“The most ass-backwards renewal gimmicks yet, shrinkage and farming simply restate the formula for racially driven sprawl that wrecked Detroit, only this time in the jargon of environmentalism and, God help us, urbanism.” Will Boisvert, “Motor City Elegy,” in The Baffler vol 2 no 1, pg 102
Monthly Archives: May 2010
Breaking News
This was emailed to Break the Gridlock yesterday:
NASCAR To Terminate All Auto Races Following Gulf Oil Spill
By JENNA FRYER
AP Auto Racing Writer
Ashamed and appalled at the devastation of British Petroleum’s Gulf of Mexico Oil spill, NASCAR Board Chairman Brian France announced today the end of NASCAR’s car and auto racing empire. “The impact on thousands of NASCAR Fans in the Deep South is clear,” He said, “NASCAR will be reorganizing as NACHAR, the National Association of Chariot Racing.” “Chariot Racing is a true Man’s Sport,” quipped NASCAR’s Jimmie Johnson, while overseeing the design of his first NACHAR Chariot, to be named the Ben Hur. Dale Earnhardt, Jr. endorsed the move, adding “I confess, our critics have had one thing right for years: NASCAR Drivers are not athletes, Chariot Racing will give them the opportunity to really impress the waitresses at Hooters.”
NACHAR’s target date for the Chariot Rollout is July 4th. The depavement of raceways, and replacement with packed red clay for the Chariot Races is already underway at several racetracks. Parking lots are being downsized and converted for Horse and bicycle parking. Limited automobile parking will still be available for people with mobility issues. Plans are to depave about 90% of the parking lots, and replace them with demonstration permaculture gardens, the produce to be promoted and sold as a healthier alternative to former NASCAR fans. Company Vice President James France cited private studies by the National Institutes of Health commissioned by NASCAR, confirming a threefold incidence of obesity and heart disease among NASCAR fans as motivation for the change. “This is change NASCAR Fans can believe in,” He said, “We want our fans to be around in their Golden Years, so they can enjoy Chariot Racing with their Grandchildren.”
Executive Vice President Lesa Kennedy was enthusiastic about the move, and added the that NASCAR is boycotting all British Petroleum products and terminated BP’s sponsorship for the final week of NASCAR events. “My Daytona Beach neighbors have expressed sheer excitement about the changes,” gushed Ms. Kennedy. A surprise lineup of Celebrities and Racehorses is planned for the July 4th Daytona Beach NACHAR Races. The NACHAR.com website rollout is scheduled for May 27th.
Livable streets: a platform for national political success
In the USA, talk of implementing livable streets policies at the national level has ignited the usual rural-urban standoff, wherein rural areas accustomed to receiving generous road subsidies are sniping at the idea that new rules might reward metropolitan areas for being more productive and efficient.
Yet in Colombia, the picture looks quite different: on Sunday, the country may well elect Antanas Mockus as the world’s first Green Party head of state; he’s a former Bogotá mayor who championed that city’s numerous public space initiatives. And, of course, South Korea’s president Lee Myung-bak — “the bulldozer” — won his reputation as mayor of Seoul by fulfilling a campaign promise to demolish the freeway covering the Cheonggyecheon river.
No open space in my backyard (2)
An open letter sent to CROP, regarding a proposed orchard nearby. BTW, the title refers to another fight over what to do with another backyard I had.
I live [south of Logan Square, near the] city-owned vacant parcel that has been identified as “future community open space.” I recently heard about a plan being advanced to develop that parcel as a fruit orchard, rather than the market plaza promised by the Logan Square Open Space Plan. This proposal puzzles and concerns me, since this location strikes me as a particularly poor location for agriculture.
I have spent my career advocating for smart neighborhood and city planning, including longtime volunteer service on local planning in the West Town and Logan Square community areas. I also spent years as a community gardener at Greenhouse Garden in Ukrainian Village, which houses a number of espaliered heirloom fruit trees.
