We’ve previously explored the ruins of Detroit in this space, and while we found the devastation captured in Yves Marchand and Romain Meffre’s photographs fascinating, the images also made us feel like we were rubbernecking at disaster porn. On the other side of the spectrum is “Views of Detroit,” a 22-minute clip from a group of Danish planning students which was shot as part of a research experiment on how to use film as a method of urban development. “The film uses a strongly subjective narrative, with no aim to point out answers to the challenges Detroit is currently facing, they explain. “However we hope our methodology can inspire planners to include new perspectives from everyday life in their work: creating future cities.” Click through to check out the fascinating portion on Michigan Central Station.
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On June 19th, 2003 three men met at the Tekehtopa restaurant in Oslo and founded the Norwegian Cartozoologic Society. What exactly is cartozoology? The society’s website defines it as, “The science or practice of discovering and studying animals outlined paradigmatically by street layouts as they appear on maps, especially with reference to physical evidence of the animals’ presence in the corresponding terrain.” There’s a list of animal shapes they have found, mostly in Oslo. However the society also accepts submissions of cartozoological findings, given it meets three conditions, one of which is “the animal should emerge.”
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Union Station in Washington, DC, is showing off a shiny new Bike Transit Center that offers secure bike parking for 150 cycles, plus a changing room, lockers, bike rentals, and a repair shop for commuters. Access to the center costs $1 per day or a yearly membership fee of $100, which includes round-the-clock entry. The facility will be the first of its kind on the East Coast, part of an effort to encourage eco-friendly commuting with the promise of added security for bicycles. Eighty-percent of the funding for the $4-million bike center came from the US Department of Transportation, with additional funds from the DDOT. Are we noticing a trend in forward-thinking civic design? More pics after the jump.
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A post over on Dwell has an interesting take on the fact that Obama’s an urbanite president who plans to maintain his home in South Chicago — extra security will lead to increased pedestrianization that could (!) trickle down to affect people living in other cities as well.
“How ironic would it be, however, to find that, for all of our calls to pedestrianize parts of the city, it takes the security of a president to make such urban interventions finally happen? In other words, what if Obama’s most immediate impact on urban policy in the United States is simply to make people realize that pedestrianization isn’t such a bad idea, after all?”
We wouldn’t mind some extra non-automotive traffic space here in New York, and we’re pretty sure our friends in other cities feel the same way. Any readers who live around Hyde Park want to let us know how this urban experiment works out? What kinds of security measures are already going into effect to keep the Secret Service smiling?
