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An experimental apartment block in Hamburg heated by a skin of algae.
Archive for the ‘Built Environment’ Category
March 26th, 2013
Category: Biofuels, Built Environment, Climate change, Energy and Environment, Germany, Woolgathering
March 23rd, 2012
Category: Built Environment, Energy and Environment, Policy Analysis, Technology and Society, Urbanism
Last fall the Economist had a short feature on traffic circles that I only noticed today. I was about to riff on how wonderful they are, and how underused in most of the US, but I’m already walking back the post I had in mind. For drivers, and people who breathe air, they are pretty [...]
March 21st, 2012
Some comments on an earlier post suggest this would be useful to set out. Heating The energy required to keep your house warm in heating season is exactly the energy lost through the exterior walls, windows, doors, roof, and up the chimney if you have one. Period. First lesson: cut that loss. Weatherstrip, get storm [...]
October 30th, 2011
Category: Built Environment, Human rights, Immigration, Personal moment, public health, Unions and organizing
125 years old, still young and still hot. I love her. I love where she stands, I love her crown of radiant wisdom and her torch and her book of laws, I love Miss Lazarus’ poem, I love that she’s an excellent sculpture on her own terms. I love that you can buy bronze paperweights [...]
October 17th, 2011
A listserv that several RBCers belong to has had a discussion about why the ancient meme that cities are evil, unAmerican congregations of overeducated snobs, while folks in small towns are decent, commonsense types who look out for each other and embody real virtue, persists. To the point that no candidate for office boasts about [...]
August 26th, 2011
Category: Arts and Cultural Policy, Built Environment, Health Care, Higher education, Illinois, Law Notes, NonProfits, Supreme Court, Taxation, Urban policy
When Harold Pollack wrote about the recent Illinois Department of Revenue decision to withdraw property tax exemptions from three hospitals, he naturally focused on the impact of the decision on health care. But those of us who work in other areas of the nonprofit sector are worried by the decision as well–or, if we aren’t, [...]
May 29th, 2011
Category: Britain, Built Environment, Energy and Environment, Europe, Infrastructure, Technology and Society
A gallery of designer pylons and a British government pylon competition.
May 9th, 2011
The paper SF Chronicle has a front-page story about the crisis of deferred maintenance at California’s state universities. [update 11/V; here's the link] Things are as bad as you think. Dangerous things like leaks into electrical cabinets, power outages, a blackboard that fell off the wall and injured a grad student last fall; “broken windows” [...]
April 28th, 2011
Category: Built Environment, Energy and Environment, Infrastructure, Republican Party, Transportation, Watching Conservatives
The New York Times reports this morning: The Christie administration, lenders and a new developer have reached a deal to revive the vast Xanadu entertainment and retail complex, which sits forlorn and unfinished along a stretch of New Jersey highway after having burned through two owners and $1.9 billion, people involved in the negotiations said [...]