Apartment Ecology

Carnival of the Green #208

2010-01-02T20:13:24Z

Carnival of the Green #208 is being hosted over at OnEarth.

19 People in One Apartment: Living in a Hong Kong cage home

2009-10-29T18:39:19Z

19 poor people live in this 625-square-foot apartment, according to CNN reporter Eunice Yoon. A space on the upper deck costs around USD 100 a month; on the lower level, USD 150, because down there you can stand upright in your space.

Some residents have been there for years; others have been squeezed out of more comfortable homes by recession-driven job loss. Perhaps they resort to cage home living because it will keep them in the urban area, where they're presumably more likely to find another job. But since these residents didn't want to appear on camera for risk of hurting their chances for employment, that's just my guess.

Via Bruce Sterling's Beyond the Beyond. Bruce writes,

Note that the area is saturated with TVs, and there's no question that everybody in there has a mobile. Note also the plethora of fans, refrigerators, and injection-molded plastic kitchen items. Those are very modern spaces, even trending toward the glossy-futuristic.

That cheery 90-year-old, he's got "Aging Broke Baby Boomer" written all over him.

Join Live Chat Today with San Fran's Mayor Newsom on Urban Eco-Initiatives

2009-10-28T16:30:56Z

The green design gurus at Inhabitat seems to be everywhere lately -- including San Francisco. At 12 noon PT/3 pm ET this afternoon, they'll be having a live, webcast conversation with Gavin Newsom, the city's mayor, on "cutting edge eco initiatives...that have made it one of the greenest cities in the U.S."

lost in a moment

2009-02-12T05:00:29Z

lost in a moment from dennis wheatley on Vimeo.

Blogging at globalwarming.change.org

2008-10-18T20:36:00Z

[UPDATE, Oct. 24, 2009: I am no longer blogging at Change.org.]

I'm now the editor of the Stop Global Warming Blog at change.org. It's consuming my blogging-brain attention, so Apartment Ecology may not be updated for a while.

Thanks for reading so far, and please come on over to globalwarming.change.org, where I'll be covering a lot of the same subjects -- sustainability, cities, diy, more -- with a more pronounced global warming focus.

Afternoon Ecology, 2 October 2008: Google Green Energy Plan, NYC Bike Racks, Snow on Mars, more

2008-10-02T20:46:24Z

Video: Courtesy Streetfilms. 10 finalists in New York City's bike rack design competition are having their creations street-tested: prototypes have been installed at Astor Place. They're all pretty neat in one way or another, and it would be great to have any one of them become the official NYC bike rack and well distributed around the city. We're hard up here for good bike parking.

While I've been off tending to non-blog things, news has continued to bubble up, boil over, and froth all around our collective feet. Lots is getting lost in the unrelenting coverage of the Wall Street meltdown. I'll try to save a few stories from the dustheap, below.

Much distinction is being drawn between the concerns of Main Street ("regular" America) and Wall Street (Rich Uncle Milburn Pennybags) -- and how improbable it seems to be to people that the former is going to melt if Big Finance burns. Lately I've been considering that, as Wall Street IS Main Street here in NYC, it's pretty much a win-win for me and my fellow New Yorkers to bail it out.

Off-Shore Wind Power Set to Expand (Worldwatch Institute)
Mayors 'Get It' on Climate Change (World Resources Institute)
Global Seed Vault Now Accepting Seeds (Scientific American)
Mars Lander Detects Falling Snow (BBC News) [[this has nothing to do with cities, the environment, or sustainability -- it's just very exciting news of more proof of water on Mars]]
Xcel Energy to Convert Coal Station Into Clean Biomass Power Plant (Biopact)

Google's Green Energy Futures Fund Could Save U.S. $1 Trillion

Evening Ecology 24 September 2008: Cities Surviving Into the Future Edition

2008-09-25T00:37:25Z

Mitchell Joachim: Redesign Cities From Scratch (Wired)
It Takes Just One Village -- Elevated Out of Poverty -- To Save a Species (The New York Times)
Eco-Cities: Urban Planning for the Future (SciAm.com)
Urban Energy Crisis: It Take 18 Coffee Trees to Caffinate 1 American (Treehugger)
Iceland Shifting Green Car Plans (Dot Earth - nytimes.com)
Flashmob Protest of Heathrow Airport Expansion (Ecostreet)
Conflux 2008: Notes From Panel "Cartography of Protest and Social Changes" (We Make Money Not Art)

