Category Archives: News

Poor Richard’s Almanac for Planners | Issue 2

Courteous Reader,

I am tempted to win your favor by declaring I wrote this Almanac for Planners solely for the public good. However, this is insincere and you are too wise for the deception of this pretense. The fact is I am excessively poor and, unfortunately, excessively wifeless. To address both problems, I must begin to make some profit since every potential wife always asks, “What kind of car do you drive?” I always have to reply, “I walk”, and the potential wife thinks I am a deviant.

Indeed, this motive would have been enough to write this Almanac many years ago except for the overwhelming desire of the public and professionals to only hear what they want to hear and my overwhelming desire to secure a salary. I am now of sufficient age to no longer care about telling people what they want to hear but only about what they need to know. This has freed me to write this Almanac for Planners in increments of ten cause it worked for Moses and the Almighty. Hopefully, my Almanac gains your likes and retweets as a means of demonstrating the usefulness of my efforts but also your charity to this poor Friend and Servant,

Richard

On Cities

11. Cities are vibrant because its residents are alive. Cemeteries are tranquil because its residents are dead. Do not ever confuse the two.

12. People are alive, cars are not. Always build your cities for the living and never for those things that are not.

13. Nothing about cities is ideal, that is what makes them so fascinating.

On Planners

14. A planner who leads never worries about being loved. A planner who worries about being loved never leads.

15. 19th century land speculators were a lot smarter than you think and 20th century urban planners were lot dumber than they pretend.

16. Life is fast enough without urban planners trying to speed things up.

On NIMBYism

17. NIMBY (Not in My Backyard) is polite terminology for “I’ve got mine, Jack, so screw you.”

18. Environmentalism is often the wolf of NIMBYism masquerading in sheep’s clothing.

19. Highly praise altruistic motives but have the courage to condemn selfish ones for what they really are.

On Urban Space
20. Space flows, never congests.

The Issue 3 cometh soon!

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Space Syntax | 2012 Olympics Opening Ceremonies | London

A lot of people did not notice it at the time. Heck, even I did not notice it in the moment. But what was that on the stadium floor during the 2012 Olympics Opening Ceremonies in London… after they took up the turf masquerading as a ‘green and pleasant land’? Why is was none other than the space syntax model of London itself! Pretty cool, if you ask me. See a beautiful aerial photograph of the space syntax model on the stadium floor during rehearsals below, courtesy of The Sun above.

More information here from University College London.

Read more about it here at The Daily Mail.

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Original CNN Money/Fortune Article about Backdoor Bailouts

Excerpt:

“What’s more, dozens of zombie home builders and other serial money-losers will stake similar claims (of profit) in coming months, in a cash scramble that could cost the government more than $50 billion.”

You really can’t make up these examples of crony capitalism.

Link to the full article: http://money.cnn.com/2010/01/07/news/companies/lennar.taxes.fortune/index.htm.

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Long commute time linked with poor health, new study shows | USATODAY.com

A study published this month in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine found that the longer people drive to work, the more likely they are to have poor cardiovascular health.

“This is the first study to show that people who commute long distances to work were less fit, weighed more, were less physically active and had higher blood pressure,” said Christine M. Hoehner, a public health professor at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis and the study’s lead author. “All those are strong predictors of heart disease, diabetes, and some cancers.”

The study monitored the health of 4,297 adults from 12 counties in Texas, a metropolitan region where 90 percent of people commute to work by car, Hoehner said.

The New York area has the longest average commuting time — almost 35 minutes — of any metropolitan area, according to the Census Bureau in its analysis of the 2009 American Community Survey. But the other nine metro areas in the top 10 also averaged a half hour or more. And even the area with the shortest average commute, Great Falls, Mont., still clocked in at 14 minutes.

That’s important because those who commuted by car 10 miles or more each way were more likely to have high blood pressure than people who drove shorter distances. And those who traveled 15 or more miles each way were more likely to have bigger waistlines and less likely to be physically active, according to Hoehner’s study.

Tom Ricci, 53, drives 130 miles round trip each day from his home in Mahopac, N.Y., to his job at a music record company in Lyndhurst, N.J.

He gets up at 4:30 a.m. almost every day to hit the gym before work.

“I’d go crazy and lose my mind” without a workout routine, Ricci said. “You need a release from that grind.”

Diet, exercise and sleep habits were not looked at in the study, Hoehner said. They also can also contribute to obesity and high blood pressure.

Christine Bruno of Garrison, N.Y., feels the difference. Her commute used to be 7 minutes. Now since she moved in with her fiance it take up to 90 minutes each way to make the 40-mile trek to New Rochelle, N.Y.

“By the time you finish your final meal of the day, there is no time to do much else,” said Bruno, 40. “There is no time to exercise. And there is no time to go to the gym, and it’s a huge issue, because I used to be a gym rat.”

Danielle Mahoney, 36, lives in Patterson, N.Y., works in Suffern, N.Y., and commutes 126 miles round trip a day. Her company offers fitness classes to employees several times a week so they can exercise during the day. Without them, Mahoney said, she wouldn’t have time for the gym, especially with twin toddlers at home.

The hours she spends in her car are “definitely draining,” she said. “If it’s a longer day or you didn’t get enough sleep, you can doze when you are driving,” she said. “Numerous times I catch myself.”

Dr. Franklin Zimmerman, a cardiologist and director of critical care at Phelps Memorial Hospital in Sleepy Hollow, N.Y., said what makes long commutes by car even worse is that many people are also sitting at work.

He tells patients to get 30 minutes of moderate to vigorous exercise each day. If people can’t get to the gym, he suggests they park their cars farther from their offices and then walk. People can also sneak in exercise by getting off the elevator and taking the stairs.

“It’s OK to split it up into increments,” he said. “It’s hard to find 30 minutes, but it’s not hard to find five minutes, and all of that still counts.”

Contributing: Tim Henderson, The (Westchester, N.Y.) Journal News

via Long commute time linked with poor health, new study shows – USATODAY.com.

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