For Portland, being sustainable is all about making connections.

Roy Koch, provost and vice president for academic affairs at Portland State University, said Portland continues to top lists of sustainable cities because of the “interconnectedness” of its urban planning, mass transit and environmental awareness.

“All these systems working together make Portland a very desirable place to live,” he said.

That appears to be the consensus at The Ethisphere Institute, a New York business ethics and social responsibility think-tank, which named Portland a Top 10 sustainable city. The Institute published the sustainable cities list in its quarterly magazine. The Ethisphere Institute also publishes the World’s Most Ethical Companies rankings.

“Portland consistently tops sustainability and quality of living charts for U.S. and international cities and is an easy pick for U.S.’s mid-sized city winner,” according to the article, which was published Monday. Portland was among 10 mid-sized cities identified as a “global sustainability center.” Others were Victoria; Copenhagen; Helsinki; Oslo; Edinburgh; Doha, Qatar; Reykjavik, Iceland; Wellington, New Zealand; and Rotterdam, Netherlands. The institute did not give each city a ranking. [Read full article]

By Sam Bennett,

DJC Oregon - September 9, 2008