The city of Melbourne assigned trees email addresses so citizens could report problems. Instead, people wrote thousands of love letters to their favorite trees. — theatlantic.com

“What is it that you can do in a pavilion that you can’t do in a building? Buildings – you don’t want them to move. How can we get this structure to respond in a very subtle way to the weather and perhaps amplify the sound of the wind moving through it?” — theguardian.com

The 40-storey building at 888 Collins Street, in Victoria Harbour, will interpret real-time weather data from the Bureau of Meteorology and will transmit the next day's forecast every half-hour. However, rather than showing the weather report in numbers and with a temperature display [lighting designer] Canadian-born Bruce Ramus said it would be more of an abstract representation and reflection of the environment of Docklands. — Domain

Conceived as a kind of southern hemisphere Serpentine Pavilion, the MPavilion has just opened its first work, a 12×12 meter kinetic box by the local architect Sean Godsell. Using the typically restrained massing of his homes as a template Godsell has then animated the space with a fully louvered skin. The pavilion is placed in the 18th century Queen Victoria Garden with Melbourne’s high rises serving as a backdrop. — eVolo

Melbourne is now a more expensive place to live than New York. The increasing cost of living, and in particular, the cost of housing risks seriously undermining the city’s liveability.

Plan Melbourne, the new metropolitan strategy for the city, recognises that housing affordability is one of the pressing issues facing Melburnians. The strategy offers a set of concepts aimed at shaping the city’s future and – the government hopes – addressing housing affordability and choice. — thisbigcity.net

The Economic Intelligence Unit (EIU) claims its annual Liveability Survey could be used to "assign a hardship allowance as part of expatriate relocation packages," among other things.

But that needn't apply to those in Melbourne, which for the fourth year running has been declared the best city in the world to live.

The Australian culture hub was buoyed by superlative healthcare, infrastructure and education as well as a murder rate of 3.1 per 100,000 people, half the global average of 6.2. — cnn.com

The Jury of Melbourne's Flinders Street Station competition was unanimous in the highly anticipated selection of the final winner: the beautiful vaulted roof-scape designed by Australian/Swiss team HASSELL + Herzog & de Meuron with London-based Purcell as heritage consultants. The entry by Eduardo Velasquez, Manuel Pineda and Santiago Medina was announced as Winner of the People's Choice Award. — bustler.net

The public is invited to vote for their favorite entry from a field of six finalists in the Flinders Street Station Design Competition, an international, high-profile architectural competition to rejuvenate and restore the historic Flinders Street Station in Melbourne, Australia. The shortlist sports some big names, including Pritzker Prize winners Zaha Hadid and the team of Jaques Herzog and Pierre de Meuron. — bustler.net

The City of Melbourne has been certified carbon neutral, an important step toward its goal of becoming one of the world’s most sustainable cities.

In a carbon constrained economy, councillor Arron Wood said the certification by Low Carbon Australia against the National Carbon Offset Standard (NCOS) “was a solid demonstration of the City of Melbourne’s commitment to a more sustainable Melbourne.” — DesignBuild Source