An Array of Utopian Flowers
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San Onofre Beach as Permanent Nuclear Waste Dump
Posted on August 7, 2018 | 1 Comment -
The Underworld, Rebirth and Renewal with Ceres and Proserpina
Posted on June 29, 2018 | No Comments -
Cinematic Cultural Change in West Africa with Idrissa Ouédraogo
Posted on June 3, 2018 | 1 Comment -
Mild Satire, Outrage and Hostility, with Philip Roth
Posted on June 2, 2018 | No Comments -
Big Noise from Big Band Drummer Gene Krupa
Posted on April 10, 2018 | No Comments
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sprawl Archive
Iannis Xenakis and the Notion of a Cosmic Utopia
Posted on February 21, 2018 | No CommentsIannis Xenakis, the Greek-French experimental composer and protege designer for the famous architect Le Corbusier, advanced theories of the vertical "Cosmic" city as the only sustainable way forward. Here, he wrote this essay in 1966, decrying decentralization (read: suburban sprawl) in favor of building up, up, up...5 million inhabitants to be housed in a single megastructure, a hyperbolic paraboloid of more than 3,000 meters high and 50 meters wide.
Urban Farming: Nature, Art, and Society Converge
Posted on June 30, 2013 | 5 CommentsUrban farmers and gardeners around the world transform abandoned lots into edible landscapes, improving human and ecological health as well as creating beautiful places. Richard Ingersoll surveys a myriad of concepts and projects from around Europe and the United States.
Arcosanti: Paolo Soleri’s Visionary Eco-City Prototype in Arizona
Posted on January 18, 2013 | 6 CommentsA visionary eco-city in the Arizona desert, Arcosanti is an urban laboratory created by Paolo Soleri. Based on the concept of Arcology, or ecological architecture, it presents a compact, sustainable, energy-efficient urban form that confronts environmental destruction, economic collapse, and social dislocation.
BioMilano: Italian Eco-Vision Grows 26-Storey Vertical Forest
Posted on January 15, 2013 | 2 CommentsBosco Verticale or Vertical Forest, the first phase of BioMilano, a re-envisioning of Milan, Italy, with an eye toward ecological urbanism, integrating tree and skyscraper, city and wild.
Hello Urbanism: Southern California Sprawl Grows Up
Posted on April 18, 2012 | 3 CommentsSouthern California's new Sustainable Communities Strategy plan posits that as a region, we have to grow up, not out. That doesn't mean Hong Kong skyscrapers, but more apartments near light-rail stations and vibrant mixed-use areas like the ones in downtown Pasadena.
Detroit’s Sprawling Legacy: How to Overcome the Automobile? – By Jack Eidt
Posted on March 18, 2012 | 7 CommentsDetroit must overcome its sprawling landscape and its prime benefactor: the automobile, to revive the economy and become an environmentally sustainable 21st Century city.
Smart Growth: San Diego’s Approach to Sustainable Communities
Posted on March 10, 2012 | 4 CommentsWith "ambitious but achievable" transportation and land use proposals left off the table, California's first climate protection mandated Sustainable Communities Strategy aimed high but did not quite achieve setting the San Diego region on a long-term course toward sustainability.
San Diego: Sprawling Under Sunshine and the City of Villages
Posted on February 9, 2012 | 1 CommentSan Diego, a militarized metropolis with a deeply stratified economy, began as a series of villages amid canyons served by public transit, transformed into freeway-close suburban sprawl, but slowly reimagines the sustainable village model.
Newhall Ranch: Feds OK Massive Flood Plain Development
Posted on August 10, 2011 | No CommentsThe US Environmental Protection Agency and Army Corps of Engineers resolved their differences and advanced one of the largest sprawling developments ever contemplated in California on 12,000 acres along the Santa Clara River in northwest Los Angeles County. Newhall Ranch would create a city for 60,000 on a six-mile stretch of the wild, open, agricultural, free-flowing river flood plain.
Urban Humanity Revival: Walkable Neighborhoods and Mass Transit
Posted on April 25, 2011 | No CommentsThe time is now to invest in walkable neighborhoods accessed by mass transit with opportunities for cultural coming together and societal participation, instead of environmentally-destructive sprawl, cultural intolerance, societal alienation, and personal anonymity.
Nowhere to Run: American Mountain Lion in Decline
Posted on January 31, 2011 | 7 CommentsIt's the widest-ranging native land animal in the Americas, yet is declining throughout much of its range. Wilderutopia carries an interview with big cat expert Dr. Howard Quigley about the status and research implications of the elusive, enigmatic, and unique cougar.
Suburban Sprawl: Serpentine Sameness from the Skies
Posted on November 18, 2010 | 3 CommentsHelicopter photos by Christoph Gielen reveal the beautifully-designed patterns and shapes of our auto-dependent homes on the range, walking not preferred, neighbors as yet uncontacted, wildlife unwelcome, sustainable future in question.
Re-envisioning LA Sprawl – Multi-Modal, Multi-Layered, Costing Multi-Billions
Posted on October 26, 2010 | 2 CommentsOne method to rescue this unsustainable, fossil-fuel-addicted, disease-inducing polluted mega-metropolis from its sterile streetscape of cars, exhaust, and non-descript sidewalk-life, is to provide alternative transportation that cuts out the need for parking and forces people to walk.
Megacities Rise from the Egyptian Desert
Posted on August 31, 2010 | No CommentsUnsustainable urban sprawl continues to spread through the world responding to massive population growth and poor planning practices, as people clamor to escape the crowded, contaminated, crime-ridden urban miasma like Cairo.
