Naomi, Haley, Jamie, Francesca, and Tyler discuss the Big Home localization project

00:02 To begin the game.

00:04 Shane podium in Rickall floor Michigan dean.

00:08 For Michigan State Jared Broussard and Jeremy Bernard. This is an interview of Francesca, Naomi Haley and Jamie as part of the EAS 564 localization course requirement within the School for Environment and Sustainability at the University of Michigan. I am Tyler and together we developed a vision and plan for the big home community space. What we just heard was a recording of Michigan Stadium at a game earlier this year. This group's project would see a different future for the stadium, what we call turning the big house into a big home. We're here to talk about a course project for localization. Could you speak briefly about the course? Jamie, what is this premise I keep hearing about? The localization seminar focuses on a future scenario that is a little bit unconventional in the field of sustainability. There is a general assumption within the field that renewable energy technologies will eventually replace fossil fuels to keep up with the increasing energy demands, and that the global economy will continue to grow indefinitely through technological innovation. In localization, we consider a scenario where that doesn't occur in the way that we might expect. The premise of the course is that after the depletion of fossil fuel availability, a resource descent will occur sometime in the 21st century. This dissent in the availability of energy will result in a future where people ultimately consume less energy by necessity rather than by choice. Localization is primarily explored as a series of concepts and values which could help communities to transition to this very different low throughput future. Huh. This sounds like a pretty bleak version of the future. How does the idea of localization claim to respond to these problems? There is definitely a degree of shock that goes along with considering the resource descent scenario as a real possibility. Progress and economic growth are strong mythic forces in our culture, and calling them into question is a challenging process. Many people's first response is to assume that resource descent or an end to economic growth must translate to some catastrophic doomsday scenario. However, while there are undoubtedly some negative possibilities associated with the premise, the course readings and seminar discussions highlighted many beneficial aspects of transitioning from our current centralized, high consumption society to one which is more distributed and localized. Some of the benefits of localization on personal health and wellness emerge from a need to create stronger interpersonal connections, the development of real, intangible, localized economies, and an increased awareness and connection with the natural world and a sense of place. We learned various ways we could connect with these benefits now and help to advance them in the future, such as supporting local farmers, joining skillshare programs, and advocating for local renewable energy plans while the premise can be scary, the point of the course is to envision how we might benefit from the transition as communities and as individuals. Localization doesn't sound like other potential solutions to the climate crisis we hear debated in the news. Haley where does localization differ from those more mainstream ideas?

03:28 So the ideas you might be hearing a lot more about involve relying on existing or future technology to solve our environmental crisis. These ideas focus on a path of economic growth that is supposedly environmentally sustainable. Solutions from this viewpoint, aim to find ways for society to continue with life as we know it. Improving efficiencies like fuel economy or finding new ways to utilize the waste we produce, like recycling or composting, fall in this realm, the concept of localization takes a different approach and instead suggests targeting the source of our environmental issues, which is overconsumption. There's an emphasis on resource descent or shifting our way of living to reduce our energy needs. So in this way, localization focuses on degrowth rather than green growth, and it offers an opportunity for all of us to slow down and let go of our societal obsession with productivity. Localization offers us an opportunity to build stronger relationships within our communities.

04:24 These are interesting ideas, and I can see how they might be useful given the premise. So then, Naomi, what is your project?

04:33 Good question, Tyler. Our idea for this project came from that reading we did by Donella Meadows about the importance of envisioning the future that we want to have. She talks about how envisioning allows us to have a clear goal in mind of where we want to go. I mean, we're obviously still living in the age of Michigan football right now, so we knew we wouldn't be able to actually convert the stadium into a community center within the scope of this project. So we decided to practice the process of envisioning. This process helped us deepen our understanding of the premise of localization and kind of emulated an experience that will hopefully help us in the future when it becomes more commonplace as we approach degrowth. In terms of the project itself, we started with the idea that it would be interesting to envision a space that served multiple purposes for a community. Early on in the process, we came to the consensus that it would be really fun to think about kind of using an already existing space somewhere close to home. And, you know, what's more iconic than the Michigan Stadium in Ann Arbor. Choosing the stadium felt kind of fun and novel, but we went back and forth on whether or nothing we wanted to make it our focus for a few reasons. Mainly, the stadium is a huge space and we were worried that it wouldn't actually be able to that we wouldn't be able to accurately envision how to use all of it in our final product. We also were hoping that our product would be useful for other communities, but we know that not every community has such a substantial space that may become fallow in the nearest future. We decided to persist with the stadium, though, simply because it is such a keystone to our community, and we believe that it makes such an interesting and engaging study subject. Since we didn't even get into infrastructural questions about converting the physical space, we still hope our final product could be useful for other communities. And given the size of the stadium, we wonder if it could even support multiple localized communities within the Ann Arbor area. We chose a community center as the focus of our project because we believe that the process of building community is aided by having this kind of centralized physical space that could provide for all members of the community.

