In cities across the United States, sandwiched quietly between the newly coveted urban space of the central city and the suburban sprawl of the periphery, are outwardly conventional landscapes experiencing profound transformation. Neither urban nor suburban, they represent a hybrid condition — part global city, part garden suburb, part swinging singles complex, part disinvestment.
Popularity: 25% [?]
Some 120,000 people work in Tysons Corner, Va., but only 17,000 live there. To transform this hotbed of suburban gridlock into a green, walkable city, a soon-to-be-adopted plan-as envisioned by our artist-calls for as much as tripling the current square footage by expanding upward, with the tallest buildings located next to four new train stations, which should be completed by 2013.
Popularity: 64% [?]
Much has been written about how suburbs have taken people away from the city and that now suburbanites need to return back to where they came. But in reality most suburbs of large cities have grown not from the migration of local city-dwellers but from migration from small towns and the countryside.
It is true that suburban areas have been growing strongly, while core cities have tended to grow much more slowly or even to decline. The predominance of suburban growth is not just an American phenomenon, but is fairly universal in the high income world).
Popularity: 23% [?]
If the rest of the world cannot get it right in these unhappy times, this tiny Buddhist kingdom high in the Himalayan mountains says it is working on an answer.
“Greed, insatiable human greed,” said Prime Minister Jigme Thinley of Bhutan, describing what he sees as the cause of today’s economic catastrophe in the world beyond the snow-topped mountains. “What we need is change,” he said in the whitewashed fortress where he works. “We need to think gross national happiness.”
Popularity: 21% [?]
Seeking to improve air quality, an Arlington citizens’ group will study ways to reduce emissions from cars idling in drive-through restaurants.
“We’re just trying to put our heads together and see if there’s any way we can improve the situation,” City Councilwoman Sheri Capehart said Wednesday. “And there may not be.”
Popularity: 13% [?]
A gigantic isometric eBoy-like infographic, based on the concept of summarizing world statistics as a village of 100 people [binsworld.com]. As a result, all the objects and characteristics within it become a percentage: 6 cars, 24 televisions, 9 English speaking people, 10 homosexuals, and so on. The village is divided into 5 navigable zones: Economy, Life, Food, Danger and a World map.
Popularity: 13% [?]