2 Barcelona transicionistas participating in Transition Network conference @ Liverpool 2011

Tomorrow the Transition Network conference begins in Liverpool (Friday 8th till Monday 11th of July). Barcelona en Transició is sending over 2 of its members to plug in and participate; Juan del Río and Duncan Crowley. The first is from the island of Mallorca and has been living in Barcelona for some years (he speaks Catalan fluently), the second from the island of Ireland who also has been living in Barcelona for some years (he doesent speak Catalan, but understands it more or less). They will contribute their inputs from the Barcelona perspective into the conference; transició, decreixement, local initiaves and projects… As well as offering views on the #SpanishRevolution and the acampadaBCN (which was finally evicted last week from Placa Catalunya, after 6 weeks of occupation and action. Even the urban garden was taken out) with which both have been participating heavily.

Juan del Río

Juan is one of the pioneers of the transition movement in Barcelona. In 2009, he travelled to the cradle of the transition movement, Totnes, to investigate on the ground and to see if it was applicable to the reality of Barcelona. This investigation resulted in his final thesis in a Masters in Sustainability at the UPC. Continueing on from that, here is an interview with Juan for the Semana de la Sostenibilidad (week of sustainability) of pueblo de Rivas, in the community of Madrid

Duncan Crowley

Duncan is an Irish eco architect, city tour guide, #acampadaBCN global communications activist, part founder of Barcelona en Transició. He has been involved with setting up community gardens in Dublin, Ireland and proposed the Botanic Spine, an 18km greenway, CPUL (continous productive urban landscape) and eco corridor for his city. In Barcelona his work on similar proposals for the city have been published in recent book by IAAC (Institute for Advanced Architecture of Catalonia); THE SELF-SUFFICIENT CITY: Envisioning the habitat of the future. He also participated in some of the UK climate camps and the Irish one in 2009. A recent interview with Duncan appeared in the May edition of BCN MES: Let’s plant some seeds :// GARDENING FOR CHANGE.

Barcelona en Transició

So far this year, things have been very good for the group. Good ground has been made, here are some of the highlights…

• The first local Transition Initiative in Barcelona city is up and running: San Marti La Verneda. Some weeks back the hub group partcipated in a series of events for the local barrio festival; thursday the cuba film, fri an eco urban presentation Barcelona 2030?, saturday a bike ride to participate and the party, sunday Taller d’economía social… It rocked!!! All this has come from hub member and resident in the barrio Ricart, and all his compañer@s in the barri.
• A 6 week TRANSITION TRAINING course was given in Fabrica del sol (the sun factory). This training programme will hopefully become one of the key tools to helping set up local barrio (neighbourhood) initiaves. It was very well recieved and more civic centres have invited the group to set up similar training programmes around the city.
• In December Barcelona did a live video conference with Camden based transitioner Alexis Rowell, part of the Agenda 21 events.
• We participated in the multi way vid stream conference with Transition Scotland: International Transition Conference 2010: Transitions: diverse routes to belonging
• A successfull open space event happened about growing food in the city, more community gardens exist now in the city, related post event article: Greening Barcelona
• We participated in a few No money picnics in parc ciutadella
• In October we did a very successfull local barrio wander: Poble Sec en Transició: Cicle de caminada i xerrades 2010
• Previous years events: Eventos y aventuras de Barcelona en Transició en 2010

#SpanishRevolution

Related Articles: Ireland: J19: ‘Indignants’ to protest EU Pact in Dublin, Cork, Galway and Limerick | Who are the real Wallies? Why the F*CK are the Irish people still asleep??? | IRELAND WAKE UP | We are Ireland, we will resist | Anger and indignation in Ireland, Greece and Tunisia | The #IrishRevolution starts now Spain: With The Outraged In Madrid | #SpanishRevolution comes to Greece: #M25Gr = #GreekRevolution | Tahrir Comes to Spain | Tahrir > Spain > World |  #SpanishRevolution – Instaling Democracy 2.0  | #spanishrevolution goes global Greece: Grassroots politics flourish in Greek turmoil | The Greek protests are not just about the economic crisis | Athens protests: Syntagma Square on frontline of European austerity protests General: “Peoples of Europe, Rise Up” Greece’s message being taken up by France, and maybe beyond too?

Following the Transition Network Conference:

Conference highlights from our very own Rob

As the Transition movement grows, deepens and spreads, it is developing strongly around themes such as localisation and social enterprise, the practicalities of making projects happen on the ground, and the critical importance of building good strong groups to underpin the whole process (to name but a few).

The conference offers the opportunity to reconnect with what’s emerging, what people are doing, as well as to hear new ideas from a range of other areas/organisations.  You will meet people doing Transition in cities, towns, villages and universities up and down the country, as well as some from further afield.

Every Transition conference has had its own distinct identity, from the first one at Ruskin Mill to last year’s event at Seale Hayne.  This year will be another unique experience, drawing on the passion and experience of Liverpool’s Transition groups and also a variety of other local food/community development groups in the city.

It promises to be a rich, exhilarating and energising weekend.  You will also get a very real taste of what the soon-to-be-published ‘Transition Companion’ will look like and how it presents Transition in a very different way to the ‘Transition Handbook’.  Soul food for Transition.   See you there.

List of links and information:

• Conference main page
• Conference programme
• Conference tickets booking page
• Please complete the Transition Project Support Survey
• Steph Bradley’s marvelous blog about the conference
• Rob’s blog on the conference
• An extraordinary looking Liverpool exhibition of work by the artist Rene Magritte
• Add a conference banner to your website! Go on!
• Follow the conference on the Transition Conference 2011 blog

(Post conference feedback)

• Full summary of what went on at Full round up of materials from the 2011 Transition Network conference
• Which includes *** Spanish revolution impromptu late night meeting on Sunday (click to listen to audio recording)
• And this vid (see end of post) Duncan updates Adrienne on Democracy2.0 in Barcelona
• Most of the vids shown can be found at Homage to Plaza Catalunya: REAL DEMOCRACY NOW IRELAND event but here they are now to view…

First vid – true graphical representation of the communication network flow of M15

BARCELONA REVOLUTION
(This is translated, click the CC buton to read – HD] (ENG) (FR) (IT)

above film included main image of dude in poster with megaphone saying:

is fighting to say that we have had enough of having the piss taken out of us… all of us…

 Spanish Revolution

This was the vid, that we just intended showing the first 3 mins, but the room wanted to see it all, lots of great footage with the music of muse.

 

And one of the ones we didnt get to show you during the talk, but which we referred to was the following:

 

The instigator of the Icelandic revolution, Hörður Torfason, sends a message of support to the Spanish people (vid in english, with spanish subtitles) transcripted in both languages here

 

Democracy2.0 report from Barcelona

Duncan Crowley talks to Adrienne Campbell about the assemblies in public squares in Barcelona, at the 2011 Transition conference

 

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