Practical Hope: Transition Town Totnes

This resource is part of a collection called Practical Hope: Inspiration for Community Action.

Reimagining community resilience through everyday actions

About Transition Towns Totnes

Totnes is a small town in Devon. Transition Town Totnes was founded in 2005 in response to concerns about peak oil, climate change, and economic uncertainty. The work of Transition Town Totnes is holistic in nature, ranging from re-imagining the local economy to food growing.

How is Transition Town Totnes making a difference?

Transition Town Totnes is working on many exciting projects across a range of different themes. However, all of its projects are grounded in the ideals of the Transition movement, focusing on making Totnes resilient and allowing the town and the people who live there to flourish. Its projects include:

  1. Totnes Climate Hub: A public space for networking, workshops, education, and inspiration.
  2. Incredible Edible: A community food growing initiative.
  3. REconomy Centre: A co-working space that allows people to connect as well as share skills and knowledge. The aim is to support a regenerative economy that is sustainable and resilient.
  4. Inner Transition: A group that provides volunteers with emotional and holistic support to mitigate climate anxiety and burnout. The project includes space for support, mentoring, and meditation.
  5. Transition Streets: A self-led community project where six to eight households meet in their homes to explore practical actions they can take on a personal/ community level. 

Transition Streets is about being solution-focused and practical. It is about making the benefits feel tangible and the process easy to engage with.

Guy Erlacher-Downing, Coordinator, Transition Town Totnes 

How did they do it?

Transition Town Totnes will celebrate its twentieth anniversary next year. It is a grassroots charity that operates through a small staff team and a wealth of local volunteers. The organisation is funded through various mechanisms, including grants from governments and trusts, crowdfunding, and donations from the local community.

Like many organisations, COVID-19 was a period of change for Transition Town Totnes. There was a shift in personnel as people moved away and reduced attendance at in-person events. However, the pandemic did offer a range of opportunities as local people had more free time, and several of the organisation’s work streams moved online.

Working at the community level bridges a gap between individual action (which is limited) and government action (which is slow) and offers real opportunities to implement practical and solution-based approaches to a range of issues, as demonstrated by the brilliant array of projects being undertaken by Transition Town Totnes.

There are challenges in making these projects happen due to funding, timescales (things take longer than anticipated) and, at times, differing opinions among stakeholders. However, engaging with the local community is critical to making the work of Transition Town Totnes a success. This is done by offering new members easy access/contact points and hosting fun but informative in-person events to get more people involved (e.g., film nights).

People have to see the change you are making happen in the community.

Guy Erlacher-Downing, Coordinator, Transition Town Totnes 

Three things to unlock Transition Town Totnes’ potential.

  1. Access to free room hire to enable more in-person work with the community.
  2. Access to people and organisations that support the promotion of Transition Town Totnes’ work and opportunities to network with other community groups.
  3. Greater local government engagement with community groups on key policies and documents, such as Neighbourhood Plans.

Transition Town Totnes’ advice for new community projects:

  • Look at what else is going on in your community. Find the gaps.
  • Don’t reinvent the wheel.
  • Be strategic! Do what you can with the resources and capacity you have.
  • Set key milestones for the change you are trying to achieve.
  • Celebrate the wins.

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