Does anyone have a view on the latest eco-trend -' transition town' put forward by Rob Hopkins? BFF is about to embark on a regular slot which will follow our nearest town Lampeter as it begins its transition.

Our journo will visit the town and talk to traders, the local authority and eco-activists about what they intend to do to move away from oil dependency. As usual, I'm skeptical and have pre-concieved ideas that it will be just the usual suspects that actually do the transition while everyone else goes about their normal activities - the heath food shops the old hippies and the weekend environmentalists. i hope I'm wrong. if anyone on the forum lives in a transition town let me know how its going please.

I'd like to hear to what people make of Transtition Towns.
Coming from Biff's point of view, I do not believe the culture/mindset in this country has what it takes.
I drove(amen) round Lewis two weeks ago and didn't see any great cycle routes, early days, yes, but the groundshifts required I think are beyond politicians / goverment in the UK. The is always money to made selling what you have come up with to those who need it. You need to get in their early. The Uk's been lagging for a while.
Heres hoping, I for one would like to Live in a town thats more user friendly, I left Ghent/Gent/Gand last weekend feeling slightly envious. A place that seemed better to live in.

Hello all I came across your forum while doing a bit of research on the proposed 'Transition Town Lampeter' and as a resident of the town I have strong feelings about the project. I must stress that I am a supporter of the project but have some concerns regarding its implementation and how it has been reported in the press, in particular an exceptionally poor and somewhat misleading article in the Guardian by Felicity Lawrence on Saturday April 7th.

On April the 2nd a meeting was held by the Soil Association to discuss the transition town idea with the general public. After the meeting a show of hands was taken to ascertain the support for proceeding with the project, the result was an emphatic yes. My main concern is that the vast majority of the meetings attendants do not live in Lampeter, or in fact, anywhere near Lampeter. I estimate, that out of the 450 people who are said to have attended the event, only some 15-20% of them where actually from Lampeter, or from the immediate locality. The local business community was barely represented at all, I would estimate somewhere in the region of half a dozen business owners where present, not exactly a promising turnout. Funnily enough the meeting was mostly attended by "old hippies and the weekend environmentalists".

If you read the Guardian article you would believe that the towns people are enthusiastically behind the project, but the fact of the matter is that only a small number of them are even aware that the idea even exists. Very little advertisement was made for the meeting in the local area, most people I spoke to prior to the event had not heard of it. In fact the local County Council member was first made aware of the matter after, by chance, reading an article in the Western Mail.

If Transition Culture wishes to involve Lampeters general public by “engaging people on a heart level” (I quote Mr Hopkins answering a question from the floor) then surely they must be the ones who are consulted with, and not an audience whose majority will be largely unaffected (if in fact at all) by the scheme. It is my opinion that there is a lot of work to be done in the local community, spreading information and actually asking the local population what they would like to see come out of the project, before this project can attain any level of success.

I've included some links that relate to the subject:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/oil/story/0,,2051911,00.html
http://transitionculture.org/
http://www.transitiontowns.org/Totnes/
http://www.transitiontowns.org/Kinsale/
http://www.transitionpenwith.com/index.html

The 15 - 20% is only an estimate but I think it’s a fair one. I didn't work this out with any kind of scientific methodology, so really its only an anecdotal statement. Firstly I looked over the delegate sheet which listed most of the attendees names and addresses, and then I had a look around the hall to see who was there. Lampeter is only a small town and I know most of its inhabitants if not by name then by sight. I also had a chat to a few local people halfway through the meeting and they raised the same point. As for my definition of local, I would say anyone who lives within 8 miles of the town, or who use the towns facilities on a regular basis. Of course I cannot be absolutely accurate with this estimate but I do not think it is far from the truth.

The meeting seemed to generate a lot of interest form all over Wales, of course there were a lot of people from Ceredigion, Carmarthenshire, Powys, Pembrokeshire and Gwynedd; but there was also a number of people travelling much further for instance, Swansea, Cardiff, Bristol and even Cumbria. Of course the people who travelled long distances were in the minority, and the majority of attendants lived within 50 miles of the Town. However I do not think that just living somewhere in West Wales qualifies one as local to Lampeter.

I myself look forward to the next transition town meeting, and hope that a few more local people will turn up. Hopefully the participation of more locals will create some realistic and desirable methods of turning Lampeter into a Transition Town.

Modbury, in Devon, has made a nice start by all the shops agreeing not to give out plastic bags.
http://environment.guardian.co.uk/waste/story/0,,2077992,00.html

About 400 people turned out to hear Richard Heinberg and others at the TransitionTown meeting in Stroud on Wednesday night. Last night it was Nailsworth.

