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clipped from citiwire.netNeal Peirce / Oct 23 2009
For Release Sunday, October 25, 2009
© 2009 Washington Post Writers Group
BARCELONA — How can a city resuscitate an entire depressed, old inner city district, many of its blocks marked by the skeletons of abandoned factories?
Even more challenging–how to transform the same area into a high-powered knowledge hub that adds jobs by the thousands and draws dozens of high-powered national and international firms?
The "free enterprise" American approach might be to bring in the bulldozers, create an industrial park that displaces the old residents, and maybe offer companies public subsidies to move in.
Not Barcelona. Ten years ago this entrepreneurial city decided to build a modern "knowledge economy" close to downtown in its old waterfront Poblenou district, once a leading cotton mill center, renaming it "22@Barcelona, District of Innovation."
Barcelona's then-mayor, Joan Close, took the initiative. But an extraordinary political consensus–ranging all the way from the city's capitalist right wing to socialist-oriented left–came together to design 22@Barcelona and set it in motion.
Their central idea: Talent is the gold of our time, crucial to build thriving new economic clusters. Talented people (and cutting-edge firms) want lively urban environments. Instead of the isolation of corporate campuses, they're anxious to brush shoulders with other gifted people from companies, universities and the artistic realm.
So 22@Barcelona has been consciously shaped to include attractive green spaces, restaurants and entertainment, bike lanes, and plentiful public transit both within the area and between it and greater Barcelona.
But to create that environment–and not force out the families and workers living there–the Barcelona politicians decided on an ingenious but highly controlled form of real estate redevelopment.
Each of the district's 100-square meter blocks–rather than individual land holdings–were made the basic unit for regeneration. Once 60 percent of landowners in any one of the 115 blocks agree to act collectively, they can–as a community–increase the value of their property by getting city permission to rebuild with greater height (more stories) than allowed in the past.
But there's a tradeoff. In return, owners must agree to release 30 percent of their land holding for new public investment. Of that 30 percent, the city takes a third each for shared green space, for publicly subsidized housing, and for knowledge-based activity such as a technology center or university facility. The land parcels can also be exchanged across blocks–for a larger park, for example.
One can imagine American property owners screaming "property rights" and "eminent domain abuse" at any such proposal. Not to mention another "taking": 22@'s owners are obliged to pay 50 percent of street infrastructure improvements.
But look at what they gain, notes Josep Miquel Piqué, Barcelona's forceful CEO of 22@ operations. There's revitalized public space to lift the spirits of residents and workers. District heating and cooling, plus fiber optic connections are provided. There's actually a pneumatic underground waste disposal system (with colored bags to make recycling easy). Plus a system of underground "galleries" for cables and pipes and future needs, avoiding the need to keep digging up streets for improvements.
And 22@ isn't shy about defining and shaping the economic environment. It's defined five top "innovation clusters" –information technology, media, design, medical devices and energy efficiency. And, says Piqué, "We are managing the ecosystem for innovation. We've grown to 1,441 companies, many international, in nine years. If we need university talent, finance, or information technology, we promote the connections to make it possible. We incite artists to work with the companies, for inspiration. We work together with the private firms, the universities, to create a critical mass to compete in the world."
The physical result is an amazingly eclectic neighborhood. Technology centers and new apartments are cheek by jowl with old lots and housing still in transition. Government offices, television and radio studios, cultural centers, social service agencies–they're all there, and much more.
Yet Piqué claims "We don't forget the people living here beforehand. We are including social housing. We recognize residents' children as the new generation of talent we want right here. We invite students for internships in the firms, the activities we have. That's the difference between the Silicon Valley model and ours."
An American can't visit 22@ without wondering: Could U.S. cities ever find the left-to-right political consensus, muster the faith in a government-chartered organization with 22@-like powers, to remake our lagging neighborhoods with parallel stem-to-stern remedies and approaches?
For our dawning back-to-the-city era, what better? But I'm not optimistic. Barcelona-style collaboration (and trust in government) just isn't in our political DNA.
But what if a talent-focused economic era, marked by keen global competition, requires intensely entrepreneurial and rule-setting city government on the 22@Barcelona model? It will be a tough shift. But we Americans can't keep saying "no" and "can't" forever.
clipped from southeastmain.wordpress.comWhen I read Terry Grant's post about the gorgeous fall we've been having in Portland, Oregon, I almost just sent you to her site. She stole my fire — and my blog post idea, too. Not that that's so surprising; we do live in the same place, after all.
But then I looked at my photos and decided that all was not lost. I take different photos of fall than Terry does, even though I have equal amounts of abject adoration of its colors:
This looks like the usual fall color photo — with the addition of the bike, the fire hydrant, cars, and utility wires. But aren't those grasses yummy.
Even when Hawthorne fills the camera's screen with debris, there's still no denying the advent of the color.
And southeast Grand Avenue's bars can't match the maple across the street.
I was particularly fond of the one above, particularly as I had just been complimented on my photo processes a moment before, when I took this next one:
This one is nice, but there's something very zen about the glimpse of beauty amidst the debris of the quotidian — telephone poles, posters for rock bands, graffiti on the back of a walk light — and a blaze of oak leaves.
clipped from www.npr.orgConservative talk show host Rush Limbaugh suggested this week that perhaps climate change reporter Andrew C. Revkin of The New York Times should take his own life to reduce carbon emissions, if he felt it was so important to the planet's future to reduce them.
"If he really thinks that human beings, in their natural existence, are going to cause the extinction of life on Earth," Limbaugh asked, "Mr. Revkin, why don't you just go kill yourself, and help the planet by dying?"
