Yule Heibel’s Post Studio © 2003-2008

How to Create a Vibrant Waterfront | Project for Public Spaces (PPS)

Portal page for two additional links, “10 Qualities of a Great Waterfront” and “The 9 most important steps in revitalizing a waterfront.” The main worry for the authors here (”A common challenge is how to revitalize places where the river, lake or sea has been cut off from the rest of town by wide roadways or hulking industrial facilities”) doesn’t apply to Victoria, whose waterfront is *not* cut off by road arterials or industrial areas. But in general terms, there are still some nuggets on the linked-to pages.

tags: project_for_public_spaces, waterfront, urbanplanning, urban_design

CEOs for Cities: Connected Urban Development

Another article that underscores the need for (and uses of) “cross-use” (as defined by Jane Jacobs). The interesting difference/ twist here is that cross-use is created/ nourished through congestion-cutting strategies and transit infrastructure, as well as (get this!) broadband infrastructure (!).

So, interesting pointer: congestion as another barrier to cross-use. Something to think about.

And: think about taking broadband/ digital infrastructure into account when thinking about cross-use vs single-use. How to map the virtual onto the real/ actual? Hmmm….

Note: CEOs for Cities entry has further links.

tags: ceos_for_cities, urban_development, cross_use, cities, jjacobs

Connected Urban Development - Connected Urban Development - Cisco Systems

This is the Cisco site that CEOs for Cities blog post pointed to. It describes the Cisco-funded/ sponsored program, “Connected Urban Development” (CUD), now in several cities around the world.

Question: how does a city get involved with this? From the webpage:
QUOTE
By using network connectivity for communication, collaboration, urban planning, and other activities, CUD will help change the way in which cities do the following:

* Deliver services to residents
* Manage the flow of traffic
* Operate public transportation
* Use and manage real estate resources
UNQUOTE

tags: cisco, urban_design, cross_use, connectedness, infrastructure, ceos_for_cities

Instant Suburb of Prefabs Hits New York

Andrew Blum’s article describes Cellophane House, a 5-storey prefab going up in Manhattan at the corner of 53rd and Sixth.

tags: prefab, wired_magazine, andrew_blum, architecture, nyc

• Cellophane House is five stories tall, with floor-to-ceiling windows, translucent polycarbonate steps embedded with LEDs, and exterior walls made of NextGen SmartWrap, an experimental plastic laminated with photovoltaic cells. Its aluminum frame was cut from off-the-shelf components in Europe, assembled in New Jersey, then snapped together in 16 days on a vacant lot next to the Museum of Modern Art — joining four other full-size houses onsite through October as part of the exhibit Home Delivery: Fabricating the Modern Dwelling. It looks as if a suburban cul-de-sac took a wrong turn at the Holland Tunnel.
• Prefab is “modernism’s oldest dream,” curator Barry Bergdoll says. Since the industrial revolution, architects have been in thrall of the idea that houses could be built in factories, like any kind of widget. But reality hasn’t been extremely cooperative. Whether because of conservative public tastes, unachievable economies of scale, or designers’ less-than-stellar business acumen, their utopian visions have mostly remained fantasies.
• But the strange subdivision next door to the museum suggests that prefab’s time has finally come. The difference now is bits, not bolts. “Digital fabrication has become one of the key flash points for architects thinking about the way things are made,” Bergdoll says as we tour the houses. On an upper floor of Cellophane, two riggers saw a crossbeam amid a flurry of sparks. (It was fabricated too long.) Nearby, a team of MIT students hammer at a cottage made of computer-cut plywood with grooves and joints ready to be fit together like puzzle pieces.

Election ignores cities, panel says (Toronto Star)

Critique of Harper’s Conservative party for being contemptuous of cities and for trying to start a “culture war” of sorts between the salt-of-the-earth rurals vs those decadent urbanites. Sigh.

tags: thestar, toronto, canada, cities, election, stephen_harper, infrastructure_funding, municipal_funding

• Cities must be an issue in the federal election and are being ignored to everybody’s detriment, a panel of urban experts said yesterday at the University of Toronto.
• Canadians risk a damaging polarization between conservative rural voters and liberal urban voters similar to the divide between Republicans and Democrats in the U.S., argued Eric Miller, director of the university’s Cities Centre.

• Richard Florida, director of the Martin Prosperity Institute at U of T’s Rotman School of Management, spoke about dismantling the divisions between urban and rural issues, local and national issues.

