USA TODAY article - Slow City Movement

[JNA]

Sam's Law Warning.

HEADLINE: Va. town on Slow City pace before movement began
Ideology nurtured in Europe urges communities left behind by globalization to keep themselves small and use their strengths to sustain their economies

HIGHLIGHT:

The idea applies in particular to cities bypassed by globalization. Rather than rely on age-old ways to spur the economy — more development and tax breaks for businesses that create jobs — towns are encouraged to stay small and play on their cultural and environmental strengths. Try to create a sustainable community that contributes to social equity and protects the environment. Nurture local arts and history and the purveyors of locally grown foods. Appeal to a harried society's need to slow down and smell the roses rather than car exhaust.

Slow City is an offshoot of the Slow Food movement that flourished when McDonald's moved to one of Rome's historic piazzas in 1989. It pushed people to counter fast food by rediscovering the flavors of regional cooking and the joys of leisurely meals.

Città Lente started when mayors of four small Italian towns — Greve-in-Chianti, Bra, Orvieto and Positano — drafted a charter that contains 55 pledges, including closing some streets to traffic and banning supermarket chains and neon signs. Cities of fewer than 50,000 people can join. Almost 80 cities in Italy, Germany, Switzerland, England, Norway, Brazil, Japan, Greece and Croatia have become members.

None is in the USA.

From Urban Dictionary - citta slow

Walmart and MacDonalds hate the Citta Slow movement and hope it will never see the day of light in America.

[michaelskis]

I think that it is fascinating and would be welcomed by the residents of many small towns.

My only concern is the ability to adequately create and enforce regulations to prevent these types of developments from occurring?