Salt Lake City Green, a City's Progressive Environmentalism

Salt Lake City Mayor Rocky Anderson outlined his city's comprehensive environmental initiative (Salt Lake City Green, born in 2001) during a Monday morning session at the Salt Palace during the ASLA annual meeting. LASN was on hand and impressed to hear and witness how and why Salt Lake City is worthy of emulation. The city promotes alternative transportation (19 miles of light rail system); saves energy and resources (89 city vehicles switched to natural gas, downsized larger vehicles, and began a zero-waste recycling policy); has water and energy conservation policies; works to meet or surpass the international standards set by the Kyoto Protocol to curb greenhouse gasses and global warming; launched the E2 Businesses project to encourage businesses to understand that economics and ecology are not fundamentally opposed and that environmentally sound practices are good for business; protects pedestrians (cross walks that ?EUR??,,????'??chirp?EUR??,,????'?? and count down the crossing time); provides city employees with bikes and helmets; and preserves open spaces, among other initiatives.

Now, if only Mayor Anderson could bring his progressive policies to Southern California!