#shareable cities

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SHARE VIENNA IN A NUTSHELL

Imagine a city where everyone's needs are met because people make the personal choice to share. Where everyone can create meaningful livelihoods. Where fresh, local food is available to all. Where affordable housing and shared transportation are abundant. Where the poor are lifted up, the middle class is strengthened, and the rich are respected because they all work together for the common good.

Some foods are just too good not to share, which is one reason to think about policies for food sharing. A more sobering reason is that close to 15 percent of households in the U.S. have been identified as food insecure. Food sharing is a joy and a necessity, and it’s also just a practical and obvious thing to do. Growing and preparing food is labor- and resource-intensive, which means it makes sense to collaborate in the effort, and to share in the bounty. Cities should, thus, embrace citizen-led initiatives to share food, and should remove legal barriers to it. Our last article in this series focused on policies that facilitate urban agriculture, and this piece looks at other ways that city policies affect communities’ ability to share in the production and consumption of food. A large number of laws related to food are made at state and local levels, but cities still have a significant role to play in affecting a local food system. Furthermore, through zoning ordinances, especially, cities can affect what kinds of food-related activities take place and where.