Community sharing innovators offer hope to amplify the best aspects of the Sharing Economy – many explicitly adopt practices that enhance a range of ecological, social and economy sustainability goals. These actors are a diverse set of individuals and organizations focused at more local scales that currently use digital technology more modestly and emphasize in-person connection. Non-monetized transactions are more dominant.
Key recommendations to advance urban sustainability:
Prioritize support for Community Sharing innovators who promote reuse, borrowing, swapping, repair and maintenance of goods, combined with educational efforts to promote buying less and smarter.
Enable Community Sharing by supporting a sharing inventory and web page, promoting events and ideas, and acting as a facilitator and connector.
To scale Community Sharing, shift to community-based behaviour change, support expansion into new neighborhoods, help innovators get better organized, and provide underutilized public spaces and municipal infrastructure.
Consider adopting a more systematic, on-line approach to sharing spaces for Community Sharing innovators modeled on the UK Space for Growth programme.
What to watch out for:
Missing out on the opportunity Community Sharing presents to foster healthy, connected communities while promoting other goals such as more affordable living, reducing eco-footprints, and supporting business and workforce development.
Getting too fixated on understanding the impacts on city priorities upfront; instead tie them into pilot project efforts and/or engage innovators to help measure impacts.
