1. You could get rid of your neighbour once and for all by melting their house with your solar panel windows

2. Create the cheapest outdoor festival EVER!!! by using a wind farm to create strobe lighting

3. Save up your compost heap and ask someone in the heavens to ensure it lights up (ok so it might combust- which is slightly different) every summers evening, for a good old BBQ

4. For a short period of the year, the new LED lightbulbs will give all of us the chance to a) put our foot down on the peddle and get out of the cold quicker without being stopped by the police or caught for driving through the red lights (I never said any of this was safe or moral) and b) use the money we would have spent on traffic fines to buy a special someone something extra special for Christmas

Ok so maybe these ideas are ridiculous, but the article by Heather Farris and Nick Masercola highlight some of the potential dangerous and harmful flaws with new green tech, but rather than rant about, let’s invite some techies, engineers and scientists to develop a better solution and if that doesn’t work we should get the builder to enforce proper construction design management solutions, so that I don’t have the chance to melt my neighbours home- because actually I quite like them.

This is a really interesting article because I think it really shows how difficult it is for cities like Detroit to try and find the solution to a dwindling population and low income. My only questions about this approach is how detroit will attract people to their city where some communities will be in darkness? What if some neighbourhoods become attractive again to a new class of people? How will those people living in Detroit who are hoping to see change and also seeing small signs of change view this policy to darken parts of the city? what effect will this have upon policing and other security and health services who still need to access local people?

Waterways sound Map for London-

I heard the sound from Deptford Creek which is around the corner from me. Interestingly I have never heard much of that sound before- due to all the local noise mainly traffic nearby.

 Is your area on there? Do you recognise any of the sounds? …Click the link above and have a go!

thebrownarchitect:

artstalking:

TOMAS SARACENO

Tomas Saraceno’s suspended environments create networks of habitable platforms floating in the air.  These airborne utopias join like clouds, and bind together forming aerial cities in a constant state of evolution.

Through the creation of such spaces, Saraceno challenges notions of nationality and the built environment.  His installations both grow to encorporate the environment that surrounds them, and simultaneously strive to create a new, evolutionary means of inhabiting space.

How are artists effected by the idea of a utopia, how are they representing them? Tom Saraceno believes utopia will be in the sky amongst the clouds in this installation.

How are planners affected by ideas of utopia and how are they expressing them in policies and projects?..I’m not sure, but this brings me a sense of joy and inspiration to work even harder to achieve better outcomes

(via amritseera)

visualoop:

Via

(via humanscalecities)

I wonder if this will set a precedence? Anyone know of any case studies where deprived communities have demanded access to renewable energy?

Malcolm X

(thinking about the Black Radical Tradition of farming)

Im considering doing my dissertation project on social justice and renewable energy!…any ideas anyone?

(Source: pambana, via fuckyeahenvironmentaljustice)

inlikewiththecity:

World’s Largest Underground High-Speed Rail Station

Meant to connect Hong Kong to Beijing, the Express Rail Link West Kowloon Terminus is said to become the largest underground high-speed rail station in the world.

MEANWHILE in CHINA…

Wow amazing!

nickoftimela:

simplynorule:

Golden Gate Bridge and San Francisco at night (by canbalci)

Oh I love the city! 

Love this city…can’t wait to revisit it again!