For decades, L.A.'s skyscrapers have had a decidedly boxy style because of requirements that they have emergency helicopter landing pads on top. That code was changed last year, and some architecture buffs hope to see more creative designs in the future.
The Times long has taken the measure of the Los Angeles skyline, as seen from the observation deck of City Hall. Here's how it has evolved
— latimes.com
Related: The daring men building LA's New Wilshire Grand tower View full entry
The Federal Highway Administration has very quietly acknowledged that the driving boom is over. [...]
the agency’s more recent forecast finally recognizes that the protracted post-World War II era has given way to a different paradigm.
The new vision of the future suggests that driving per capita will essentially remain flat in the future. The benchmark is important because excessively high estimates of future driving volume get used to justify wasteful spending on new and wider highways.
— usa.streetsblog.org
If there’s anything positive to emerge from the current mess, it’s that local advocates like Cary Moon, who warned against building the tunnel in the first place, are commanding attention again. Moon recently took to the pages of the local alt-weekly, the Stranger, to argue that in light of the tunnel project’s spectacular, slow-motion meltdown, the city should explore other options. — streetsblog.org
Previously: In Seattle, a Sinking Feeling About a Troubled Tunnel View full entry
California's bullet-train agency will officially start construction in Fresno this week on the first 29-mile segment of the system, a symbol of the significant progress the $68-billion project has made against persistent political and legal opposition. [...]
But the milestone marked by Tuesday's groundbreaking ceremony also will serve as a reminder of the enormous financial, technical and political risks still faced by the Los Angeles-to-San Francisco project.
— latimes.com
The subterranean settlement was discovered in the Nevşehir province of Turkey’s Central Anatolia region, in the historical area of Cappadocia. [...]
the site, located around the Nevşehir hill fort near the city of Kayseri, appears to dwarf all other finds to date. [...]
The agency has already spent 90 million Turkish liras (£25m) on the development project, but the organisation’s head said he did not see the money spent as a loss due to the magnitude of the historical discovery.
— independent.co.uk
Day-to-day life [in Singapore] is famously governed by a series of rules that maintain this clean, well-ordered city. The import of chewing gum is banned, therefore globs of the stuff aren’t found on the street. There are fines for irritating people with a musical instrument or your own drunkenness... The result is a low-crime, scrupulously run city – with none of the incomprehensible, exciting chaos of cities found in neighbouring Indonesia or Malaysia. — the Guardian
[NYC] neighborhoods with the best access to transit, usually in Manhattan...also have the highest median household income, and the lowest unemployment rate...
Neighborhoods with the worst access to transit (South Staten Island) had lower median incomes... and slightly lower unemployment rates...The neighborhoods with limited access to public transit, like the Flatlands in Brooklyn, fare the worst: their unemployment rate is nearly 12%, and their median household income is around $46,000.
— Gothamist
That or the subway was designed around, and continues to serve, historically-affluent communities...The study was conducted by NYU's Rudin Center for Transportation Policy and Management. View full entry
By switching off the floodlighting we want to make those on the march stop and think. It is a challenge: consider who you are marching alongside. — theguardian
Cologne cathedral to switch off lights in protest at anti-Muslim march.Two strong reads are possible, one with the actual intent of the official response to racist march to show church's disapproval, the other is more involuntary, perhaps recalling the core of the situation as the idea of crusades... View full entry
At the heart of the plan will be the idea that downtown Yangon should retain its vibrancy rather than become another sanitized zone that appeals to well-to-do tourists impressed by expensive hotels and tony cafes, Mr. Thant Myint-U said — NYT
Jane Perlez reports in from the old colonial capital, where groups like Yangon Heritage Trust are working to preserve the distinctive charm of a now crumbling, British ostentation. Previously noted by Alexander Walter; here, here and here View full entry
Technofuturism:Aftershock #4: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Neuroscientific Architecture Research: Bringing the brain into evidence-based design, one EEG-measured dérive at a time. Reporting from the Academy of Neuroscience for Architecture's conference in San Diego, California.Working... View full entry
NYC has been the focal point for recurrent demonstrations over the last couple of weeks, with large, long marches, die-ins and rallies. This is not surprising, since NYC is the most populous city in the country. But even more than that, the urban environment — dense, centralized, vertical, walkable — creates spaces that are conducive for these protests to pick up steam. The existence of public spaces, such as Union Square and Washington Square Park, function as easily accessible rallying points. — america.aljazeera.com
The smart city is, to many urban thinkers, just a buzzphrase that has outlived its usefulness: ‘the wrong idea pitched in the wrong way to the wrong people’. So why did that happen – and what’s coming in its place? — theguardian.com
Let's admit it, we architects much too often get lost in narcissistic own-horn-tooting, passionate ego-inflating, disillusioned navel-gazing, vile shit-flinging or simply in the mundane day-to-day operations for the paying clientele. But all is not completely lost thanks to the tireless work and... View full entry
Paul Keskeys examined the the state of residential development across The Pond, and asks the question: How can we rock the status quo? Therein he diagnoses the root cause "They will tell a tale of mass production, of value engineering, and of misguided nostalgia...It is economic pragmatism gone... View full entry
Mt. Prospect Avenue in Newark has New Jersey’s first protected bike lane, as far as we know. But unfortunately it looks like the Garden State will soon be back to zero.
Andrew Besold at WalkBikeJersey is reporting Mayor Ras Baraka has ordered the removal of the bike lane, and in the meantime is allowing people to park in it.
— streetsblog.net
