Internet-synced, sustainable, xeriscaped,
solar-canopied-power-grid-contributing bike/walk/transit trails would provide
training and employment opportunities to incarcerated, in-need, and skilled
populations; on-line/in-the-field learning and vacation/tour opportunities to
general/all populations; and begin connecting cities with fertile valley,
forest, coastal, mountain, and desert communities in and across borders--
helping protect the environment, bolster economic, energy, and food/water
security, increase understanding, appreciation, stewardship and enjoyment of
our interdependent world.
The challenge to contribute to the creation of green corporations;
green recreation and tourism; secure renewable energy; improved land and waste
management; improved security of food and water; educational, vocational, and
elder-inclusion opportunities; provision for mainstream, at-risk, and
incarcerated/rehabilitated populations—these criteria all combined to produce
the concept of an integrated opportunity to build infrastructure while
improving environmental, educational, economic, energy, and earth security.
When combined with energy-harnessing technologies to capture and supply
electrical power to local/national grid systems, people from all walks of life
can become stakeholders in infrastructure building and sustaining green-living
projects which improve the health and education of participants, enable low/no-cost
entertainment and exercise options, produce renewable energy for use or
donation to needy communities world-wide, encourage local-to-global
connectivity, interaction and tolerance, and provide opportunities for
inclusion of all who wish to participate, regardless of origin, as well as
reduce pollution, slow the depletion of resources, and contribute to the health
of our shared local and global environments.
Instead of enduring the flight of doctors, intellectual and corporate
talent, creativity, and culture to cities or even other nations,
globally-linked trails and communities can enable even “remote” local citizenry
to offer highly trained specialists (in medicine, education, technologies,
industry, arts, culinary arts, services, etc.) the access to dependable,
high-quality resources, including energy, internet, peripheral services and
supplies needed for excellent care and standards of living.
Networked bicycle/human-powered-transit (roller blades, pedal carts,
pedestrian and wind/para-powered) trails would provide multi-tiered
opportunities for responsible entrepreneurship, recreation, learning, energy,
environment and grey-water/waste management/soil rebuilding among local
populations.
Utilizing solar/valent-power canopy (evolving with technology), trails
would have photo/motion-sensitive lighting for night treks; connectivity,
GPS/SMS-sync capabilities; sync-links to:
- · Local amenities/products/services
- · Traditional arts/culture/education
- · Traditional healing/indigenous plants/medicinal plants, minerals, resources and services
- · Site/climate-specific trekking and survival information
- · Elder and contemporary knowledge speakers/programs
- · Inter-trail races, local-knowledge/history/game programs
- · Inter-school/sister-city, green-education/green-globe projects
- · Linked off-trail, green-key, safe and sustainable tourism activities
Trail-project solar/valent energy-systems could connect with the
local/national power grid, enhancing energy access/energy security nation-wide.
Wheeled transit vehicles (bicycles, strollers, pedestrian-roll-sticks,
rollerblades, etc.) could “link in” by picking up a rechargeable
battery/loadable-devices at start of transit on trails, and delivery of the
charged battery/loaded-device at departure points (hooked into the larger power
grid system) along the trail.
[Note: Similar opportunities for installing and utilizing
motion-powered energy systems, utilizing small chargeable batteries on wheeled
systems or in-shoe devices, utilized while in waiting areas (airports/transit,
medical well-visitor waiting zones, social-services waiting zones, etc), in
schools, malls, training centers, hotel exercise zones, in appropriate prison
facilities/rehabilitation programs, on mass-transit vehicles (long-route bus,
train and subway commuter-transport) and in airplanes and on ships, are also
possible.
