“Mass-market production and the commodification of housing has led to a ‘flattening’ of design into a limited set of bland, homogeneous options” writes Diana Ionescu for Planetizen. Once upon a time, houses used to have unique features. Today, if you drive around any American city, you’ll see neighborhoods full of cookie cutter homes and rows of surprisingly similar, cheaply … [Read more...] about Flat is the new normal.
Climate
From beetles to mass timber.
Sandra Lupien is the Director of MassTimber@MSU, a program at Michigan State University that harnesses outreach, communications, research, education, and partnerships to advance mass timber construction and manufacture in Michigan and the surrounding region. Sandra has two decades of diverse policy, communications, external affairs, and leadership experience in the non-profit, … [Read more...] about From beetles to mass timber.
$0 Fares.
“Kansas City’s Zero Fare transit program shows major success – and what still needs to be done. It’s been three years since Kansas City voted to make its public transit free. Can it keep going?" writes Sandy Smith for Next City. In 2019 Kansas City council were unanimous in their vote to make pubic transit free, making it the first large city in the US to … [Read more...] about $0 Fares.
Dump it Right There.
In 1992 Julie Bargmann founded D.I.R.T (Dump It Right There) studio, a landscape architecture firm in Charlottesville, VA. She set out to focus on regenerating contaminated and forgotten urban and post industrial sites. Early on, one of the studio’s first major projects catapulted her work into the spotlight and became the early poster child for D.I.R.T. The Vintondale … [Read more...] about Dump it Right There.
Agri-Crowdfunding.
“The world’s population is expected to have grown by over a third from 2009 to 2050, an additional 2.3 billion people. To feed this number of people, food production will have to increase by around 70% from the 2005/07 levels (source: The World Bank). Meeting this world demand for food is going to need innovation in agriculture: selecting what to grow, how to … [Read more...] about Agri-Crowdfunding.