Category: portland
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Portland City Hall Garden
Portland definitely has a bug for urban agriculture. Wherever you look there are community gardens, victory plots in street rights-of-way, rooftop and balcony planters, and farmer’s markets. The dichotomy of urban living and productive rural ag space is being redefined as more people grow and raise their own food within the City, cutting down on…
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London Bridge, Updated
The idea of habitable or living bridges keeps popping up in proposals, and the idea has a lot of merit in our desire to provide density, connectivity and ultimately, increased livability of urban areas. Another recent proposal uses the old/new idea in London to build a bridge including retail and residential uses and is being…
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Models, Now and Then
Spotted on Places and Spaces, this ‘lifelike’ 3-D model of Portland posted in Digital Urban offers a glimpse into the new wave of modeling, cobbled together from a variety of sources and punctuated by some visual fly-throughs that are quite stunning. This model was created by local firm Newlands & Company (aka NC3D), the cream…
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Host Analog
The insertion of ecological artworks into the urban patterns offers opportunities to confront our relationship in nature in new ways. Additionally, the location in proximity to density and multi-modal traffic (versus, something tucked away in a far-off location) also gives artists a significantly larger audience to express concepts to. One very central piece in Portland…
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From the Archives: Urban Habitat
One of the more interesting urban legends (which happens to be true) is the story of the coyote that decided to hitch a ride on Portland’s MAX light rail – recently reemerged on the Seattle Transit Blog. :: image via Seattle Transit Blog Some more info via the strange Dogs In the News – from…
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Daily Double + A Flurry of Darts
I’m typically not one to focus on my own doings terribly often on the blog – but I had to laugh at the fortune of this press double-play today from my home city of Portland. First, from writer Sam Bennett from the Oregon Daily Journal of Commerce – investigating the potential of the Sustainable Sites…
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Welcome to Portlandia
Is Portland European, or is Europe Portlandian? Hmmmm….
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Urban Roof Farming x2
One of those interesting trends that may be the hot topic of 2009 (and a major topic of conversation in 2008) is the growing of food in cities – particularly on rooftops and buildings. A couple of recent articles present some viable examples of rooftop agriculture used for education and production. The San Francisco Chronicle…
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The Paralytic City
As we spend another day cooped up inside, waiting out what has lovingly been dubbed ‘Arctic Blast’ – the most massive of winter storms – seriously. In a place of the country that has an occasional ice storm, but doesn’t typically have snow stick around for more than a day or two at most –…
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Portland = Ecotopia?
In my third year of undergraduate studies, my Ecology instructor offhandedly mentioned the book Ecotopia by Ernest Callenbach, as something to read if you want to see a potential model of ecological urbanism. While I was toying with my youthful and newly formed consciousness about an ecological ethic, I was both rapt and appalled. Rapt,…