Go Take a Walk! Small Steps to a Better World
September 25, 2008
Community | Social Action
(1 comments)
By Gardening Grandma
Rachel Cohen, an Eisendrath legislative assistant at the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism, writes on the RAC's blog about the "walk to school" movements popping up in Massachusetts and around the world. Parents and children are making the conscious decision to walk more and drive less, and are doing so at a time when speed and safety are both paramount concerns for families.
It's no surprise that the motivating factor is not exercise (although with the obesity problems in our country, that alone would be great) but rather about reducing our carbon footprint.
But why limit it to children? Next time you need a quart of milk, a book from the library, or some cash from the ATM, why not leave the car in the garage and take a walk? Better yet, why not walk to services this Rosh Hashanah?
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The walk to school idea is one we should all support. Unfortunately, as pointed out by the previous commenter, not all communities are planned on a human scale. Instead, many communities are planned around the assumption that all trips outside the home will be made using a private automobile!
We can still make the transformation, but in many cases we will need to vote with our wallets before we can vote with our feet. By this I mean (where possible) migrating to communities where many of the basic services (shops, schools, etc.) are within walking distance of homes, or pressuring developers and local authorities to ensure that new developments are planned on a pedestrian dimension.
To give credit where credit is due, the Orthodox have already to some extent achieved this objective, by concentrating in areas that can be encompassed by an Eruv, where everything must be within walking distance. An unintended consequence…