A developer is planning 2,600 units for Treasure Island in San Francicso Bay, but environmentalists are calling for a car-free neighborhood of 20,000.
"Instead of a windswept former naval base with poor access to the Bay Bridge, 403 human-made acres could be a community where 20,000 people live mostly automobile-free lives. Energy would be generated by windmills; shops and parks would be within walking distance. Downtown San Francisco would be a 10-minute ferry ride away.""The current scenario calls for 2,600 housing units in four new neighborhoods, with 200 more tucked into the wooded natural hills of Yerba Buena Island to the south.""What could be is glimpsed in a set of visions crafted by urban design students last semester at UC Berkeley's College of Environmental Design. Professor Elizabeth Macdonald led six teams through a study of Treasure Island, and then had them draw up plans for a community shaped by "ecologically responsible approaches to transportation, energy, water and waste disposal issues." "The island really does need to have a density to support all the lifestyle features we'd like," Palmer says. "I hope we have an opportunity to reopen the density and population discussion, because it deserves another look. "
Thanks to Charles Siegel
FULL STORY: If a green utopia on Treasure Island sounds far-fetched, dreamers have a plan

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