Archive for the ‘ Environment ’ Category
GM has introduced an new Aramis in the form of a two-person Segway with GPS and high-speed wireless. And it will autopilot you to your destination. [ READ MORE ]
(also via Metafilter) Brooklyn’s Gowanus Canal, long nicknamed the “Lavender Lake” for its copious oil slicks, has gained a new title : Superfund Site. New Yorkers respond with really cool photography. While some developers bow out in light of the recent news, other area developers, hoping for a speedy cleanup of the industrial waste and, [ READ MORE ]
Herrick, Feinstein LLP, a law firm I consulted and worked for some years ago and now home to a couple of Columbia UP graduates, has created a blog (Herrick ZONE) with information on NYC land use and environment plans and news. [ READ MORE ]
This page presents an underground desert world for the future Southwest US. Exceptionally good looking. Seems as though the future of the Southwest is to finally just move into the shopping mall. [ READ MORE ]
It won’t come as any surprise to urban planners, but this new book, Green Metropolis, argues that per capita New York City is a “blue ribbon winner” in sustainability. Might serve as a useful introductory book for a class in urban sustainability. [ READ MORE ]
[Straight from Slashdot] “Solar Roadways, a project to replace over 25,000 square miles of road in the US with solar panels you can drive on, just received $100,000 in funding from the Department of Transportation for the first 12ft-by-12ft prototype panel. Each panel consists of three layers: a base layer with data and power cables [ READ MORE ]
I wish they one of these in each subway car here in NYC. [ READ MORE ]
In contrast to DM’s recent caution regarding the use of organicist metaphors for the urban, I came across this article on the biology of cities. The rather interesting original articleemploys two concepts from biology and ecosystems science (economies of scale in size and metabolism and population growth equations) to show three things. First, the physical [ READ MORE ]
David Brooks says (courtesy JP in DC): You may not know it to look at them, but urban planners are human and have dreams. Unfortunately, he goes on to say that planners dreams are not the American dream. [ READ MORE ]
And TOB sends in this article on why we should consider burning our trash rather than burying it. [ READ MORE ]
If you hate Thomas Friedman, you’ll love this…and this. [ READ MORE ]
SG sent a link to this brief piece by Allison Arieff in the NYTimes out to the UP crew. It purports to explore ways in which we can attend to the half-built and increasingly abandoned homes of the suburbs and exurbs. It starts by presenting the success of adaptive reuse of abandoned sites like the [ READ MORE ]
This piece reports on recent research findings by Marc Berman at the University of Michigan. The basic finding is that interacting with nature, including a simple viewing of pictures, enhances memory and attention, since all the distractions in urban environments draw down the reserves of energy we each have to devote to these mental activities. [ READ MORE ]
MWP sends this link, which suggests that Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer is investigating what it would take to build skyscraper farms in Manhattan. Imagine looking out your window and seeing the vegetables you’ll soon be eating for dinner rather than your neighbor eating dinner! [ READ MORE ]
In Detroit. [ READ MORE ]