About Possible Bound Brook — It All Starts Right Here

Possible Bound Brook is an experiment in community regeneration.

It is a community-based and -inspired imagining of a possible future for the town. It is also practical — a collaborative and co-creative conversation about making things happen. Its outcome is not a pre-defined plan or vision, but arises within the dialog that we are having with residents and community leaders — and, right now, with you. It’s where we get down to earth.

Because as far as sustainability is concerned, local is where the rubber meets the road. We’ve chosen to engage with Bound Brook, the oldest community in Somerset County, as a starting-point for re-conceiving community in the 21st century: as self-generating, evolving, and resilient in the face of disruptive change.

Bound Brook, by proclamation, is ground zero in the Race to Zero Carbon. Bound Brook and South Bound Brook were the first towns to sign on to this challenge, and Possible Bound Brook is in part our response to this aspiration. It’s a call to examine our carbon footprint [1][2], and develop win-win-win solutions: solutions for People, Place, and Planet.

It’s a community with a remarkable set of opportunities, which also have their challenges. Some locals have told us that political divisions, personality conflicts, and favoritism have created problems in the past. What’s important is to recognize that community includes, and overrides, these concerns. Successful solutions are successful despite past setbacks and inaction. The future, both locally and globally, is ours to create.

Think of this site as a conversation, a conversation for possibility, a conversation for what’s actually possible, and for what’s wanted and needed. In a sense, this is what community is — it’s actually what we say it is, how we construct its story, and what we have to contribute to it.

—Team Possible Bound Brook, Updated July 2017

[1] Municipal Carbon Footprint
[1a] Step by step instructions

[2] Community Carbon Footprint
[2a] Step by step instructions