Limbaugh accused Revkin of being part of a radical environmentalist fringe. But those who know Revkin say he's a scrupulous journalist who's somewhat revolutionary in an altogether different aspect: the way he reports the news.
Part old-school newspaper reporter, part frenetic blogger, Revkin is curating information on the question of how the world can grow to a projected population of 9 billion people over the next 40 years with as little damage as possible.
"My way is to say, 'What do we know? What don't we know? What can we learn? What's essentially unknowable?' And then, 'What does society do with that body of information that's left'?" Revkin says.
Revkin's first long article on climate change appeared in Discover magazine 21 years ago. His blog, Dot Earth, is just two years old, an outgrowth of earlier online reports he filed while on extended reporting trips to the North Pole and Greenland.
On the blog, Revkin posts early versions of his own reporting, excerpts of stories from other news outlets, links to government documents and scientific journal articles, corporate presentations and blog postings. Revkin often solicits and publishes the opinions of readers — relying on them for tips and insight, while simultaneously helping them sift through the flood of information coming their way.
It's a new role for someone who had been a fairly conventional though distinguished print reporter.
"It's more like being a mountain guide after an avalanche, than being the old-style, 'Here's the news, take it or leave it, thank you very much, goodnight,' " Revkin says.
New York University journalism professor Jay Rosen says Revkin's work on Dot Earth represents an important step toward a new model for how the news business will work.
"One day, I think all beat reporting will be done this way," Rosen says. "The pressures to be in the paper regularly, to be on the front page have kept traditional reporters from really exploring what the Web — the two-way Web, the read-write, back-and-forth nature of the Web — can do for their reporting."
Even after all these years, the sensitive nature of the climate change debate can lead Revkin to wade into controversial areas. Sometimes he gets slapped by environmental advocates who take issue with Revkin's reporting. Former Clinton administration energy official Joe Romm, who writes the Climate Progress Blog for the left-of-center Center for American Progress, is a frequent critic.
But more often, Revkin finds himself attacked from the right. Such was the case after a recent public forum held by the Woodrow Wilson Center in Washington, D.C. Revkin spoke long distance by Internet videophone to the group.
He says his remarks were intended to indicate skepticism toward the push for governments to grant financial credits for reducing carbon emissions. "Probably the single most concrete and substantive thing an American, a young American, could do to lower their carbon footprint is not turning off the lights or driving a Prius — it's having fewer kids," Revkin said.
If the country pursues carbon-centric policies, Revkin asked, should there be financial rewards for families that have one child rather than two or three?
He told the audience, "Obviously it's just a thought experiment, but it raises some interesting questions."
By Revkin's account, those statements reverberated around the Internet — and were quickly distorted.
"In this case, I was asking a question about population and carbon — and it got conflated with those who make strong statements about depopulating the world and that kind of thing," Revkin says.
The conservative editorial page of Investors' Business Daily ran a critical piece. Then the nation's top-rated radio talk show host spoke up. Limbaugh invoked the much maligned Chinese government's "one child" policy — and made pointed comparisons to jihadists and Palestinian suicide bombers.
Revkin has received angry hate mail and telephone messages. He wants Limbaugh to apologize to the rest of his family — especially his older son, a regular Limbaugh listener who is, Revkin says, currently serving in the Israeli military.
clipped from www.cdc.gov
What can I do to protect myself from getting sick?
Take these everyday steps to protect your health:
Cover your nose and mouth with a tissue when you cough or sneeze. Throw the tissue in the trash after you use it.
Other important actions that you can take are:
clipped from 74.125.155.132 clipped from www.portlandonline.com clipped from chemistry.about.com clipped from chemistry.about.com
Liquid oxygen in an unsilvered dewar flask. Liquid oxygen is blue.
Warwick Hillier, Australia National University, CanberraPhotograph of graphite, one of the forms of elemental carbon.
U.S. Geological SurveyNGC 604, a region of ionized hydrogen in the Triangulum Galaxy.
Hubble Space Telescope, photo PR96-27BCalcium is a metal. It readily oxidizes in air. Because it makes up such a large part of the skeleton, about one-third of the mass of human body comes from calcium, after water has been removed.
Tomihahndorf, Creative Commons LicenseRed phosphorus is one of several forms taken by this element.
RTC, wikipedia.orgChunk of potassium metal with peroxides/superoxides (yellow crystals) and ozonide (red coloring) on its surface
Justin Urgitis, www.wikipedia.orgSodium metal chunks under mineral oil.
Justin Urgitis, wikipedia.org
Vial of chlorine gas.
Photograph of the element magnesium, with a penny to indicate size of the sample.
U.S. Geological SurveyCrystals of the nonmetallic element sulfur.
Smithsonian Institution
Try this one: Click Here. clipped from writersalmanac.publicradio.orgby Tom Hennen
Cold wind.
The day is waiting for winter
Without a sound.
Everything is waiting—
Broken-down cars in the dead weeds.
The weeds themselves.
Trees.
Even sunlight
Is in no hurry and stays
For a long time
On each cornstalk.
Blackbirds are silent
And sit in piles.
From a distance
They look like
Something
Spilled on the road.
"Autumn Waiting" by Tom Hennen, from Looking into the Weather. © Westerheim Press, 1983.
clipped from tickets.orsymphony.org
Carlos Kalmar, conductor
Kirill Gerstein, piano
Bach: Orchestral Suite No. 4
Bernstein: Symphony No. 2 for Piano and Orchestra, "The Age of Anxiety"
Beethoven: Symphony No. 7
[Watch Kirill Gerstein in action performing Rachmaninoff at another venue.]
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