Sharing tidbits and links:
– Lew Powell shared this article about a math whiz in Manhattan who is devising an intricate Excel program to show the cost to everyone from each car, truck, taxi or bus that enters Manhattan daily. It’s in Wired magazine. For congestion-policy geeks and others.
[Lew, for you who don’t know him, is now retired from his long-time role as Observer Forum editor, Buzz editor and office “wag” – as when people would write, “an office wag quipped … ” and recount a pithy and witty observation.]
– A sad, ironic note. The Mecklenburg County Park and Recreation Department recently learned it’s one of three finalists for the 2010 NRPA Gold Medal Award. It’s an annual award from the National Recreation and Park Association (NRPA) honoring excellence in management and planning of parks and recreation agencies. Of course, the county park department’s budget is being cut almost in half. It’s losing dozens of staff to layoffs, and some of its programs will have to be eliminated.
– Want to see a new promotional video for the city, done by the Charlotte Regional Visitors Authority (CRVA)? It’s at the bottom of this page. Cameos by Michael Jordon,
Winston Kelly, Anthony Foxx, a tray full of homemade biscuits and more. I note one shot early on is from – gasp! – the Daniel Stowe Botanical Gardens in Belmont (not Gastonia, as I wrote in haste Thurday night). That’s legit if you think of “Charlotte” as the region. Not sure about that Childress Vineyard clip, though. It’s up the road rather a ways, outside Lexington. Pick you up some Lexington BBQ on your way …
– Here’s a link to the piece in the Atlantic magazine about Andres Duany – a piece I referenced in my May 21 op-ed, “Jane Jacobs, Robert Moses and NIMBYs.” If you missed them, here are a couple of earlier posts on related topics, here and here. Both were written at a conference where Duany spoke, sponsored by the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy, the Nieman Foundation and the Harvard Graduate School of Design. Anthony Flint of Lincoln Institute sure wished I’d have mentioned that sponsorship in the print oped. I should have, he’s right.
– ‘Bright flight’ changes the face of cities, suburbs/Younger, educated whites moving to urban areas for homes, jobs – It’s a link to an Associated Press story on the msnbc.com web site. It refers to a Brookings Institution study released in May, but the link to the study on Brookings site is temporarily broken. This link takes you to the main Metropolitan Policy Program site at Brookings.