EcoDistricts are offering a new way of thinking about sustainable urban development.

Portland Oregon is focusing on five neighborhoods within the city to re-vision as Eco-Distrcits.  The city is working with local businesses, NGO’s, and impassioned citizens to create a forward-looking consortium that will encourage all levels of sustainable development including sustainable building and redevelopment projects as well as non-motorized transit systems, waste reduction, greater wildlife habitat connection, water use reduction, and a goal of net zero district wide energy use. According to Naomi Cole, the program manager of the Portland Sustainability Institute, “What we’re trying to do with eco-districts is really trying to layer all of those strategies … as a way of concentrating resources and strategies in one neighborhood.”

Students in the University of Oregon’s Architecture and Landscape Architecture departments are working together to vision an EcoDistrict at Lents in outer southeast Portland.  The students are working with input from Portland Metro, a Portland area ecologist and landscape architect, as well as sustainability experts at the business school at the U of O.  Students are examining possibilities of district wide energy, the potential for harnessing energy from passing vehicles traveling along Interstate 205, as well as achieving greater habitat connectivity and urban density along with green job growth and a pedestrian and bike centered transportation system.

Portland State University recently hosted the EcoDistrict Summit bringing together professionals, city employees, planning and design students, and citizens focused on  bringing the vision of EcoDistricts to life in Portland and throughout the nation.  The collaboration that has already begun in Portland, combined with grant funding and community support seem to indicate that deliberate focus on the ecological potential of districts will help to prepare those regions for a thriving future.