Jaime Lerner Quotes

I do worry about population growth and the preservation of the green belt space but I don't think these are insurmountable problems.

If we pollute the air, water and soil that keep us alive and well, and destroy the biodiversity that allows natural systems to function, no amount of money will save us.

The most important question we have to deal with is a combination of population control and the control of our environment - how to utilize the world in as effective a way as we can for the future of mankind.

One great building does not make a great city.

I don't like L.A. It's just not fun. I don't know why, but I just don't get it. You have to drive to get everywhere, and when it rains everybody freaks out.

A sustainable world means working together to create prosperity for all.

If managed well, urbanization can create enormous opportunities: allowing innovation and new ideas to emerge, saving energy, land and natural resources, managing climate and the risk of disasters.

We need to remind ourselves that our ultimate goal is not to reduce greenhouse gases or global warming per se but to improve the quality of life and the environment. We all want to leave the planet in decent shape for our kids. Radically reducing greenhouse gas emissions is not necessarily the best way to achieve that.

If conservationists will attempt to resume responsibility for their need to eat, they will be led back fairly directly to all their previous concerns for the welfare of nature.

In the 21st century, I think the heroes will be the people who will improve the quality of life, fight poverty and introduce more sustainability.

I think it's evident that expensive neighborhoods in Seattle are surrounded by natural beauty. That elevates city life. So if we can make cities more attractive in the long run, we can be smarter about issues like development, zoning and economics.

In the urban areas, we have focused on infrastructure roads, telecommunications, power.

With increasing fervor since the 1980s, sustainability has been the watchword of scientists, environmental activists, and indeed all those concerned about the complex, fragile systems on the sphere we inhabit. It has shaped debates about business, design, and our lifestyles.

As mayor of Anchorage, with 43 percent of the state's population, we have worked on a variety of projects from road projects to renewable energy to a variety of things.

As mayor of San Francisco, I will provide the vision and work hard to make San Francisco a beautiful, well-planned city with excellent housing and transportation options.

We learned that economic growth and environmental protection can and should go hand in hand.

There are real and growing dangers to our simple and most precious possessions: the air we breathe, the water we bring, and the land which sustains us.... If we do not act, the world of the year 2000 will be much less able to sustain life than it is now.

Every time we try to do something to improve the environment someone predicts that it will ruin the economy.

The environment is more than just nature. The environment is peoples needs.

We face the question whether a still higher standard of living is worth its cost in things natural, wild, and free.

Climate change is not just about carbon dioxide levels and melting polar ice caps. It is about our public health and protecting our Earth for future generations.

Just think in terms of green energy and how much time, money, brain power and policy action has started to pour into green energy, and I think that's wonderful. We're going to need that same kind of effort towards global gridlock if we're going to keep the individual mobility that we all take for granted today.

I am generally enthusiastic about cities. Here in the West there is a panic. Every time we have a debate about cities, we talk about the problems of cities.

I don't have a car and have decided never to own one.

Setting San Francisco on a course to sustainability will require all of us to work in concert on a number of ambitious efforts.