Person-powered grid-contribution systems could also be installed to
amass and donate sustainable and renewable power from participants in corporate
settings, fast-food play (and innovative “adult play”) zones, and, especially,
in sports stadiums-- where fans in stadiums (and eventually, those in their
homes, with sync-in connectivity) can “vote with their feet” and pedal/power to
express support for their teams, donate power, play online team games (if franchises
agree), enhance group dynamics, charitable and social inclusivity, and provide
ownership of individual, family, community, brand-or-fan-based, regional or
national/international efforts to improve standards of living, improve health,
and encourage fun, win-win engagements which are environmentally sustainable,
and age, gender, ability, social, political, and culturally-inclusive.]
In addition to utilizing solar-canopies and valent-energy collectors
(which can also be channeled to “sweep” dust from the solar panels), these
trails could incorporate hanging, tiered, and ground-level/border xeriscaped
gardens which could provide food and water security for humans, pollinating
bees, butterflies, birds, and related flora and fauna living within the improved
environmental stability of the trail zones. Trail-zone grey-water and
hydro-management programs could also be utilized, to increase water security.
Individuals/groups from trail-adjacent communities would be
hired/responsible for the maintainance of local-to-global access/connectivity
programs and projects, receiving multi-skill training/vocational/avocational
opportunities, including:
- · engineering/design/construction and maintenance
- · agro-ecology/xeriscaping
- · connectivity/communications
- · renewable energy/power-grid establishment/use/maintenance
- · food/water/energy security programs
- · waste/sanitation
- · arts/recreation
- · indigenous-heritage-knowledge/wealth/resource preservation
- · resilient adaptation; youth-elder programs; community representation/planning
- · eco-tourism
- · service-sector planning/management/marketing
- · rest/refreshment/lodging
- · massage/hammam/indigenous-therapies
- · guides, security, translation
- · bike/equipment maintenance, mapping
- · web-page/data-sync design/maintenance
Networked-trails-projects can re-integrate impoverished, migrant,
under-served, at-risk, and prison-community citizens-- enabling education,
skills, and potential/available employment in all the sectors intersecting with
trail use/operations. At-risk/incarcerated
adults and youth joining supervised trail-programs can acquire specific
skills/knowledge/training, on-the-job-experience, verifiable performance
records, and employment on the trail-systems they help build and/or maintain.
Associate benefits of constructing and utilizing internet linked trails
would include possibilities for regional/national/international racing (single
location and multi-location or global/synced-start racing events); tourism;
continual field-learning cauldrons for those using the trails and for
residents; cradle-to-cradle sustainable development collaborations; daily-use
transit/portage routes (excluding heavy-vehicle/fuel-burning
transport)—networked-trails could enhance connectivity, access, and recognition
of the intra-connected, fragile balance between the eco-climates,
agro-urban-economies, and food/water/energy-security and social-inclusion/responsibility issues
faced by each nation, region, community, and individual world-wide.
In Morocco, as everywhere, there are microcosms of environment,
culture, economy-- and multiple issues directly impacting the survival,
stability and sustainability of the kingdom’s citizens. Partnership approaches
to community-based projects can improve resilience, celebrate existing
heritage/knowledge, encourage more secure food/water/energy/transit practices—
and inspire positive transformation within the communities and among all who
participate, though tourism, project-participation, and economic involvement.
Although adaptable to any climate/topography, site-specific trail projects
in Morocco can decrease erosion, diminish heat-bloom, desertification and
vulnerability to drought while increasing available arable land-use, and
enhancing access to (without increasing
deterioration in) fragile and at-risk eco-environments. Local, migrant, tourist
and other populations can utilize the trails as main arteries of connectivity
and access, lessening the pollution footprints of erosion,
slow/non-biodegradable waste and obsolescence.
The 7th World-Environment-Education Congress, WEEC2013, was hosted in Marrakech, Morocco. Trails, even one prototype, perhaps in Morocco’s
southlands, would begin connecting cities with fertile valley, forest, coastal,
mountain, and desert communities in Morocco and across borders-- helping
protect the environment, bolster economic, energy, and food/water security,
increase understanding, appreciation and responsible stewardship and enjoyment
of our interdependent world.
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