When the Transition network began in 2007, only a few towns embraced the Transition concept; currently, New Zealand has roughly 65 Transition Towns. Let us have a look at the journey of transition town in Auckland and its current state.
How did the transition movement start?
The notion was born during an innovative ecological course taught by English conservationist Rob Hopkins at an Irish secondary institute in County Cork in 2004. He moved to Totnes, Devon, a small market town, a year later to co-found the world’s first Transition Town. There are currently over 1200 Transition organizations in over 40 countries, so it isn’t simply a British trend.
Four main assumptions of transition towns:
Life with substantially reduced energy use is unavoidable; it’s better to plan ahead of time than be caught off guard.
The communities are currently unprepared to withstand the catastrophic energy shocks that will follow peak oil and climate change.
The communities must act as a group and move quickly.
The communities can develop modes of living that are more linked, more meaningful, and respect the biological constraints of our planet by releasing the collective brain of those around them to imaginatively and actively design our energy downfall.
Transition towns in other countries
A Transition group in Brixton, London, has funded £130,000 to build England’s first internal society power station atop a council estate, with 82kW of solar panels. Likewise, a Transition community in Derbyshire has established a food center, making it possible to sell food grown in back yards as an option to stores.
Issues in New Zealand
New Zealand’s population is steadily expanding. We can see that Auckland has long been renowned as New Zealand’s most populated city if we look closely. With the changing climate and the increased export and import of international items, the city’s role has faded. It is also known that New Zealand does not have its own power source and must rely on power cables borrowed from other governments.
As a result, Auckland people have taken a positive step. They have begun to participate in and become a part of the transition towns’ initiatives.
The growing trend of transition towns in Auckland
Residents of Auckland have begun to improve the environment and the economy after noticing the problems that people in the country face. Auckland’s transitional towns have been manufacturing and employing local products and using less transportation for a better lifestyle. These neighborhoods have started partnering with schools to help the city move toward a more sustainable future by participating in environmental projects and emphasizing reusing rather than waste. Such communities have decided to run various activities to raise public awareness about the world’s deteriorating ecological problems. These towns’ actions demonstrate that the program will be effective in the future.
Transition town communities are leading people to believe that, although the world’s climate has transformed, we are now staring back at climate change rather than forward to it.