  “We need to move across the divide,” Florida said, bemoaning the state of U.S. affairs. He said cities shouldn’t be isolated from other concerns. “It has to be our obligation in urban areas to lead and help … to benefit everyone.”

• During questions, one member of the audience raised the spectre of the Canadian Constitution, which delineates the provinces’ authority over municipalities.

  “The Constitution is an excuse not to do something,” Miller said later, pointing to overlap in areas such as immigration, which is a federal responsibility, yet is an issue for cities, where most immigrants settle.

• Most of the panel, which included environmental philosopher Ingrid Stefanovic, argued that urban issues were inseparable from national issues – from climate change, transportation strategy and the country’s economic health, to immigration and concerns about urban sprawl and the environment.

  Stefanovic, who argued cities and the environment should be viewed as one issue, said: “I think all political parties have to recognize cities are going to be playing an important role – should be playing an important role – in this election.”

WATT: World’s 1st Sustainable Dance Club (SDC)

Page for WATT, Rotterdam’s Sustainable Dance Club. Includes a really cool video (one guy, quoting verbatim, talks about how we’re “leaving the tree hugger age” and moving into a whole new era that embraces innovation etc.). Found via Inhabitat (see http://www.inhabitat.com/2008/10/02/sust…), which includes more images.

tags: dance_club, sustainability, innovation, rotterdam, environment

Creative Providence - Frontpage

Portal page for “Creative Providence,” billed as “a cultural plan for the City” by Providence Mayor David N. Cicilline. Good looking site, friendly UI, easy to navigate. Could/ should be a model for other cities (wish we’d build something like this for Cultural Capital Victoria…).

Note: somewhat mind-blowing - the City of Providence has its own Department of Art, Culture + Tourism… Wow, I guess they take this stuff seriously!

tags: providence, creative_cities, reference

• The cultural plan will explore the current strengths, weaknesses, challenges, and opportunities for the City’s arts, creative, and cultural sector. The focus will be on stimulating economic development, strengthening the creative economy, education, civic engagement, and enhancing the quality of life in the City of Providence. It will better position the City to realize its full potential as a creative center and to deliver on its promise of innovation and change.
• Providence’s cultural planning process and the creation of the plan will be a collaborative effort led by two consulting firms: Craig Dreeszen, a nationally recognized cultural planner, and the staff from Providence-based think tank, New Commons. Dr. Dreeszen will guide the steering committee and produce the formal cultural plan. Robert Leaver, of New Commons, will design and facilitate the public forums - including a conference, online website, and an operating network to guide the development of the plan.
• These consultants will help steer the process but it will take significant community participation to produce a locally responsive cultural plan and create a sustainable and integrated creative community. The City of Providence’s Department of Art, Culture + Tourism wants to cultivate a collective creative community of artists and arts administrators who will lead the future development of our City.

Plant Tweak Could Let Toxic Soil Feed Millions | Wired Science from Wired.com

UC Riverside scientists have a breakthrough that would allow genetic engineering to enable plants to become tolerant of aluminum toxicity. Apparently, much of the world’s potentially arable land has that aluminum toxicity, and therefore can’t be used for food production. Ths would circumvent that problem, and possibly signal a breakthrough into the second wave of a Green Revolution. (The first one has kind of reached its limits.)

tags: wired_magazine, agriculture, bioneering, genetic_engineering, food, crops, paul_larsen

• “Aluminum toxicity is a very limiting factor, especially in developing
  countries, in South America and Africa and Indonesia,” said biochemist Paul Larsen. “It’s not like these
  areas are devoid of plant life, but they’re not crop plants. Among
  agriculturally important plants, there aren’t mechanisms for aluminum
  tolerance.”
• There’s no more room for farms in the developed world; demand for cropland is fueling deforestation in the rain forests of Latin America and Africa; and the limits of the Green Revolution, which increased global food production through the use of pesticides and industrial farming techniques, have been reached. Another revolution, say agronomists, is needed.
• There’s no guarantee that the tweak will prove successful and safe — but if it does, it could provide food for millions.

• “I don’t expect to make any money off it,” he said. “I’d like it to trickle down to the people who need it.

  He does worry that the technique could be used as an excuse to clear
  rain forests from currently aluminum-toxic soil. Instead of this, said
  Larsen, already-cut land could be made more productive.

  “If we can make use of the land that’s available now, maybe we can make
  it so we don’t have to cut forests down in the future,” he said.

