It's a Good Magazine

You see before you my well-thumbed copy of GOOD Magazine. Last year, I recommended the Transportation issue to readers of the Middletown Eye, but this Spring's issue is even more fun.

GOOD magazine is an unusual publication, more intent on forming an online community of contributors (www.good.is) than on selling subscriptions. Seasonally, they tackle a different issue that affects the quality of life here on the planet. The current issue, titled "Here comes the neighborhood", offers hundreds of ideas about how to make our communities more enjoyable places to live.

For example:

•The town of Port Townsend, Washington formed their own lending network, so that local people can invest in local businesses. So far, they've helped create a dairy, a bike shop, and a nightclub in their town.

•There are federal "Transportation Enhancements" funds that can help a neighborhood to buy and then demolish billboards in their community.

•Tyson's Corners in Virginia is in the midst of a giant experiment with de-sprawling, turning shopping centers and multi-lane highways into neighborhoods.

One piece that was particularly appropriate to the recent debates on the Middletown Eye was an article entitled "Agriculture is the New Golf."

Shucks - we're out here working to get the old golf, and there's already a new golf! Wake up, Middletown!

If you're wondering how to get your hands on a copy of GOOD magazine (which incidentally was co-founded by Max Schorr from Wesleyan's class of 2003), I'm afraid I'm not much help. None of the Middletown stores carry it, as far as I know, but you can drive out of town to find it at a certain big box natural food chain store. Or, you can join the GOOD magazine website.