ISABELLA GARDENS
Achieving sustainable living is no easy task, but the journey
will be fun. Success requires a diversity of approaches. They
include the design of ecologically sustainable communities and
infrastructure, plus skills, technologies, tactics, and information
which enable access to, and control over, the necessities of life:
food, water, energy, and waste management.
This brings us to the challenge of making retirement villages
more sustainable. For all those aspects of life that a community
needs in order to sustain itself and thrive, how do we build
in resilience to mitigate the effects of already emerging global
problems, and particularly to reduce carbon emissions and
avoid human-induced climate change?
A truly sustainable community that shapes its evolution
will achieve the objective of becoming a locally integrated,
nurturing and co-operative community. Expanding nearby
services, capacities and resources is an important priority
for a retirement village too, as it enables people’s needs to
be met relatively close to home.
Building resilience requires updating and maintaining skills
such as gardening, food growing, arts and crafts, recycling
consumer items, and repair and maintenance. Improvising
when appropriate, learning new things from others, and sharing
resources and knowledge all necessitate a system of democratic,
consultative community decision-making and governance.
Peter Enge, a resident at Isabella Gardens,
shares his view on what sustainable living is in the
Lendlease Retirement Living context.
Peter Enge, Resident