How to Create a Vibrant Waterfront | Project for Public Spaces (PPS)

Portal page for two additional links, “10 Qualities of a Great Waterfront” and “The 9 most important steps in revitalizing a waterfront.” The main worry for the authors here (”A common challenge is how to revitalize places where the river, lake or sea has been cut off from the rest of town by wide roadways or hulking industrial facilities”) doesn’t apply to Victoria, whose waterfront is *not* cut off by road arterials or industrial areas. But in general terms, there are still some nuggets on the linked-to pages.

tags: project_for_public_spaces, waterfront, urbanplanning, urban_design

Connected Urban Development - Connected Urban Development - Cisco Systems

This is the Cisco site that CEOs for Cities blog post pointed to (linked to below). It describes the Cisco-funded/ sponsored program, “Connected Urban Development” (CUD), now in several cities around the world.

My question would be: how does a city (say, mine) get involved with this? From the webpage:
QUOTE
By using network connectivity for communication, collaboration, urban planning, and other activities, CUD will help change the way in which cities do the following:

* Deliver services to residents
* Manage the flow of traffic
* Operate public transportation
* Use and manage real estate resources
UNQUOTE

tags: cisco, urban_design, cross_use, connectedness, infrastructure, ceos_for_cities

CEOs for Cities: Connected Urban Development

Another article that underscores the need for (and uses of) “cross-use” (as defined by Jane Jacobs). The interesting difference/ twist here is that cross-use is created/ nourished through congestion-cutting strategies and transit infrastructure, as well as (get this!) broadband infrastructure (!).

So, interesting point to ponder: that congestion is another barrier to cross-use. Something to think about.

And: think about taking broadband/ digital infrastructure into account when thinking about cross-use vs single-use. How to map the virtual onto the real/ actual? Hmmm….

Note: CEOs for Cities entry has further links.

tags: ceos_for_cities, urban_development, cross_use, cities, jjacobs

CityStates: Commentary on an Urban World: Kalokairi Calling: Mama Mia! and ‘Redesigning the American Dream’

Michael Dudley, who only the other day came out with a brilliant analysis of The Dark Knight, now looks at Mama Mia! across a range of feminist texts as well as some urbanist readings. Fascinating stuff, a must-read…

tags: michael_dudley, city_states_blog, movies, popular_culture, feminism, mama_mia!

The end of suburban sprawl - Annotated

Well, well …an opinion piece in the Ottawa Citizen (republished across the CanWest newspaper empire, therefore also in Victoria’s Times-Colonist), unsigned, that lays out the tenets of anti-sprawl and pro-urbanist thinking succinctly and favorably. (Except that while the title calls it “suburban sprawl,” the author calls it “urban sprawl” in the first paragraph. Odd.)

Of interest for a Canadian perspective is that the article hints at the realities of infrastructure funding in Canada.

tags: sprawl, ottawa, urbanism, cities, commentary

You can’t eat Whuffie (but it’s getting harder to eat without it) | ::HorsePigCow:: marketing uncommon - Annotated

Tara Hunt wrote an interesting post on “whuffie” and what it means today. She also then broached the minefield of how (if) the whuffie factor gets monetized. The comments board is fascinating, and I also added my 2cents (actually, more like a $1.25 since I inflated those 2 cents into two too-long comments…).

I’m pretty sure my remarks are way too theoretical and esoteric, but they helped me make some connections and sort out a few things, so even if they’re useless to others, I benefited. Not sure if that has anything to do with whuffie, but there you go…

tags: horsepigcow, tara_hunt, blogs, whuffie, socialtheory, socialcritique, socialnetworks, comments

PDF: The Entrepreneurial Advantage of World Cities

31-page PDF (still to read), “The Entrepreneurial Advantage of World Cities,” subtitled “Evidence from Global Entrepreneurship Monitor Data.”

From the abstract:
QUOTE
Recent discussions in the Economic Geography literature increasingly focus on creative cities and the importance of creativity for achieving economic growth. Considering the increased attention on urban areas it is not surprising that the regional dimension of entrepreneurship is a subject of great interest. We set out a framework encompassing the individual process between entrepreneurial perceptions and entrepreneurial activity and demonstrate how the urban environment can have an impact on this process.
UNQUOTE

tags: cities, data, entrepreneurship, reference

How Buildings Learn | PSFK - Trends, Ideas & Inspiration

PSFK’s Piers Fawkes writes an entry that provides the links (now available on Google Video) to the BBC series, “How Buildings Learn,” by Stewart Brand. In addition to the six parts (each ~30 min. long), Fawkes includes some choice quotes.

