A new link has been added, http://ycycles.wordpress.com.

Facilities & Services has hired Grace Kyung, a Masters of Urban Planning student to work on bicycle sharing for campus during the ‘13-’14 school year. This will be a 25% assistantship, focusing primarily on departmental bike sharing first, and then on bike rentals and a campus-wide bike share program for the general public.  Funding for this GRA position is being provided by Administrative Information Technology Services (AITS).

Position Description:

The Bicycle Sharing Graduate Research Assistant will work with the Campus Bicycle Coordinator under Facilities & Services to research and facilitate new bicycle sharing opportunities for the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. The RA will research bicycle sharing best practices at peer institutions and communities around the United States, and will make recommendations based on this research to follow the existing recommendations of the 2012 Bicycle Sharing Feasibility Study. The RA will be the primary point of contact for departments interested in launching their own departmental bicycle sharing programs for university employees, including a small number of departments who have agreed to pilot such programs in the coming year. The RA will also develop and maintain a Bicycle Sharing Manual and Toolkit to help assist additional interested departments in the future. The RA will conduct research to determine the best solution for bike sharing or rentals for students and visitors on campus, by partnering with a variety of campus units and community agencies. 

-----Original Message-----
From: Johnston, Morgan B
Sent: Tuesday, September 24, 2013 9:56 AM
To: Shin, Faith Donga
Cc: Preston, Jesse L; Dempsey, John Garrett
Subject: RE: [Public Engagement Portal] Psychology and Sustainability

Hello Faith,

I am very sorry for the month-long delay in this response!  It is amazing how quickly time slips away from me at the beginning of the semester.

As I understand it, the interaction of Psychology and environmental initiatives is primarily linked to what I call "behavior change" as it related to sustainability.  We have a lot of control over the built environment on campus, but we do not have direct control over the behavior of the campus users (students, faculty, staff, and visitors). 

There are many projects on campus that could benefit from behavior change and your input.  Essentially, any sustainability initiative where we are encouraging people to behave "better" could use your help.  Would you be interested in focusing on transportation, waste management, energy, clean water, etc, or would you prefer to work with us on the overall campus behavior and attitudes about sustainability?

It would be great to meet with you and Professor Preston.  I would also like to include Jack Dempsey, with the Center for a Sustainable Environment.  Please let me know if you are more interested in a single focus area or the broad sustainability movement for campus.  Then I will help us arrange a meeting.

Thanks a bunch, and I look forward to meeting with you.

Sincerely,

Morgan

-----Original Message-----

From: Faith Shin [mailto:fdshin2@illinois.edu]

Sent: Tuesday, August 27, 2013 2:37 PM

To: Johnston, Morgan B

Subject: [Public Engagement Portal] Psychology and Sustainability

Hello Morgan,

My name is Faith Shin, and I am a graduate student within the Psychology department. We met today during the sustainability coffee discussion, and I would just like to reach out to you in regards to our research. Jesse Preston, my advisor, and some of her graduate students, myself included, are interested in researching how psychology and environmental initiatives can be combined and studied. Since you are the sustainability coordinator on campus, I was wondering if you know of any ways that our lab and your department can work together. Thank you!

Best,

Faith Shin

-----

This message sent using the Public Engagement Portal Contact Page http://engage.illinois.edu/

See attached file.

From: Johnston, Morgan B
Sent: Tuesday, September 24, 2013 9:22 AM
To: Fee, Casey A
Cc: Mueller-Soppart, Marlon Anthony; Jones, Maria
Subject: RE: Expresso Green Team

Hi Casey and Marlon,

How is this going?  Are you having some success?  I added Maria Jones to this email list, since she is the SSC Food and Waste Working Group chair.  The SSC could not allocate funds to Espresso, but there may be other opportunities for collaboration.  Of course, Marlon could bring that up as well.

Thanks!