When I participated in the Logan Square Open Space Plan public outreach process, the conversation about this parcel centered around creating a space filled with human activity. That makes sense given that this is one of Logan Square’s busiest corners, with thriving businesses opening up all around. Pedestrian-oriented retail districts like this need a critical mass of activity to thrive, and that activity should be reinforced whenever possible. That the retail is growing despite nearby parking lots, blank walls, empty storefronts, and high-speed thoroughfares is heartening, but we cannot take further growth for granted. A market plaza would bring more people and more commerce to this corner, helping all of the nearby businesses thrive…
An orchard, closed and gated to the public for all but a few days each year (I know from experience that otherwise fruit and/or trees would be lost to theft or vandalism), would do nothing to reinforce this hub of activity. Creating a “walled garden” (lasting at least several, if not a hundred, years) at the key junction of the Logan-Milwaukee business district will freeze this budding area’s growth and prevent it from coalescing into something greater. In addition, I know from having dug in my own yard that the soil underneath this site does not lend itself to trees: construction of the subway portal and trench required extensive excavation which was backfilled with gravel aggregate, which lurks just a foot beneath the ground.
Scores of vacant lots exist elsewhere in Logan Square, Humboldt Park, and Garfield Park, including high-visibility sites along the boulevard system or near the future Bloomingdale Trail. In fact, the Logan Square Open Space Plan identified several lots that would be ideal for community gardens, provided a group (like yours) was willing to step up and organize management of the site. Many of these would make for suitable locations for quiet agricultural uses, reinforcing the areas’ quiet residential or industrial character.
I wish your organization luck on finding a great site for your worthy project.
Tidbits, 11 May
- In a classic case of Manhattan myopia, Ed Glaeser makes an oversimplified argument that high-rises can spur economic diversity in Economix. Two crucial shortcomings to the argument: (1) high-rises have inordinately high construction costs per unit, due to expensive steel/concrete structures and elevators; and (2) their highly standardized units and interiors, and high ratio of communal-but-not-common space, resist any efforts to meaningfully mix price points within.
- “The Deepwater Horizon spill illustrates that every gallon of gas is a gallon of risks — risks of spills in production and transport, of worker deaths, of asthma-inducing air pollution and of climate change, to name a few. We should print these risks on every gasoline receipt, just as we label smoking’s risks on cigarette packs. And we should throw our newfound political will behind a sweeping commitment to use less gas — build cars that use less oil (or none at all) and figure out better ways to transport Americans.” — Lisa Margonelli in the NYT (h/t Ryan Avent)
- Brookings (via TNR) unveiled an interesting new metro-area cluster typology. Larger growing regions can be low-education “border growth,” better educated and whiter “New Heartland” (Charlotte, Columbus, KC, MSP, SLC), or diverse and highly educated “Next Frontier” (they bet on Albuquerque, Austin, DC, Denver, DFW, Houston, Sacramento, Seattle, and Tucson). The “rust belt” divides into stable, better educated “Skilled Anchor” (Hartford, Milwaukee, Pittsburgh) and declining, less educated “Industrial Core” cities (Memphis, New Orleans, Toledo).
- Seems like I’m not the only one who’s disappointed by the New United Airlines’ adoption of Continental’s whiffleball clip-art logo. It offers some peculiarly ugly typography — notably the stem on the uppercase U, which appears to be, in a sad twist on the false small caps of UA’s 90s look, an inverted and enlarged n. Contrast that with the “Helvetica on fast forward” look of the current wordmark, so clean and detailed that it draws attention to the angles snipped into the T. What also worries me is that the new company seems, so far, to be taking its design cues from Continental’s graphically blunt advertising, which features all-caps headlines, underlines (more appropriate for emphasis on typewriters than in digital media), high contrast colors, and predictable visuals — quite different from UA’s almost too elegant, soft-sell approach of spare watercolor illustration, in greys and pastels, set against lots of whitespace. In fact, Continental’s ad agency deliberately says about its strategy: “forgo the flowery imagery and messaging of typical airline ads and focus on what really matters to business travelers: getting basic needs met with consistency. Our campaign… talks to travelers in a simple, straightforward style and voice…” The visual contrast is nowhere more evident than in comparing their recent TV spots; particularly the parting shot that introduces the logo:
(Interestingly, in choosing blue as the new airline color, it appears that US aviation is joining other duopoly markets that have coalesced around red vs. blue. Coke-Pepsi, Colgate-Crest, Labour-Tory, Republican-Democrat, TWA-Pan Am, and now Delta-United.) [originally posted to FT]
- A recent article on “Chinglish” in the NYT reveals that the Shanghai government has been cracking down on poor English translations. That might explain why the amusing picture book cited in the article was one of the few English-language books widely available at most bookshops, gift shops, and the like — having it everywhere sure seemed strange given China’s strong aversion to embarrassment.
west north 