Hi,
I am part of a newly formed Aberystwyth Transition Town group. This group came about by someone attending the soil assoiciation meeting in Lampeter, so whilst it wasn't strictly a local event, some positive things elsewhere are coming out of it.

As there seems to be a fair few people from west wales around I think I can get away with a plug for our very first public event: We will be showing the film 'The End of Suburbia', followed by a discussion and introduction to the transition towns idea from Sarah Pugh (of Transition City Bristol). This is taking place at the Morlan Centre, Aberystwyth, 14th June 7.30pm, all welcome.
Cheers

Hello there-I make films for BBC (Wales mostly) and I am interested in following developments in mid Wales re Transition Towns. From a meeting I attended at Ciliau Aeron recently it seems a disparate and far-flung movement so I hope that by joining this discussion I can see what's going on. (I hope Green Building Forum don't mind me piggy backing this way).
From what Bob Irving says, it may be a hard story to illustrate on TV as it's all a bit didactic at the mo. But I did meet people at Cilia Aeron who were engaged in various activities and I would be very keen to hear from more people about what's happening. I'm especially interested in stories about people changing the way they live in radical ways or people struggling to change etc.

Hi jonesg6c,

I'm part of the Transition Town Llandeilo movement, which was sparked by several locals attending the Lampeter event. Our Launch day is today (2nd Sept) at the Civic Hall.

I, and the rest of the group, would be happy to give you any info we can, and/or meet with you.

We also have a real live project on the go (officially separate from the TTL initiative but strongly in tune with it) to turn the redundant local former Provisions Market into a multi-use business, retail and community centre, run as a social eneterprise by a Development Trust of which I'm a director. This is in the face of stiff competition from property developers and on a very tight time scale imposed by the County Council (which would like to be rid og it and get as much fast money as possible).

Hi, I am a university student studying about Transition Towns. I have been set an assignment to obtain feedback from people who have read the Transition Towns Primer, would you please comment on whether you think that it is an easy read? Do you need to read it all to understand the message? Can it be implemented? Does it get boring? Does it help? Could it be improved?

I thank you all in advanced for your help and reply.

Great
http://www.transitiontownlouth.org.uk

So will TT's work and have they got the answers? I personally like this bit of context setting from the TT wiki

http://transitiontowns.org/TransitionNetwork/TransitionInitiative#Disclaimer

Cheerful disclaimer!

Just in case you were under the impression that Transition is a process defined by people who have all the answers, you need to be aware of a key fact.

We truly don't know if this will work. Transition is a social experiment on a massive scale.

What we are convinced of is this:

* if we wait for the governments, it'll be too little, too late
* if we act as individuals, it'll be too little
* but if we act as communities, it might just be enough, just in time.

Everything that you read on this site is the result of real work undertaken in the real world with community engagement at its heart. There's not an ivory tower in sight, no professors in musty oak-panelled studies churning out erudite papers, no slavish adherence to a model carved in stone.

This site, just like the transition model, is brought to you by people who are actively engaged in transition in a community. People who are learning by doing - and learning all the time. People who understand that we can't sit back and wait for someone else to do the work. People like you, perhaps... \\!! Final point Just to weave the climate change and peak oil situations together...

* Climate change makes this carbon reduction transition essential
* Peak oil makes it inevitable
* Transition initiatives make it feasible, viable and attractive (as far we can tell so far...)

Who is Linda Snell?

Ah yes of course... i knew TT's were being mentioned in the Archers but no more details about characters etc. The Archers thing seesm a bit of a double edged sword for TT's, good to get the media coverage of course, but not so good if its going to create associations with the sort of personthis character seems to be portraying...

I sometimes wonder if the death-knell for LETS was when The Daily Mail described it as "So revolutionary its bound to sweep the country"

Posted By: James NortonKeep meaning to go to this but am put off by the Linda Snell factor...

http://www.transitionsheffield.org.uk/

sadly I am pre-booked for another worthy cause tomorrow, am on mailing list so will try to go to next one...

Last year Transition Sheffield did 9 film screenings, one film we showed in two venues was a Rob Hopkins talk which started with a re-enactment of a scene from the Archers, but, because we found it so cringworthy, we cut this bit out and started the DVD just after this bit ended...

There were two Transition meetings in Sheffield last night, the one I was at had 28 people at it and was really good, hope to meet you at one in the future