West Bridgford in Transition - Time for change: London’s Do-It-Yourself Approach to Safer Streets by Elizabeth Press on August 10,2010

In the UK, the non-profit Sustrans is pioneering a community-based method to reclaim streets from high-speed traffic and make neighborhoods safer and more sociable places.

Called "DIY Streets," the program brings neighbours together to help them redesign their streets in a way that puts people, safety, and streetlife first. So far, individual streets have benefited from DIY redesigns in 11 communities in England and Wales. Recently Streetfilms got a walk through of one successful DIY project -- on Clapton Terrace in London. With the people who made it happen as our guides, we saw how planners and neighbors collaborated to transform a place where speeding used to rule into a local street with calm traffic and safe space to socialize.

Can the DIY model work in West Bridgford?

12 Step plan

Set up a steering group and design it's demise from the outset. A core team to drive the project forward during the initial phases. Awareness raising. (see who is in the steering group)

Build crucial networks and prepare the community in general. Lay the foundations. Network with existing groups.
(pedals, Notts Wild life trust, Skills Exchange, WB Summer Gathering)

Organise the ‘great unleashing’. Create a memorable milestone to mark the project’s ‘coming of age’, moving the project into the community.

Form working groups. Set up smaller groups to focus on specific aspects of the process.

Use open space an effective approach to running meetings for Transition Initiatives.

Develop visible, practical manifestations of the project. Create practical, high visibility manifestations in your community.
(bike trailer hand out)

Facilitate the great re-skilling. Reverse the ‘great deskilling’ of the last 40 years by offering training in a range of skills.

Build a bridge to local government. Cultivate a positive and productive relationship with your local authority.

Honour the elders. Engage with those who remember the transition to cheap oil.

Let it go where it wants to go… Act as a catalyst for the community to design its own transition.

Create an Energy Descent Action Plan. Combine the practical actions to form the Energy Descent Action Plan.

West Bridgford in Transition - Time for change

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London’s Do-It-Yourself Approach to Safer Streets by Elizabeth Press on August 10,2010

12 Step plan

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