Sustainable Cities Initiative (SCI)

The Sustainable Cities Initiative (SCI) is a direct outgrowth and integration of several research, education, and technology transfer projects supported by OTREC at the University of Oregon over the last five years. Over that period, the supported PIs initiated ways to better connect the related work on sustainable transportation, livability, and urban design into something that provided a more robust research agenda, educational experience for undergraduate and graduate students, provided better service to Oregon (or elsewhere) communities, and more directly informed the policy making and agency administration efforts around sustainable transportation topics. The result was the development of the Sustainable…

The Sustainable Cities Initiative (SCI) is a direct outgrowth and integration of several research, education, and technology transfer projects supported by OTREC at the University of Oregon over the last five years.  Over that period, the supported PIs initiated ways to better connect the related work on sustainable transportation, livability, and urban design into something that provided a more robust research agenda, educational experience for undergraduate and graduate students, provided better service to Oregon (or elsewhere) communities, and more directly informed the policy making and agency administration efforts around sustainable transportation topics. 

The result was the development of the Sustainable Cities Initiative (SCI), a cross-disciplinary effort that integrates research, education, service, and public outreach to impact the design and development of Oregon’s cities and to serve as a model of sustainable city design for the nation. SCI works at a variety of scales from geographic regions to individual buildings.  The aim is to apply multiple perspectives and disciplines to achieve solutions to sustainable city design problems and to bring this expertise to students, scholars, funders, project partners, and policy makers.

SCI has been functioning as a start up organization for 18 months, and has recently been recognized by the University of Oregon as one of its “Big Ideas” - an area of focus for the institution going forward.  Over this time period SCI has engaged in many activities to set its foundation moving forward including:
* Sustainable City Year (SCY) program - this is an effort to direct existing courses across disciplines to serve a single city during an entire academic year.  This year, 20+ courses, 15 faculty, 6 disciplines, and about 100,000 hours of effort have gone into working with the City of Gresham.  The City of Salem has been selected as the 2010-2011 SCY city.
* Experts-in-Residence (EIR) - This is an effort to bring national experts to Oregon for multi-day engagements with faculty, students, and the community on issues of critical importance. In 2009, Bill Wilkinson, one of the nation’s experts in bicycle and pedestrian policy came to Oregon, and in May 2010, Professor Jonathan Levine from the University of Michigan will come to Oregon to talk about transportation, land use, and zoning.  Professor Levine’s visit will also be coordinated with PSU’s transportation speaker series, which is a positive direction to continue existing collaboration.
* Policy Advising - In late 2008, SCI members submitted Congressional testimony on the automobile recovery act. In 2009, SCI submitted a White Paper to the Federal Transit Administration on performance metrics for transit and livability issues. In 2010, SCI added a Law Fellow who has been providing interpretation of pending federal transportation legislation, including Congressman Blumenauer’s Livability bill.  SCI has met several times with many members of Congress in Oregon and DC about transportation related priorities and offered opinions on ways to move forward sustainably.
* Research - Many of SCI’s members (and past OTREC recipients) do complementary work and several have been co-PIs on grants.  It remains a larger goal, however, to develop more integrated and truly collaborative research, including relationships that span OTREC campuses.  One example of evidence in moving in this direction is that out of SCI’s White paper to the FTA on livability metrics for transit, a research collaboration developed between UO and PSU.  This collaboration has received some financial support from ODOT and will be seeking complementary support from OTREC.  SCI intends to foster more of these ‘real’ collaborations through building on our core strengths in the topics of: Transportation Livability Metrics, Sustainable Suburbs, Active Transportation, and Urban Ecology / Ecological Design.

SCI is a relatively new effort, but has already been honored by two significant awards this year: 1) In late March, SCI was one of five nominees worldwide, and the only nomination from the United States, to be nominated for the prestigious Globe Award in sustainability research.  SCI will be present at the awards ceremony in Stockholm, Sweden at the end of April; and 2) The Oregon chapter of the American Planning Association has recognized SCI in 2010 for its “Special Achievement Award”, an award that SCI did not even submit materials for.  In its short history, SCI has been visited by the U.S. Undersecretary of Education, members of Congress (House and Senate), the Oregon University System Chancellor, various state agencies, and mayors and city staff from multiple cities.. This proposal to OTREC intends to capture this amazing diversity of interest and enthusiasm and transform it into a long-term sustainable model of education, research, and service focused on sustainable transportation and sustainable city design.