Austin is a large city - the 16th largest in the country, in fact. It's too large to make implementing Transition on a city-wide level feasable. The Austin Neighborhoods Council has divided Austin into "sectors" for its organization, and we have decided to use that layout as a template for our organization, as well. You can see the map of those sectors on our home page; clicking on the map there will show you an enlarged version.
We plan for each sector to have at least one active "Transition Town" within it, dedicated to guiding its part of Austin through the transition down from the age of cheap oil. The ultimate plan is for each Transition Town then to subdivide into "Transition Neighborhoods", once it has enough active neighborhoods to do that. How a Transition Town subdivides itself into Transition Neighorhoods is the business of the Town, not Transition Austin, though the central organization will be there to help.
As you can see in the diagram below, there are currently five
active Transition Towns in the Austin area:
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Transition Town Jollyville, in northwest Austin (sector 1);
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Transition Town Upper East, in northeast Austin (sector 3);
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Transition Town East Austin, in east Austin (sector 6);
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Transition Town Decker Lake, encompassing part of sector 6
and a small part of sector 3;
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Transition Town Oak Hill, in southwest Austin (sector 8).
More will be added as more people, from more areas of Austin,
join the movement.
Transition Austin fully supports the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UN General Assembly resolution 217 A(III) of 10 December 1948). That is, we completely reject discrimination on the basis of race, religion, national origin, sexual orientation, or gender identity in all of our programs and efforts.
We are organized in a "hub and spoke" model, because some
of our activities need to be tailored to the needs of the
individual areas of Austin, and some activities need to be
centralized for efficiency.
Click on the diagram below for a full-sized image:
Some activities will be carried out in all the Transition Towns and Neighborhoods. For example, there will be farmers' markets, to which gardeners in an area can bring their extra produce and either sell it or barter it for other produce, in all the Transition Towns and Neighborhoods. Another activity we will all pursue is re-skilling - relearning the skills our grandparents had and took for granted, before the "great de-skilling" that was made possible by the age of cheap oil. For example, yard-scale gardening is a very important skill for everyone to re-learn; see www.Edible-Yard.org for an example. Re-skilling festivals will be hosted by individual Transition Towns, but will be open to participation by people all across Austin.
The hub manages the centralized functions - communication and coordination among the transition towns; Internet presence (including this web site); public relations (presentations, training, press liaison, etc.); working with the City of Austin (for example, to ensure that its new 30-year plan includes real sustainability); and finances (IRS status, donations, expenditures, etc.).