Evening Ecology 22 September 2008: Urban Traffic Edition

2008-09-22T23:22:25Z

Portland, Ore., San Fran, Seattle Top List of Most Sustainable U.S. Cities [[again]] [[My home town, NYC, moves from 6th to 5th place.]] (TriplePundit)
Crude Reality: Who Said Anything About Cheap Oil? (Environmental Capital - wsj.com)
Toyota iQ Urban Car Exposed at the Royal College of Art [[it's adorable -- I just want to hug it and kiss it and love it]] (Treehugger)
Chicago Releases Climate Action Plan (DotEarth - nytimes.com)
New Beijing Traffic Restrictions Surprisingly Popular (The City Fix)

Image: Beijing traffic, 2006, by proggie via flickr, who wrote in part, "What struck me most about the traffic in China was not so much the volume, but the controlled chaos. Cars, buses, bicycles, scooters, and pedestrians were going in all directions, disregarding traffic lights and sings, cutting each other off, weaving in and out, and performing maneuvers that drivers in Vancouver would have heart attacks over. Yet in China it seemed to be normal and expected, and nobody got angry or even lifted a finger. "

Evening Ecology 17 September 2008: Whales Near NY Harbor, Whether to Rebuild After Ike, Climate & Energy Misc

2008-09-18T02:47:40Z

Near New York Harbor, the Song of Whales(The New York Times)
What Effect Could Wall Street Meltdown Have on Clean Energy Development? (Gristmill - Grist)
After Ike, To Rebuild Cities or Not on Texas Coast? (The Christian Science Monitor)
Berkeley Approves Landmark Solar Energy Lending Program for Homeowners (Solve Climate)
States Aim to Cut Greenhouse Gases by Making Polluters Pay (The New York Times)

Image: "Oblique aerial photography of Bolivar Peninsula, TX, [[which is directly north-northeast of Galveston Island, TX]] on September 9, 2008 (top) and September 15, 2008, two days after landfall of Hurricane Ike (bottom). Yellow arrows mark features that appear in each image. In addition to the loss of houses, the evidence of inundation here includes eroded dune face and sand deposited well inland of the shoreline." Source: U.S. Geological Survey

Afternoon Ecology 15 September 2008: Newark as Eco-City, Rochester Public Transit Renaissance, more

2008-09-15T19:16:02Z

Could Newark Flower as an Eco-City? (The Star Ledger)
Is It Time To Kill the Lawn? American icon losing ground to edible gardens (The Oregonian)
Communities Plan for a Low-Energy Future? (The Christian Science Monitor)
Creativity Helps Rochester's Transit System Turn a Profit (The New York Times)

Morning Ecology 5 September 2008: Air Quality, Urban Wilds, and When to Quit Edition

2008-09-05T14:20:38Z

Telemetric air quality displays in downtown Seoul (Beyond the Beyond - wired.com)
Air Pollution's Causes, Consequences and Solutions
Wild Cats Take Up Residence in California Foreclosures (BLDG BLOG)
Brooklyn, Butterflies and Bees (Slow Food Nation) [[I wrote this.]]
San Francisco's Victory Garden Gets An Extension (Sustainable Cities Blog)
New Orleans: "When do humans hold the line, and when do they back off, in the face of inevitable disasters?" (Dot Earth - nytimes.com)

Image: Via Bruce Sterling: "Urban informatics applications double as big, visible street billboards."

Afternoon Ecology 3 September 2008: Joe Biden on Energy, Environment Edition

2008-09-03T16:07:04Z

A Look at Joe Biden's Environmental Record (Grist)
An Interview With Joe Biden About Energy, Environment (Grist)
Why Biden Is an Important Pick for the Climate (Climate Progress)
Biden's Beliefs: Obama's Running Mate Calls Energy America's Top Issue (Environmental Capital - wsj.com)

Image: Atlantic Tropical Cyclone Activity, Sept. 3, 2008. Credit: National Hurricane Center

Morning Ecology 3 September 2008: Sarah Palin's Energy, Enviro Record Edition

2008-09-03T15:45:56Z

Palin: No Fresh Pick on Energy, Enviro Policies (Elizabeth Grossman, Island Press Blog)
Palin: Global Warming Not Man-Made (Political Radar - abcnews.com)

