Transition Town, USA

A transition town is a simple concept. It involves motivated people pooling their creative and intellectual resources to redefine what a “city” or “town” means in the United States. People create a Transition Initiative because they’re concerned about a modern problem or even a handful of modern problems.

For some, the reason is peak oil, climate change, or runaway inflation. While the term Transition Initiative was originally coined to deal with declining oil supplies and climate concerns, the basic concept could be applied to any issue. We can define a transition town as one actively addressing questions that concerns:

“Any aspect of life that the community needs in order to sustain itself and thrive…”

In concrete terms, a transition town is created when interested citizens do some or all of the following:

1. Undertake a proactive effort to make positive changes.

2. Connect with the local government and other interested groups in the community.

3. Connect with other transition initiative communities.

4. Examine key areas of life like food, energy, transport, health, economics, livelihood.

5. Launch a 15-20 year defined action plan designed to make the community resilient no matter how the future turns out.

Pie-in-the-sky? Maybe. Better than doing nothing? Definitely!

The Holistic Survival Team

Flickr / Exothermic