both ended up buying something. $1.98 for a poetry anthology is the type of impulse buy I can support.

The crowds were beginning to gather outside of Burma Superstar, the absolute best Burmeese food on this continent. Luckily it was early yet, so we were able to slip by unharmed.

We continued walking down the street, we heard streaming out of the Plough and Stars. It turned out to be a five piece bluegrass-folk type band. Awesome! I love folk music. Sadly we couldn't go in, AWOL isn't 21 yet. But we could still stare longingly.

It then became too dark to take pictures, and so the story ends. But it continues everyday. Every neighborhood has its own pedestrian story to tell. Why did Ariel and I go out last night? I needed to get some cash, so we were walking to the bank. This was not a special outing, just a mundane task; however, the simplest actions in life can provide us with great pleasure if we let them. I love my neighborhood and I love the ways I am able to participate in it. A life on two legs should be something we treasure, and it is something we can all aspire to as we re-imagine our future and reshape our present.