Is an eco-town a contradiction?

I am reminded to think about the eco-town subject as councils across Oxfordshire are called to unite in their thinking - see this item on the Oxfordshire County Council website. So here are my concerns:

• No matter how many new houses are built to be eco-friendly this can only make a small dent in the fact that the UK's existing houses are very poor on the eco-scale. Surely we would be seem more serious as a society about Climate Change if we addressed the larger subject rather than be seen to tinker round at the edges.
• An eco-town sounds like a grand idea that has some poor downsides. To me THE primary goal of an eco-town is to reduce travel time to workplaces. That is as a society I feel we should stop building housing estates separate from industrial estates. Instead they should be mixed up. Get the workplace close to the home so we can all bicycle.
• Instead the current eco-town concepts seem to me to focus too much on houses on the fringe of towns and cities necessitating new transport links, thus altogether increasing our combined carbon footprints.

The above observations and thoughts are my own opinions. It may be that these have been considered by planners and taken into account. My guess, though is that both National and Local government does not have the will or resources to address the real problem.