Each week we will be focusing on blogs from around the world dealing specifically with urban environments. We’ll be on the lookout for websites outside the country that approach themes related to urban experiences and issues.
• Are slower streets more popular? Flickr user Eric Fischer attempts to quantify the relationship through a series of graphs which plot the number of photos/tweets per 100-ft sq. area and the indicated vehicle speed. By his calculation, 9 miles per hour is the ideal speed for a photograph/tweet-worthy street.
• Modern airports have lots of unused space. At Chicago’s O’Hare airport, some of that space is being put to use for a beekeeping program. Local community groups have installed a 2,400 sq. ft. apiary, complete with 23 hives which will produce 575 pounds of honey. Other program benefits: the program trains felons in the art of bee keeping and the bees provide a useful indicator of air quality. (GOOD)
• NYT writer, Jeff Gordiner, comments on the possibility for high and low speed urban living created by NYC’s High Line. On the High Line, the pace of life slows down, people sit, stroll and contemplate. Below the High Line, the loud clubs of the Meatpacking District thump. “It’s all New York, of course, both the manic and the muted; the city thrives on opposition.”
• In Paris, artist Elise Morin and architect Clémence Eliard have created an undulating landscape of discarded CDs. (Pop-Up City)
• Just how does Google know where the centre of the city is? German artist Aram Bartholl is exploring this question by installing life-size iconic red pins in the exact location that Google identifies as city centre. (Architizer)
Image from Architizer
Do you have a World Wide Wednesday worthy article you’d like to share? Send the link to www@spacing.ca