Category: transportation
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Picturing Smart Growth
A recent email from Kaid Benfield, fellow blogger and Director of Smart Growth for the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) alerted me to an interesting visual tool they had recently unveiled, called Picturing Smart Growth” A short overview: “With generous assistance from our friends at Urban Advantage, NRDC has created a map of the United…
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To Infinity and Beyond
A concept of landscape architecture and site design involves the acknowledgement of desire paths, those etched remnants of the accumulation of thousands of footsteps over a particular planted area. While often this idea is used to determine the future location of pathways – there are millions of urban ‘desire paths’ that are created by the…
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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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The Detroit Dilemma
As mentioned previously, I spent an intensive three-day long whirlwind charrette in Detroit, Michigan as part of on interdisciplinary team for the Sustainable Design Assessment Team (SDAT) program as part of the AIAs Communities by Design Program. This was my first SDAT experience, as well as my first visit to Detroit (short of passing through…
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Platform to Nowhere
There’s something amazingly simple and death-defying about the detailing of this project by Todd Saunders & Tommie Wilhelmsen in a picturesque location in Aurland, Norway. Some text via Arch Daily: “The landscape is so fantastic that it is difficult to improve the place, but at the same time very easy to destroy the atmosphere by…
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Mind the GAP
The GAP in this case being the Grand Army Plaza, the forecourt space to the north of Brooklyn’s Prospect Park, and one of those woefully inadequate urban spaces that perhaps was grandiose at one time – but due to current pressure has become inaccessible and dangerous. :: image via Grand Army Plaza Coalition Or in…
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World Veg.itecture from Land8Lounge
One of the great things about the network of professionals and students that are members of Land8Lounge is the ability to cast a wide, international net for specific information. Case in point, an ongoing discussion on World Examples of Veg.itecture to go along with the group of the similar name – which is my way…
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Reading List: Materials for Sustainable Sites
It’s rare to find a must-read book for the profession of landscape architecture. This is not to say that there aren’t a bunch of amazing books to highlight a diversity of works – including projects, theories, styles and interests. It is, however, rather uncommon for the topical nature of a text to be able to…
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West Side Stories
Competitions allow some interesting opportunities. One is the ability for firms to shape up against one another in at least an equitable showdown. Another is that it gives some opportunity for firms to either experiment graphically or flex their artistic muscle. :: Hargreaves Design featuring curled overpass – image via New York Post In a…
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Ecotopia Revisited
Another semi-pointless ranking of US cities names Portland greenest amongst the uber green… which begs the real question… why are there no North Dakota cities in these rankings ever? :: image via TreehuggerThe verdict: “If you live in Portland, you might want to think twice before complaining about the 40-plus inches of rain dumped on…