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Monthly archive for May, 2009
LaHood Looks For Rail World Answers In Spain
Friday, May 29th, 2009
[SButtonZ button="digg"] Ray LaHood is over in Spain, snooping around their high speed train system for ideas. Today he took a jaunt on the AVE from Madrid to Zaragosa and then hung around in a railway control center with the Read more ›
Virginia DOT’s Demolition Porn Vid
Friday, May 29th, 2009
[SButtonZ button="digg"] What’s funny about this compilation of bridges getting blowed up to opera music is that is it seems to be an official government production. Having a bureaucratic logo attached to this kind of gleeful id — how often Read more ›
The Daily Dig – High Speed Rail Edition
Friday, May 29th, 2009
[SButtonZ button="digg"] The global rail equipment market will be worth $150 billion by 2015, and European companies like Seimens are salivating. But, of course, there’s no reason to think about that here. Cuz Amewica don’t know how make twains Read more ›
Highway Engineer Pranks
Thursday, May 28th, 2009
We’ve been deeply into highway interchanges here recently — immersed in the task of identifying double trumpets and whirlpools and many other specimens in satellite photos. After seeing our pieces on the subject, a tipster sent us these more whimsical Read more ›
The World’s 5 Most Ambitious Megaprojects
Thursday, May 28th, 2009
[SButtonZ button="digg"] Megaprojects are the multi-billion dollar infrastructural undertakings that, when completed, play a major role in organizing our daily lives. They serve as vital conduits for the movement of our cars, trains, and water; they transport the gas later Read more ›
The Daily Dig
Thursday, May 28th, 2009
Bogota’s former mayor discusses his city’s highly successful bus rapid transit system. But don’t call it a bus–it’s “Transmilenio” because the name makes it sexy. (WNYC) NYC Transit didn’t bother to fix trip-and-fall hazards on the edge of subway platforms, Read more ›
Now That We All Agree White Roofs Are A Great Idea–Let’s Use Stimulus Money To Make It Happen!
Wednesday, May 27th, 2009
[SButtonZ button="digg"] Is the Great Whitening about to begin? As you may have read about here, a recent scientific paper has suggested that lightening roofs and paved areas in urban areas around the globe would have such a strong cooling Read more ›
MIT Unveils Fancy ‘iPhone-like’ Bus Stop
Wednesday, May 27th, 2009
[SButtonZ button="digg"] The punsters at the SENSEable City design lab up in Cambridge have named their smarter-than-you’ll-ever be interactive bus shelter the “EyeStop” (nudge, nudge). The sleek structure allows you to do the sort of exciting and useful things you Read more ›
Does Mysterious Math Law Really Predict The Size Of Our Cities?
Wednesday, May 27th, 2009
[SButtonZ button="digg"] Last week, over at the Gray Lady’s house, there was a story about something called Zipf’s Law, which supposedly predicts the relative populations of our cities. It’s named after a fellow named George Zipf who several decades ago Read more ›
The Daily Dig
Wednesday, May 27th, 2009
- If we want to remain a great nation and to address the frightening prospects of ongoing job losses, infrastructure investment is the place to start, says Bob Herbert. A bill before Congress creating a national infrastructure bank is a Read more ›
New Hope For Detroit’s Endangered Train Station
Tuesday, May 26th, 2009
[SButtonZ button="digg"] A group of state legislators is urging that stunning Michigan Central train station be left standing, instead of being dynamited as the Detroit city council ordered last month. The historic depot, an encore project from the team of Read more ›
Day One For NYC’s New Broadway: Wackiness, Laziness, Anger, And Sam Champion
Tuesday, May 26th, 2009
America’s most famous street is now closed to cars right at the spot where it enters America’s most famous urban plaza. That’s right, Broadway in Times Square now belongs to pedestrians. To see how New York City’s newest public space Read more ›
London Mayor Nearly Killed While Cycling
Tuesday, May 26th, 2009
[SButtonZ button="digg"] By luck alone, the UK avoided an awful tragedy last Friday as a group of government officials on bicycles–including London mayor Boris Johnson and the country’s top transportation minister–was nearly wiped out by a freak traffic accident. Johnson Read more ›
Michael Dukakis: Obama Needs To Revive Train Manufacturing Industry
Tuesday, May 26th, 2009
[SButtonZ button="digg"] Last week we ran part one of our recent interview with Michael Dukakis, in which he discussed how building transit will lead to healthier cities and how the burden is now on governors to take the lead on Read more ›
The Mysterious Math of Cities
Friday, May 22nd, 2009
It probably isn’t much of a surprise to learn that New York is about twice as big as LA and three times as big as Chicago. Less mundane though, is the fact that it would contravene some mysterious but very Read more ›
Dept. of Demographics: Who Rides Transit?
Friday, May 22nd, 2009
[SButtonZ button="digg"] There is a stereotype that public transportation is the domain of the minority poor in this country. While that’s accurate in some places, it misrepresents the broader reality. In fact, a plurality of users nationwide are white and only Read more ›
The Daily Dig – High Speed Rail Edition
Friday, May 22nd, 2009
[SButtonZ button="digg"] – Ray LaHood says it will take “two decades” to build out America’s high speed rail network. (LaSalle News Tribune) As Michael Dukakis told us earlier this week, the northeast is lagging miserably in the planning for high Read more ›
Watching PBS’s ‘Road To The Future’
Thursday, May 21st, 2009
[SButtonZ button="digg"] We have followed the PBS series “Blueprint America” closely and last night tuned in for “Road To The Future,” a tale of three cities and how choices about transportation infrastructure define the nature of the community. Portland does Read more ›
Chinese Rail Plan Makes U.S. Look A Little Lame
Thursday, May 21st, 2009
[SButtonZ button="digg"] Dithering and doing things half-way are not among the national character flaws that might be pinned on the Chinese. One has the sense that if that country ever gets serious about greening up, it will do it with Read more ›
New Laws For Safer Streets? Hawaii Gets It Right, Missouri Gets It Wrong
Thursday, May 28th, 2009[SButtonZ button="digg"] In the last few weeks, two states considered “complete streets” laws that would have benefited residents with safer, more livable neighborhoods, and roads designed to include sidewalks and bike lanes and improve traffic flow. In one case, Hawaii, Read more ›