One of their latest initiatives is creating a private-public partnership to bring EV's from the coasts into the heartland. The assistant city manager of Normal wrote about the program on the Illinois Sierra Club blog.
The first major victory for the group was the announcement of an agreement with Mitsubishi Motors to become a pilot community for the North American release of their fully electric “i”. As part of this partnership, Mitsubishi has committed 1,000 EVs to the Bloomington-Normal market from 2011-2014. This partnership will ensure that Bloomington-Normal will become an early leader in electric vehicle deployment. The community is already installing charging stations to support the deployment EVs. To date, the Town of Normal has installed 5 public charging stations and by 2011 over 30 charging stations will be located throughout the community.
There's more info on their EVTown website. I'd like to see Springfield become a regional leader in building electric vehicle infrastructure to attract EV fleet vehicles but we're already playing catch-up to Normal. One advantage Springfield has is an environmentally friendly Governor who wants to incorporate more EVs into the state fleet. That provides an opportunity for partnerships the city can build on.
If you really want to dig deep into Normal's other initiatives, check out the 60 page sustainability plan. Or, this presentation with pictures of their downtown development plan is a little easier to digest.
Mayor Chris Koos has spoken at two Sierra Club meetings recently and everyone was inspired by the visionary things happening in Normal.