People are used to recycling bottles, cellphones, and cars, so why not whole cities or at least sections of cities?
(1) Cities are very important, and by 2050 75% of the worlds population will be urban dwellers http://www.urban-age.net
(2) Great cities depend on great universities, and universities are often in the top ten employers of regions (top 5 if they have a medical school and hospital attached) http://www.edu-impact.com
(3) The relationship between great cities and great universities is becoming a vital partnership as change accelerates http://www.usucoalition.org/downloads/part4/great_cities_great_universities.pdf
(4) The % of WW GDP by nation and % of top-500-ranked universities are correlated very, very highly http://www.arwu.org/ARWUAnalysis2009.jsp
(5) There is green-tech, city-making industry emerging, and it will require rethinking urban space and property law to better support continuous improvement. Urban sustainability and service innovations will be key, and the next Moore’s Law may be a Moore’s law related to green buildings, and smarter cities (decade scale, but exponential change) – perhaps… http://www.pacebutler.com/blog/making-detroit-bloom-again/
http://www.charleslandry.com/docs/Bk-landry.pd
http://www.urban-age.net/publications/newspapers/istanbul/articles/04_PhilippRode/en_GB/
http://content.usatoday.com/communities/greenhouse/post/2010/06/home-recycling/1
For example, here is a mini-city in the making inside Silicon Valley: http://deliveringthefuture.org/
Part of a climate to prosperity green tech effort http://www.jointventure.org/images/stories/pdf/GreenprintforSiliconValley2409embargoedto22009.pdf