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.

(via urbanresolve)

WILL BIRMINGHAM CLEAN UP?

Birmingham currently asks its residents to put black bags full of rubbish, including food waste, out on the streets every week with recycling in open boxes collected every 2 weeks.

On most streets around the city, this means that by the time the lorries arrive to collect the stuff we put out, bags have been ripped open by rats, birds, foxes or cats and on windy days (like recently) the recycling is blowing all over the street. http://www.karmadillo.co.uk/b31/?p=5725

The second biggest city in the UK could challenge rubbish collection and recycling practices nationally but is the will of change there? or could we see the introduction of more standardised approaches set elsewhere?

I will be following this one…. update to follow later

What Future? Is the debate on urban cities being hosted by the Ove Arup Foundation and the Guardian on the 3rd November in London.

As well as discussing the usual debates around sustainable food, expansion of cities and spatial inclusion the debate will also aim to discuss and identify issues to be addressed by leaders, practitioners and teachers and mentors of the future such as:

• limited and pressurised resources
• Competition for space and rights to it
• Should we focus on changing our current cities or changing ourselves?
• Can we define the relationship between the real and virtual environment? and how will it affect the meaning and practice of ‘community development’ and its meaning?
• What will it take to be a planner, urban designer and architect and are we equipping future practitioners with the correct skills?
• Should we become ‘agents for the community’ or ‘social determinants’?

I cant wait to see what the outcome of the discussions will be.

When Healh and safety gets in the way of supporting green priorities….. Valerie Nonis of the London Borough of Lewisham, south London has been asked to remove her flower pots on the basis that they obstructed escape routes…..

An interesting article, which looks at the shape of planning and urbanism today and some of the challenges which we will face tomorrow. In sum, the following challenges were identified:

• The public will reclaim the private.

In some ways this is already happening with private shopping centres incorporating leisure activities so that people feel like they could be on the high street in public spaces.

• Our perception of ‘good or suitable’ places to live will change

Again in some ways this is already happening , Manchester and Birmingham are great examples of where city centre living has become more desirable. In addition there is still the tendency to want to live in an inner-city up and coming with all the grit and sense of chick, remember what we used to think of Brixton, Shoreditch, New Cross, Forest Hill, Peckham??? Its funny how more people are wanting to live there these days.

However in future, this maybe challenged more, with ‘private’ spaces becoming prime locations (no not squatting!) but interesting building like Pinewood Studios where proposals for re-dovelopment have been submitted. We have already seen schools, churches and hospitals as well as prisons converted in this way so why not?

• High Rise living

High rises are controversial but in the future, there maybe little choice. Besides they are already making a come back with support for a 53 storey residential building in croydon getting approval from academics, architects and sustainable designers.In the future, we could see challenging designs which enable direct street access (without the need for a lift) to the 10th or 30th floor…

• Third world regeneration projects by urban regeneration companies like Urban Splash

With growing populations at a time when they are becoming world class economic leaders and thus attracting a new work forces, slums in Brazil and India may welcome western urban regeneration companies input and we in the west could be moving to a rejuvinated mumbai slum for work.

• Greening of space

To some degree this is already happening, take the southbank centre, growing food in parks projects and roof top gardening (as planned by Renewal in their design for the new London Sports Village in South London). But could this become more militant, with work place garden or allotment terraces? car park conversions or more high rise roof gardens as intended by the developers Renewal?

• More interesting Architecture

Obvious? Well take a look at recent winners and runners up in the RIBA awards, I think the look of a building and its relationship to its surroundings will become a greater concern. Although this article does not mention it, I think the design of urban transport and layouts will also change in future. I did an article on some of the bicycle design competition in the USA and they certainly aim to challenge how we will use bicycles in the future.

• Fear of Suburbia

With inner London experiencing riots, why did it all kick of in Croydon- its a suburb! Well perhaps its loosing its suburban village identity with all the big chains? or perhaps opportunities are as limited as the inner-city areas? how about transport- any issues there? have housing officers finally got it right with mixing communities? Gentrification of the inner-cities pushed those on lower incomes out? Perhaps the answer is all of the above?

But whatever the correct the answer we are seeing some of our suburbs become increasingly ‘challenged’ places.

suchisthecity:

NEW YORK FARM CITY:

We all know urban farming is really taking root (*ahem*) in many places like Chicago, San Francisco, and New York.  Check out this video about urban farmers in NYC showing a bit of what they do, the movements and organizations they’re a part of, and where the food goes once it leaves the rooftop.

We also have lots of urban farms in the UK, for instance London has 10 at least and their great, but there is also a new initiative called the Farmshop in Hackney.

Its uses aquaponics (a sustainable food growing method using fish, water and plants), has chickens on the roof and occupys a former retail shop. Its great as they host social activities and food tasting sessions as well as a cafe. Its worked great here as its been used to overcome the empty shop problems on one of our inner city high streets.

Hackney - Farm Shop from Media Junction on Vimeo.

(via urbnist)