Cohousing-L Mailing List: Community activities

[MLYNCHIN (MLYNCHIN]

In a message dated 04.15.97 9:33:02 AM, veda [at] csd.uwm.edu (Tom Nelson Scott)
wrote:

<<I'm about to invest more time and money into research on cohousing
communities and ecovillages. Before I try to develop one or move into
an existing coho/ecovillage, I'd like to know what kind of community
I'm getting into. What are the group dynamics? How does a commonhouse
work? Should I expect TV to play a central role in developing the
sense of community, or are there more evolutionary activities that I can
participate in? What might those activities be?
>>

Old Oakland CoHousing is still in the predevelopment stage of CoHousing so I
can't speak to whether or not TV is going to be important enough to bring
 the community together. I suspect it will to some extent in terms of using
the TV/VCR for movie night, but regular programming I don't think so. Some of
us are active in the greater community so that we don't have time for it on a
regular basis.

I think there are lots of activities that will bring the community together.
We have a member who is a professional dance instructor, i.e. cajun, zydeco
dancing. I think we might want to have dance parties or lessons. I am
planning on having bicycle picnic rides where members with bicycles ride to a
picnic site. I also want to set up a badminton court so that kids and adults
can play. I think there are plans to have a game night for scrabble, mahjong,
cards. I've been making sushi to bring to meetings, and they are easy enough
to teach others. Cooking together can be another activity that brings the
community together. I am also a member of a bicycle club that has monthly
meetings with a program afterwards. A lot of the bicycle programs are slide
shows of bicycle touring. If I schedule the bicycle club meeting at the
Common House, then the cohousing members can also enjoy the program. Some of
these activities can be scheduled monthly, some quarterly, and some on a
whim.  Old Oakland is also in an urban area where there are lots to do
without driving. Although I can expect many common dinners, I'd also hope
that we will eat dinner out occasionally or on special occasions. All in all,
I think there are lots of activities that can bring the community together.

Just having these endless planning meetings, site visits, city council
meetings have brought us together-perhaps not always in the way we like, but
as a group we move forward and it feels great. The feeling is: We can't wait
to move in so we can relax and be "normal," but there's another year and a
half to go of being diligent "cohousing activists."

I like to know what other communities have done to bring community together.

Below has been sent out before, but it has been revised:

<<Oakland, California right across the bay from San Francisco. Historically
and presently home of the Oakland Raiders, Oakland A's, Hell's Angels, Black
Panthers, Ebonics, Oakland Firestorm, Cypress Freeway collapse, Oakland
Airport, Port of Oakland, Yoshi's Jazz Club. Quite a history with more to
come with Old Oakland CoHousing . There is a "there" there.

Oakland is a wonderful city. It has its urban problems like any large city,
but it is still a wonderful city. It does not have the cold nor fog that San
Francisco has. It has wonderful parks for hiking and camping and mountain
biking that are only 20 minutes away. It has diverse neighborhoods with many
unique shops and ethnic cuisines of which Old Oakland will be one. There is a
huge Asian Chinatown with Chinese, Korean, Vietnamese, Laotian, and Japanese
products. It is 50 miles away from Silicon Valley, with convenient freeway
access in all directions, but why not telecommute since Swan's Market will be
wired for it. A few members are looking into jointly owning/sharing electric
cars that can be recharged in the cohousing parking garage for local travel,
in addition to using public transportation in terms of busses. the subway,
and Amtrak. There are numerous bicycle clubs in the area, and critical mass
rides once a month with a huge bicycle commuting component advocating a bike
lane on the proposed new Bay Bridge. The City of Oakland has in place a
long-range plan of its future called "Oakland Sharing the Vision" of which
downtown redevelopment (and Swan's) is a part of.

Historic Swan's Market is in the heart of downtown Oakland with restaurants,
a movie theatre, jazz club, fresh grocery market. From Swan's, you are
minutes away from San Francisco, Berkeley, Walnut Creek by the BART subway
system. It has 21 condominiums with 13 committed households so far. Five more
households are undergoing the membership process. We could use more.
>>

Marilyn Chin
Old Oakland CoHousing in Oakland, CA, to begin reconstruction and renovation
in fall 1997.