Morgan

From: Casey Fee [mailto:fee2@illinois.edu]
Sent: Monday, September 09, 2013 8:15 PM
To: Johnston, Morgan B
Subject: Re: Expresso Green Team

Hi Morgan,

Thanks for contacting us, we're currently figuring out logistics and we will be communicating with the haulers you suggested. We just had a meeting with an Expresso Royale employee and we are going to get measurements about how much compost they produce a day, which we want before contacting the haulers. After that, we will definitely be contacting you again. 

Thanks again,

Marlon and Casey

On Mon, Sep 2, 2013 at 7:08 PM, Johnston, Morgan B <mbjohnst@illinois.edu> wrote:

Hi Casey and Marlon,

This is the Espresso at Goodwin and Oregon, right? They have no direct connection to the UI, so it would make sense to give the compost to a local group rather than a campus group. (Also, the SSC recently funded vermicomposting at the Sustainable Student Farm, so they shouldn't need additional compost.)

I think that a community garden could benefit from the compost. They may even be able to host the "compost pile." Here are a few I know of in the community:

http://urbanaillinois.us/posts/2012/08/lierman-neighborhood-community-garden

http://www.urbanaparks.org/facilities/34.html

http://www.cu-garden.com/

http://cufitfamilies.blogspot.com/2010/04/n-first-street-prosperity-garden-cared.html?m=1

http://randolphcommunitygarden.com/

http://prosperitygardens.org/

I grabbed these from a quick web search, and I found more than I expected. Perhaps you could reach out to all of them. If you have trouble hearing back from anyone, let me know and I can make a couple calls. 

Thanks, and best wishes!

Morgan

Sent from my mobile device

On Sep 2, 2013, at 3:44 PM, "Casey Fee" <fee2@illinois.edu> wrote:

Hi Morgan,

During the Friday meet and greet we, Marlon and I, discussed the prospects of getting Expresso to compost. We were wondering if you could put us in contact with people who might be interested in picking up and using the compost. 

Thanks,

Casey and Marlon

--

Casey Fee

University of Illinois | Class of 2015

Chemical Engineering

Illini 4000 Portrait's Director

From: Johnston, Morgan B
Sent: Tuesday, September 24, 2013 9:18 AM
To: Bressler, Jonathan Louis; Pickert, Diane A
Cc: Jones, Maria
Subject: RE: Food Reduction Recommendations

Hi Diane and Jonathan,

Were you able to meet and find a solution for the food waste from Tikkun Chambana?  The Student Sustainability Committee has a new working group chair for Food and Waste.  Her name is Maria Jones, and she is copied here.

Thanks,

Morgan

From: Aubrey, Dawn
Sent: Tuesday, August 27, 2013 1:35 PM
To: Johnston, Morgan B; Bressler, Jonathan Louis
Cc: Webb, Olivia Ashley; Pickert, Diane A
Subject: RE: Food Reduction Recommendations

Good Afternoon, Jonathan:

Please contact Diane Pickert at 244-5800 to schedule a time to discuss food  waste reductions. I will not be available until later next week.

Thank you,

Dawn

Dawn Aubrey, Ph.D., MBA, FMP, CEC, CCA
Associate Director of Housing for Dining Services                                               
University of Illinois
407 Clark Hall
1203 South Fourth Street
Champaign, Illinois 61820
Office Direct: 217-244-2997

From: Johnston, Morgan B
Sent: Tuesday, August 27, 2013 12:08 PM
To: Bressler, Jonathan Louis
Cc: Webb, Olivia Ashley; Aubrey, Dawn
Subject: Re: Food Reduction Recommendations

Hello Jonathan,

Thanks for reaching out. This looks like an important initiative. 

There is a team working on vermicomposting at the Sustainable Student Farm this fall, with funding from the Student Sustainability Committee (SSC). I've copied the SSC contact from last year for that project, Olivia Webb, here. 

I believe she can help you in your efforts. I'd love to be kept informed about what you are doing, so please include me in any meetings you have. We can also reach out to Housing to talk with you about possible strategies. I have copied Dawn Aubrey so she can tell us who to meet with from her team. 

