ECO•LABORATORY: Seattle’s Exemplary Eco Community
Eco•Laboratory – 2008 Natural Talent Design Competition
The Eco•Laboratory is an exemplary green complex designed around a vibrant community garden In Seattle’s Belltown neighborhood. Conceived by Weber Thompson, the project recently won the Natural Design Talent Competition at Greenbuild. The innovative design focuses upon energy systems, natural ventilation, community aspects, renewable energy, and indoor air quality, resulting in a spectacular example of what green building is about – interdisciplinary teams designing living buildings.
Hong Kong’s tri-level pedestrian street system
So if Copenhagen, Denmark is arguably the birthplace of the modern pedestrianization movement, what’s the leading city as far as a contemporary pedestrianization plan? It’d be difficult to beat what Hong Kong has done since 2000. As you can see in the plans above, Hong Kong’s newly annointed pedestrian streets aren’t just extensive within city districts, but extensive in districts throughout the city. Streets in green are pedestrianized full-time, blue is part-time, and those in yellow are traffic-calmed. For larger-sized plans check out the City of Hong Kong Transport Department’s Pedestrianization website. What’s notable about Hong Kong’s plan is that the City didn’t ask the question, “Should we pedestrianize streets”, but rather, “Which streets should we pedestrianize, and how much?“ The key criteria is the number and productivity of sources for pedestrian traffic such as subway entrances, markets, restaurants, shops, schools, and from that the three levels of pedestrianized streets, full-time, part-time and traffic-calmed are determined. Read more in the Urbanphoto article, Pedestrian Streets, Hong Kong Style.
China Should Send Western Planners Home
Chinese officials visiting the United States, Western Europe, Canada or Australia must wonder at the disconnect between the wasteland described by Western planners and the unparalleled quality of life enjoyed by people in the West.
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You don’t have to be an American or European to realize that the automobile has created mobile urban areas in which employers and employees have far greater choices or that mobility makes labor markets more efficient. It is not a mistake that housing built on inexpensive land on the periphery of urban areas has made it possible for so many millions to build up financial equity in their own homes, or enjoy the kind of privacy that the more wealthy or well-connected have enjoyed. Nor is it a mistake that nearby inexpensive land has been developed by retailers and other businesses who are, as a result, able to provide lower prices than would otherwise be possible.
The West has achieved its unparalleled affluence because planners were unable to impose their will to prevent suburbanization and the expansion of mobility. They could not hold back the democratization of prosperity.”
