Is Vancouver About to Become the Greenest City in the World?
By Allan Hunt Badiner
AlterNet.org
July 30, 2009

The city has made a rapid transition: It draws 90% of its energy from renewables, has a booming bicycle culture and a very popular progressive mayor.

Just as American television chokes with scare ads attacking Canada's health care system, it was time to check if Vancouver, British Columbia, once ranked by The Economist as first in quality of living, was still pointing the way to the future.

From the airport all along Granville Street, Vancouver's longest artery, my eyes kept searching for urban blight, some garbage or a little graffiti -- but there was none. Moving through the ethnically diverse neighborhoods, no litter could be spotted on the streets and sidewalks.

Suddenly, the sunlit skyline of downtown Vancouver revealed itself at the horizon. With gleaming glass towers, snow-capped mountains, huge parks, and wide beaches, the city appears like a Manhattan reborn in a New Age.

This is not to say it's a city without problems, or that it doesn't have its own share of the poor and homeless. But Vancouver's dynamic young and idealistic mayor, Gregor Robertson, won election in December promising to solve these problems and ultimately make Vancouver the greenest city in the world.

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