Give Peas a Chance<\/b><\/p>\n

<\/b>The humble green pea gets a fun profile boost in this clever healthy eating campaign from Wyndham City Council. I love the footpath stickers that guide people to a pop-up kitchen in the local shopping centre, where they can add their favourite pea recipe to a book. This works because it\u2019s novel and fun. I suspect the mandatory healthy eating information is the least effective element\u2026it\u2019s the little green faces and personal recipes that do the trick of grasping attention and\u00a0priming<\/a>\u00a0people to make different choices as they proceed to wander down the supermarket aisles.
\nCreated by the Wyndham City Council\u2019s Healthy Communities team.
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\nOutdoor living rooms to slow traffic<\/b>
\nSome Australian councils are doing a great job busting out of the conventional municipal straightjacket. This program from Darebin City’s Safe Travel team aims to enable neighbourhoods to take control of their streetscapes. It helps neighbours get together do creative things with their front yards, footpaths and nature strips, including permanent features like planter boxes, sculptures, street gardens, and venues for after-school games.
\nThe idea is that a street that looks like it\u2019s loved and used will slow down drivers. The web site says it succinctly: \u201cLove your street? You can get to know your neighbours and slow down the neighbourhood at the same time with Drive With Your Heart. By creating an outdoor living room in your street, you will show motorists that your street is a shared space and they will take notice and slow down.<\/em>\u201d (packing a value proposition and a theory of change into one neat paragraph).
\nThe\u00a0streets participating so far<\/a>\u00a0illustrate the outpouring of energy and imagination when people are given permission to take control of their streets (photos below from the Coburg Better Block Project off the Darebin City website). The program is called\u00a0Drive With Your Heart<\/a>.\u00a0There\u2019s a downloadable neighbourhood guide on the web site.
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\nCommunity Engagement Innovations<\/b>
\nI\u2019m a regular visitor to this\u00a0Pinterest page by Andrew Coulson<\/a>, community engagement specialist at the City of Salisbury, South Australia.
\nEvery time I look there\u2019s a breathtaking new idea for engaging communities in plan-making.
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\npopupcity.net<\/b>
\nPop Up City<\/a>\u00a0is a site is packed with cool place-making ideas.
\nTo change behaviour we need to change people\u2019s environment. Ideas like innovative street seating, pop-up town squares, Better Block projects, modular parks, playful street installations, and adventure playgrounds profoundly humanise public spaces, creating new conversations and human interactions.
\nFor example I particularly loved the\u00a0Barter Bench<\/a>\u00a0idea from Amsterdam, where a simple red peg transforms a park seat into a free economy barter site.
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\nAnd Nike\u2019s\u00a0on demand laser beam street football pitch<\/a>.
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\nSex education with vegetables<\/b>
\nMy adult students were showing this around during a Changeology workshop.
\nIt made me think: what COULDN\u2019T you animate with vegetables? http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=q64hTNEj6KQ<\/a>
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