For those who know and appreciated Stewart Brand’s book, this series is a great addition.

tags: psfk, piers_fawkes, architecture, stewart_brand, buildings, television, bbc

Be Nice to the ‘Creative Class’! :: Views :: thetyee.ca

Why does one too often get the impression that publications like The Tyee are fighting a rear-guard and even anachronistic battle? That somehow, somewhere different patterns are emerging, which its journalists just don’t see, preferring instead the familiar world of what they knew “back in the day”?

tags: thetyee, richard_florida, creative_class, vancouver, socialcritique

Lobdell’s OC: 42 things I know

William Lobdell’s entry about leavng the Los Angeles Times after 18 years of working there, and his list of 42 things he knows re the newspaper industry (and its moribund state).

tags: william_lobdell, newspapers

What’s really killing newspapers: They’re no longer the best providers of social currency. - By Jack Shafer - Slate Magazine - Annotated

Shafer’s subtitle says it all, “[Newspapers are] no longer the best providers of social currency.” What’s “social currency”? It’s “the information we acquire and then trade—or give away—to start, maintain, and nurture relationships with our fellow humans.”

In other words, it’s no longer relevant to your interaction with friends and co-workers and other citizens whether or not you’ve all read the same newspaper that morning. There is other social currency that’s more valuable, more interesting, more useful — as currency.

In that sense, the “news” is secondary to “currency” / “value.” It seems that newspapers need to figure out — if they can, if it’s possible — how to leverage currency, not news.

tags: jack_shafer, slate_magazine, newspapers, media

Technology Review: 3-D Printing for the Masses

From p.2 of this article:
QUOTE
“Ultimately, I think people will have these [3-D rapid prototyping] printers at home,” says Lipson. The idea is that people will pay a nominal amount for blueprints and then download them, in much the same way that music is shared over the Internet now, he says.
UNQUOTE

Exciting, especially in relation to Larry Lessig’s REMIX ideas — see his TED presentation, 11/07, where he talks about culture getting the creative remix treatment. Having RPT technology enter the home-use market means manufacturing will get that same treatment. Interesting days ahead…

tags: mit_techreview, rapid_prototyping, 3-d_modeling, 3-d_printing, remix_culture, shapeways

Pattern Recognition: Latest Trends (July 08) | PSFK - Trends, Ideas & Inspiration

PSFK’s round-up of trends (recent, 2008). Top of the heap in the list: lists, aka data (how to sort, how to represent, how to use); next, urbanism (varieties).

tags: psfk, trends, 2008

San Francisco & Entrepeneurialism | Marktd

I watched this video a couple of days ago (via PSFK’s Twitter feed), and loved the emphases brought to light by the interviews.

- Entrepreneurs liked the density of the city — the ability to encounter colleagues by chance, run into folks, rub shoulders;
- Some talked about liking the “small” aspects of San Francisco: that there isn’t *so* much going on to distract one’s attention from the tasks (work) at hand

I thought that latter point was kind of intriguing, something to remember when someone once again goes off on how it’s such a bad thing that *this* isn’t as happening a place as NYC or Toronto.

tags: entrepeneurialism, psfk, cities, san_francisco, socialnetworks

Protein® Feed | Could Globalization Be Going In Reverse? - Annotated

“The world is flat” or “the world is spiky” or …”the world is complex,” maybe? At any rate, this article questions the idea that outsourcing will continue to continue, spreading outward in some sort of new and flattened topography (akin to a downward spiral insofar as the search for ever cheaper labor and laxer labor laws continues, but not wholly downward because economically, there’s an upward trend associated with it, too - hence perhaps the “flat” topography). And it presents some interesting data as well as suppposition for why this might be so. It’s not just the huge up-tick in transportation costs (although that’s a key factor), it’s also the logistics — including “reverse logistics.” For example, consumers *want* to do better, and are becoming more aware of the “carbon footprint” of the products they buy.

tags: globalization, trends, economic_development, manufacturing, transportation, factories, shipping

“Trading Places” by Alan Ehrenhalt (The New Republic)

Interesting article (which incidentally puts Vancouver front & centre), blogged by Richard Florida at Creative Class: the subtitle is “the demographic inversion of the American city.” It’s about how the “inner city” and its “inner city suburbs” are now desirable (and expensive) places to live, creating a 24/7 downtown (desired & theorized early on by Jane Jacobs, eg.), while the less affluent (ok, the poor!) are forced to live on the outskirts (suburbs). This used to be called “gentrification,” but Ehrenhalt points out that it’s a much more complex process than just that.

