Transport Hero Camp is a collaborative, self-organizing open session that will be taking place on Sunday, August 24th as part of CUTA's 2008 Youth Summit on Urban Transportation. The goals of this open session are:

• to let the delegates lead the talking and thinking for the 3-hour session, in order to interact with each other in a space (both more and less formally than in other parts of the Summit);
• to get them talking to members of the community in Vancouver who have differing types and amounts of experience with urban transportation-related issues.

This session will be held using a hybrid of Open Space meeting and collaboration methods, and some elements of BarCamp technology unconferences. The name is a play on several things:

• The event is modeled most closely on Transit Camps, which have taken place in Vancouver, Toronto and the Bay Area (next one there is September 13)
• The event also hat-tips Hero Camp, an event that will be taking place in Houston, Texas in October 2008

How it all goes down

This 3-hour block is self-organizing. That means: no predetermined presentations, no keynote speakers or people talking to everyone about what they're experts in. Instead, this event is about acknowledging that everyone in the room is an expert at something, and that this expertise is helpful and valuable to someone else in the room. Our mission: to get you having the conversations you need to have to move you forward in your learning.

For those of you who have been to a Transit Camp before, we'll be doing this a little differently: instead of the usual that thing with sticky notes on the wall to organize an agenda for the day, here's how we're thinking things will happen:

1. The facilitators describe the rules and the topics, then get out of the way.
2. People are invited to come up and describe their ideas. They will still be asked to give their session a title. Once they are done speaking, they will break off immediately into a group to start having their discussion.
3. This continues until everyone is in a discussion, and everyone has a chance to say what they are passionate about.

We'll do this in two hour-long blocks with a break in between, giving those who are enjoying the conversations they are already in the chance to continue them. Finally, we'll end with a 15-minute wrap up, for people to share what they have learned.

Rules of Open Space

1. Whoever comes are the right people.
2. Whatever happens is the only thing that could have.
3. Whenever it starts is the right time.
4. When it's over, it's over.

The Law of Two Feet

"...Take responsibility for what you love. This happens by standing up for what you believe. If you feel you are neither contributing nor learning where you are, use your two feet and go somewhere else. The only person responsible for your experience is you." (The Change Handbook. 2007. Holman, Devane and Cady.)

A Recipe for Transit Hero Camp

Ingredients:

• CUTA's Youth Summit delegates
• participants of Vancouver Transit Camp and people they choose to invite
• those who applied to be delegates from British Columbia
• one room with chairs
• tools for capturing, recording and expressing creativity

Recipe:

1. Go over the rules. Seed with wonder, confidence, curiosity and joy.
2. Throw out ideas. Mix until like-minded clusters form.
3. Bake at medium to high intensity for one hour.
4. Let sit to cool for 15 minutes. Repeat steps 2 and 3.
5. Remove from oven. Let reflect for 15 minutes.

Yields innumerable servings of life-changing inspiration, contacts and learning.