06:43 Very cool. Francesca, can you talk a little bit about the process of developing this idea?

06:49 Definitely. So, in order to situate ourselves within the context of a low throughput reality, we decided to take on the roles of the community members who would actually be developing, implementing, and occupying the stadium in the future. In this way, we really sought to simulate what it might be like to engage in a democratic and collectively driven community decision making process within this 21st century scenario. To accomplish this, we engaged in a series of collaborative discussions in which we each shared our desired outcomes, expected needs, and personal preferences for what the big home would become. Through this process, we identified the shared principles that best embodied our group's priorities and compiled these into the ten core functions that the community space should serve. These include a medical checkpoint, supportive health and well being, multi use green space, community housing, skill trading and a tool library, food provisioning and distribution, infirmary housing, electricity generation and distribution, childcare, and a free cycle center. Once we've done this, we honed in on the logistical and operational components that would be required to really carry out these ten functions. So, using the current stadium as a starting point, we experimented with quite a few different ways of repurposing the physical structure to most efficiently and equitably serve our community's long term well being. Once we determined our initial collective vision for the space, we created the first of several draft blueprints for the big home. After weighing the pros and cons of each proposed iteration, we continued to refine and expand upon our framework until we settle on the final blueprint that you see today. This visual product really reflects our collective ideas for the future and is the result of an iterative, creative process that prioritized community resilience, comfort, health and sustainability.

08:45 Wow, this is quite an idea. Now that the project has concluded, how do you feel about the concepts of the class? How has your stadium project changed your perspective on things?

08:55 Well, over the course of our project, we found that localization is relatively easy and actually quite fun to envision. We're suspecting, however, that it is quite challenging to execute. We didn't even get the chance to consider the actual implementation of our project, but we know that there would need to be some infrastructure changes to the stadium to accept some of our proposals. So we're kind of still left with the questions of when would be the right time to even execute these changes. Can we begin changes of the space while the stadium is still in kind of football mode? Would we need fossil fuels or other energy sources to make these changes? So these are just some of the few remaining questions that our group has and would like to consider kind of in future explorations. Francesca so for me, the experience of taking this course really inspired me to begin learning and honing the skills that would be necessary to contribute to positive localization within my community in the future, as well as just to generally promote personal and collective resilience. In kind of thinking about this, though, I found that it's much easier said than done, especially when considering the many demands of our academic work and social lives. So a major question that I still feel needs answering is how can we commit to learning these new skills and practicing these mindsets while also balancing the competing priorities that we currently are experiencing today? Haley I think the theory of localization is really interesting, but how it might play out in the long term is still a bit unclear to me. The unknown timeframe of degrowth makes it somewhat difficult to know how we should move forward in the most effective way. I'm wondering if we can develop a more tangible understanding and framework of the timescale necessary for localization.

10:40 And Jamie, our project focused on envisioning what really seems like a far distant future, which was exciting and fun in a lot of ways, but sort of like a hands on approach. The class does focus a lot on theory of localization, but also points to a lot of potential resources to connect with around Ann Arbor, like the farmers market, Argus food stop, local folk schools, and so on. I personally felt as a grad student, I didn't really have as much time as I wanted outside of class to engage with these potential connections, and also sometimes supporting local products and local foods in particular can feel more like a luxury for people who have more means than the average grad student. I definitely look forward to discovering more ways to connect with people working on these types of projects in Ann Arbor and beyond in the future. Great. Well, thank you all for taking the time to speak with me today.