Thanks,

Morgan

Sent from my mobile device

On Aug 27, 2013, at 11:47 AM, "Jonathan Bressler" <bressle1@illinois.edu> wrote:

Dear Morgan Johnston, 

Hello, my name is Jonathan Bressler, and I am the president of Tikkun Chambana, a Jewish environmental RSO.  

We are trying to reduce food waste, as we have many larger scale food events, and was wondering if you could give us some recommedations on what we could do or if we could somehow piggyback onto what Facilities and Management are doing.  I have looked into a few things of the university and found out about the EnviroPure Food Waste Disposal Systems, but these seem very expensive and well beyond our funding capacity,

Thank you,

--
Jonathan Bressler

Natural Resources and Environmental Sciences 2014

College of Agricultural, Consumer, and Environmental Sciences

University of Illinois

Olivia Harris with the Green Observer interviewed Morgan Johnston about the Zero Waste plans for campus.  She had spoken already with Marcus Ricci and Seth Rients.  She was doing a class article, then revising it for the Green Observer.

The University has recently hired a student  and purchased a bicylce from the Campus Bicycle Shop to start a courier bike system. This is to replace vehicle deliveries on campus.    

This semester there are 7 students registered for the LINC UI Bikes Section  and 2 project managers. Their main project involves thinking of innovative and creative ideas for increasing the number of registered bikes on campus. Their goal consists of registering 3,000 bikes by the end of the semester!    

The Bike Program has a new e-mail address to recieve  feedback and any bicycle related questions or comments; bike@illinois.edu.

Amelia Neptune, Campus Bicycle Coordinator, currently recieves these e-mails.  

Warren Lavey met with John Prince and Morgan Johnston to discuss the intentions for this course.  We reviewed the summer conversations with Jordan Williams and Claire Grogan about the Business Instructional Facility and the Occupancy Sensors.  There are a lot of projects that could be identified for this class to consider, and F&S would prefer to suggest projects with existing information and contact people.  Morgan agreed to provide a list by October 21 of potential projects for the class to review.

Rachna Bhatia reached out to the Campus Bicycle Shop Manager, James Roedl to discussion potential collaboration between The Bike Project of Urbana-Champaign and the Action Researcy Illinois.  She noted that their second outreach is the first weekend of November, they have started formulating projects, and she thought this could be a good addition.
 

see file

-Involving the individual colleges for spreading the word to gain student leaders and volunteers, ex: College of Environmental Sciences, Atmospheric Sciences, ACES etc… ?

After gaining their support, I would send a mass e-mail to the admins office and they could forward to students

My name is Max Colon, and I am a Resident Advisor in Allen Hall that works with a sustainability group to try and keep Allen green. Every year, we hold a recycling box drive where our organization hands out cardboard recycling boxes that have been given to us by Housing. I have a attached a photo of one of these boxes for identification purposes. I am wondering if it is possible for you to help me figure out who in Housing should be contacted in order to continue this tradition. Any information you could provide would be greatly appreciated! - Max

We had the boxes over 10 years and we have depleted all supplies last year. Sorry- Vonne Ortiz

Amy Liu spoke with Morgan Johnston at the SSC working group kickoff meeting about reaching out to sororities and fraternities about reducing waste by using reusable water bottles.  Morgan provided Amy with contact info for Michelle Hart in the Student Services Building.  Amy also suggested the catchy phrase "Tap that" to associate their efforts with tap water. Morgan noted that she is still setting up the water fountain tour with the plumbing shop, hopefully for next week.

Today, Paul Foote met with Eva Sweeney and Morgan Johnston to begin the pre-application process for the Lighting Retrofit DCEO grant application.  After submitting a pre-application, the UI grant and contracts office will allow us to request an Anticipation Account.  The anticipation account can be used to fund retrofits directly using the anticipated grant incentives.  This grant has a bonus for work completed by Halloween and a smaller bonus for work completed by Valentine's Day.

Morgan and Sarah had a quick conversation today about the ODMFL project and plants.  Sarah reported that the plants were stored in pots at the Arboretum over the summer, and Kevin is working to move them into planted buffer polinator strips at the Sustainable Student Farm.  Sarah is going to continue to talk with Housing about the Orchard Downs project.