Why would we want to "MasterPlan" the Ecovillage site?

[Russ]

Everyone has various talents... the baker, the tailor, the candlestick maker. Not everyone has the ability to easily imagine buildings, houses, gardens, roads, etc. in three dimensions laid over the large topographic map of the ecovillage site.

The MasterPlan identifes the hard geography, and +'s & -'s of the site. It then takes into account zoning restrictions and constructs a hypothetical vision of what an ecovillage "might" look like.

The plan may or not manifest, but it helps ecovillagers begin the discussion and begin the creation which can add or delete from the Masterplan.

[Laurie "Willow" Beacom]

Can you give me some more particulars about living at Kakwa?

Some info about me and mine....

My name is Willow and I am a mother and grandmother (maaaan, I suddenly feel old!!). I am 46 and after working through my own personal life issues, I am ready to follow my dream....to live sustainably, with the land, with a community that works with the consensus process, to grow foods and soil and bask in the moonlight of our Mama Moon with no streetlights to obscure her presence. My grown children are also seekers of this lifestyle so we have been researching ecovillages throughout Canada. We currently live in Guelph Ontario, and while there is a great ecovillage just miles away (Whole Village www.wholevillage.org ) we are lonesome for the mountains. We originally come from the San Bernardino Mountains in Southern California and miss living on high! I hope I am correct in thinking that Kakwa is in a valley but is surrounded by mountains....? Our families collective desire to live off grid (as much as possible....but I am a computer whore so a wee bit of electricity would be nice ;) and to live sustainably is leading us to learn as much as we can in preparation. I have attended natural building workshops in the past with the Permaculture Institute of Northern California and this coming June/July I am attending the Earth Activist Training in Maine ( http://www.unity.edu/Visitors/SummerPrograms/EAT.aspx ) where I will be working at an organic farm learning more about the principles of sustainable permaculture, ecoforestry, and more natural building. As well, in getting ready to "walk with a gentle tread upon Momma Earth, we gave away our most prized possession....our Jeep Grand Cherokee *sobs* It hurt, but our vision for the future is worth it! We now use mass transit and walk and let me tell you, THAT has been an education. Never before have I ever not been able to leap into my Jeep and take off :D

What I would like to see in an ecovillage is, first and foremost, sustainability and true stewardship of the land. It is time to teach our children to grow soil and eat honest foods. I feel that the community would be best served by using the consensus process. I do have experience using the consensus process for many years within our local chapter of the Covenant of the Goddess. And a community is a family and family is love and I would be honoured and blessed to be part of such a community :)

peace
Willow

[Matthew Revesz]

I totally agree with the idea of a masterplan. It's always good to leave design plans open for changes so that it can evolve to be better.

[Alan Langford]

There are certain parts of a community that call naturally for a certain spot geographically. Examples,,, I was living in Alaska, and was helping a friend extract a trailer home from a site. The residents had left, and their trailer needed relocating. Unfortunately, they had located their pig pens up hill from the trailer home, and as break up had been going on for some time, much of the pig pen materials had been washed down to the north side of the trailer home and collected and frozen along the skirting. After using a pick to loosen the odorous icee, I resolved never to put pigs uphill from a house.
Possibly a couple of other obvious observations about master plans, southern sloping sites suit digging in for greenhouse building,