Palin at Her "End Times" Church: Pray for Gas Pipeline (Gristmill)
Palin on Higher Ed, Earmarks and Science (Inside Higher Ed)
Sarah Palin and Big Oil (Energy Wire - washingtonpost.com)
Palin Views On Oil, Polar Bears May Be Liabilities (AP, via CBS News)

Image: "This satellite image was captured on September 2 at 17:45 UTC (1:45 p.m. EDT) from the Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellites (GOES-11 and GOES-12). In the image, Tropical Depression Gustav is on the far left over northwest Texas; Tropical Storm Hanna is located to the right of Gustav, currently over the southern Bahamas; Tropical Storm Ike follows to the right in open ocean; and Tropical Storm Josephine is off the African coast, far right." Credit: NOAA/NASA GOES Project

2M flee Nola as Gustav advances at Cat 3 intensity; info/support @http://gustav08.ning.com/

2008-09-01T02:14:49Z

The National Hurricane Center's latest advisory pins Hurricane Gustav at Category 3 intensity, with winds near 115 miles per hour/185 km/hr. It's advancing on the northern Gulf Coast at around 17 mph/27 km/hr, with tropical storm winds now hitting land. The NHC is also forecasting a huge and dangerous storm surge of 18-25 feet.

Mississippi coast cities are looking at a one in five chance of hurricane-strength winds and nearly 100 percent chance of tropical storm force winds.

Following announcement of mandatory evacuation, two million people have fled New Orleans:

Painfully aware of the failings that led to that horrific suffering and more than 1,600 deaths, this time officials moved beyond merely insisting tourists and residents leave south Louisiana. They threatened arrest, loaded thousands onto buses and warned that anyone who remained behind would not be rescued.

This evening, Louisiana Gov. Jindal estimated there were perhaps ten thousand people left in the city.

Parts of coastal Texas have been evacuated as well; a notice up on the Gustav Information Center (launched by Andy Carvin and in search of volunteers to help set up resources, update and verify content, and more) cautions Louisiana evacuees to avoid the area surrounding Beaumont, Texas, which is now in Gustav's west--trending path.

As citizens of New Orleans and other points on the Gulf Coast attempt to learn from Hurricane Katrina by getting out of Gustav's way, GOP presidential candidate John McCain made ready to visit the scene of impending disaster, and the Republican Party has sharply curtailed its planned convention activities for Monday. The New York Times reports,

On the day Hurricane Katrina made landfall three years ago, President Bush helped Senator John McCain celebrate his birthday with a cake that melted on a blazing hot airport tarmac, just as the president's approval ratings would in the weeks to come.

This time around, the party's off. Or at least it is for Mr. Bush and Mr. McCain, who on Sunday sought to focus attention on efforts to prepare for Hurricane Gustav at the expense of carefully laid plans for this week's Republican National Convention.

In some ways, it was a nightmare moment for Republicans. The hurricane's approach put front and center once more some of the worst failings of the Bush presidency at the very moment Mr. McCain was to begin presenting a vision of the post-Bush Republican Party to the nation.

With television tracking the storm's approach and showing images of an emptying New Orleans, it was hard for voters to escape reminders of how Mr. Bush had emerged from Hurricane Katrina severely wounded by judgments of incompetence and lack of empathy....more

Image: Hurricane Gustav. Credit: NASA/JPL

Hurricane Gustav: Cat 4 and Building; B-lining for New Orleans; http://gustav08.ning.com/

2008-08-30T23:08:30Z

Much buzz building around the internets as Hurricane Gustav approaches the US Gulf Coast. Gustav has in fact bashed through the Caribbean already, killing 78 according to the Associated Press. It whipped up to Cat 3 and then Cat 4 as it made for Cuba's west coast. The National Hurricane Center feels it could well spin up to Cat 5, and make landfall on Louisiana on Monday very near the mouth of the Mississippi River, right around the time the Republican National Convention is kicking off up at the Big Muddy's northern end, in Minneapolis-St. Paul.

From Cuba, National Hurricane Center projections show it traveling right at New Orleans; New Orleanians are evacuating by the thousands.

Update, 9:30 pm ET: New Orleans Mayor Nagin has ordered a mandatory evacuation of the city.

Activity is building on the social networks to share information, and I suppose coordinate emergency response if it comes to that -- notably the Gustav Info Center on Ning, set up by Andy Carvin.

Image: National Hurricane Center, "Coast Watches and 5-Day Track Forecast Cone"