Haven’t read all the comments to this article, but it starts with some excellent ones — intelligent observations by readers.

tags: cities, downtown, creative_cities, suburbs, gentrification, trends, urbanization, urban_renewal, demographics

Night Life Reprogrammed - NYTimes.com - Annotated

Everything is more intense in NYC, including the geek or nerd “party” scene (meet ups, tweet ups, “ignite” events, etc.). More people = more capital, in terms of creative energy and innovation. (And perhaps headaches… but that’s another story…!)

Of course I’d love to figure out how to sustain a mini-version of this right here (Victoria). Vancouver works very hard at it — but even in Vancouver (I’m told), it’s the same people reappearing at the different events (i.e., nowhere near the critical mass of larger US metros). Part of the problem is enticing people to come out — it’s so easy to stay home, after all…

tags: nyt, creative_class, geek, socialtheory, ignite, meet_ups

Emotional Architecture - Using Psychological Profiles to Design Houses - NYTimes.com

At some level — perhaps because this article is about residential architecture in what looks to my eyes like an 80s “Dallas” (TV show) model (i.e., very expensive custom McMansions — emphasis on “custom” and “expensive”) — the article gives me a “yuck” reflex. At the same time, there are some links and points I need to take a closer look at, and try to think about this in terms of urban design vs. in terms of very privileged people having shrink sessions with architects by commanding super-sized SFHs.

tags: nyt, architecture, residential

RConversation: Silicon Valley’s benevolent dictatorship

I posted this to my Facebook “notes” already, but it’s such a great piece it needs to go on Diigo and the blog, too.

A must-read, especially for “the rest of us,” analysis and commentary from Rebecca MacKinnon on what it was like at the July 08 FutureBrainstorm Tech conference at Half Moon Bay in California…

Among the things MacKinnon discusses, there’s the question of what might happen to internet freedoms in some (engineered or actual) post i-9/11 “event”.

And of course there’s the matter of “benevolent dictators,” which her title already alludes to. The “benevolent dictators are the guys currently running the major internet apps / venues. Reading MacKinnon’s article, I was reminded of early “cradle to grave” type paternalistic capitalists — for example, the people who ran Beverly, Mass.’s United Shoe Machinery Corporation, the first-ever company named in anti-trust suits way back in the very early years of the 20th (!!) century. Notably, not all mid- to late-19th and early-20th century capitalists fit the bill of the caricatured “Robber Baron” — some were “benevolent.” (Or paternalistic.) But when push came to shove, it didn’t last.

Neither will this model?

tags: rebecca_mackinnon, web_2.0, capitalism, business, democracy, socialcritique

Watch This: This Dude is Pissed About Sign Design (Hell Yeah Bitch!.com)

H/t @Frymaster on twitter who pointed to this: brief (3+ minute) video clip of a guy describing his purchase on eBay of an old 50s style motel sign, and his outrage (and sadness for the state of our visual / signage world) when he learns what low quality crap will replace the old sign. He is SO right…

tags: design, signage, visual_pollution

The Bellows » NIMBYism - Annotated

Ryan Avent argues a perspective against NIMBYism here, which never occurred to me before: that “the biggest problem with public involvement and development is that some of the biggest beneficiaries of new development have no seat at the table–those who’ll be living at to-be-constructed residences. Even if you bring all neighborhood stakeholders in, educate them, and get their opinion (eliminating squeaky wheel bias), you’re still not getting the views of all interested parties.” He continues as follows:

“However the planning process addresses public participation, policy should begin with a pro-density bias to reflect that fact that other things equal, developments will always be less dense than is socially optimal. That’s because the people who would like to be residents of an area but aren’t benefit from development but have no political say in the matter.”

Got that? In ciites, you should plan for optimal density (because that’s ecologically efficient, too), but the NIMBYs will argue against density, and they will make those who want to move into the neighbourhood pay the additional cost of keeping density *below* optimal levels. As Avent puts it, “we need to determine whether the burden is on current homeowners to pay for the right to exclude additional residents, or if the burden is on non-residents to pay for the right to live there. Current policy is de facto the latter.”

tags: nimbyism, urban_development, density, affordability, the_bellows, ryan_avent