Eco Villages offer people socially aware self-sustaining micro-communities.
This is a critical time in human history. Clearly we are destroying the natural environment and we are warming up the globe. We can be sure that our species will not going to be around very long if we don’t get our consumption habits under control. – Liz Walker, co-founder and executive director of Ecovillage at Ithaca (EVI), who also has written two books on sustainable development.
The eco village mission has two aspects: conservation and living in a sustainable way and having people live in harmony together. The eco village and the cohousing movement both started in the early 1990s in Denmark and has since spread across the world.
Unlike self-sufficient communities in the past, EVI members have their own homes and manage their own finances separately, but each pays a monthly fee for maintaining the common buildings, land, and to fund future projects. Eco villagers are actively involved in the governance of the community and make decisions through a consensus process during the board of directors meetings that include members of EVI.
It’s a chance to be with our neighbors, it’s a chance to have friends without having to drive across a big city. – Barbara Pease, EVI member, retired computer scientist
Three Groves EcoVillage (TGE) in West Grove, Pennsylvania, has a similar vision of building an ecologically sustainable neighborhood.
It’s not just the environmental sustainability, it’s social sustainability… you can share your resources, you can come together and accomplish so much more because by sharing resources with my neighbor, I have to consume less. – Janet Hesselberth, co founder of Three Groves Eco Village
