Episode 20

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Published on:

24th Mar 2026

20. Todd Scott — Detroit Greenways Coalition

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Show notes: https://www.johnfiege.earth/20-todd-scott-detroit-greenways-coalition

20. Todd Scott – Detroit Greenways Coalition

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The ways we live our lives, design our communities, and move around within those communities are all intimately connected to the ecological health of the planet.

Most North American cities are designed around the automobile or at least cars have come to dominate these urban landscapes, far more than in European or Asian cities.

There are few cities in the world more closely associated with the automobile than Detroit, Michigan. Motown.

But the privileging of cars in Motor City, and other cities around the country and around the globe, has had dramatic costs, from polluted air and water and a high number of traffic fatalities, to transportation inequality and high levels of carbon pollution.

The Detroit Greenways Coalition is looking to change all that, right in the heart of the world’s automotive power center. Todd Scott is the executive director of the Detroit Greenways Coalition, and he joins me to discuss how their work promoting greenways throughout the city is improving people’s health and happiness, beautifying a very industrial city, reducing inequality and climate impacts, and a whole host of other benefits, even economic development.

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This is a tale about Detroit, but if this work can happen in Motor City, it can happen anywhere, and Todd’s stories will inspire you to go outside, find some green space and some fresh air, meet your neighbors, and explore wherever it is you live.

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I’m John Fiege, and this is Chrysalis. You can subscribe at johnfiege.earth, where you will also find show notes and all episodes of the podcast, plus my writing, photographs, and films.

Here is Todd Scott.

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Credits

This episode was researched by Lydia Montgomery and edited by Sarah Westrich, with additional editing by Isabella Fleming, Amy Cavanaugh, Arthur Koenig, Kate Fair, and Marta Kondratiuk. Music is by Daniel Rodriguez Vivas. Mixing is by Morgan Honaker.

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About the Podcast

Chrysalis with John Fiege
A newsletter and podcast about transformation in the face of global ecological crisis.
I’m a professor, filmmaker, and storyteller interested in the question of how we can transform ourselves—as individuals, as societies, as an entire species—in ways that allow our planet’s ecological systems to thrive.

I began this work through the study of environmental history and cultural geography. I then became a filmmaker and photographer focused on stories of transformation in the face of ecological peril.

Most recently, I launched the Chrysalis newsletter and podcast to have conversations with a wide variety of environmental thinkers, as well as to share my writing on our relationship with the natural world.

My newsletter, podcast, and photographs are available for free to anyone. By becoming a paid subscriber on johnfiege.earth—what we call a Butterfly Subscriber—you can also stream my films and post on the community comments section of the newsletter. Your support provides essential resources for the newsletter and podcast to grow and remain free and ad-free for everyone.

Humanity has been a very hungry caterpillar, eating everything in sight. Can we now transform into a beautiful butterfly ready to pollinate the flowers, rather than just eat the leaves?

This is the question that animates me—and I believe that digging deeply into the question itself can catalyze transformation.

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John Fiege