Category: New Tech
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Counting the Carbon Foot Prints and Changing Our Behavior!
In a recent discussion with a planner the question of over-consumption came up and how it impacts the health of our planet. It is understood that we consume more raw materials than a sustainable eco-system can provide for. In 2007 our (global) Ecological Foot Print was 1.5 planet earth, i.e. we consumed earth’s resources 1.5 times faster than the earth…
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Sim City through the eyes of a city planner
Ever since the first iteration of the computer game, Sim City has been associated with urban planning, or more precisely, city building. The series’ wide reach make it one of the most successful simulation games of all time. And you know that a city building game has firmly placed itself in popular culture when even Stephen Colbert jokes about…
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When Planners Take Vacation Pictures
On a recent trip to Germany, I took exactly ONE picture, and it wasn’t of the Brandenburg Gate or the picturesque Rhine Valley but – of an electric car charging station. Mind you, this picture was not taken in any of the major cities but in a mid-sized town of about 250,000 people, in a…
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Using mapping tools to make the development permitting process more transparent
It’s occurred to me that, in the era of open governments and publicly available data of all kinds, the development and permitting process should seek to connect to this emerging practice and become more transparent. We live in a time in which governments are increasingly making their data available to the public, only to hope…
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Revisit Paris and New York, Courtesy of Airpano from Russia
AirPano Several photography buffs from Moscow started to photograph the famous monuments and cities with a 360 degree panoramic camera mounted on a small radio controlled helicopter like device. These high-resolution films of the cities taken from a height of 50 to 250 meter are amazing to see. Their panoramic views provide a detailed context to these monuments which is hard to get through a…