permaculture

[<permed@nor.com.au>]

>>Could it be possible to design essentially an agrarian suburb? The cities
>>need food (although rooftops can help, they probably need more). Give each
>>home 1 or 2 acres of land, have some communal waterfront ponds with fish,
>>let the kids go fishing out their back door, grow fruit trees along the
>>paths, garden it...and allow folks to make a bit of a living on the food
>>they harvest/produce.
This description fits the vision of most intentional communities from the 
early 70's and sounds a bit like Crystal Waters and Jarlanbah - it's been 
done and around in a rural context for 3 decades and there's many lessons 
to be learnt. Note that for most families 1-2 acres is far too much land 
to try and manage, on Jarlanbah we reduced this to a half acre (the 
minimum allowed for rural residential) and folks share 33 acres of 
community land. 
The term Agrarian Suburb to me conjours a more urban picture rather than 
the rural residential estate described above. Village Homes is a great 
example of a truly productive 'agrarian suburb'.
Robyn