Ever wonder why the supermarket only carries four types of apples? With the proliferation of commercial-scale agriculture, hundreds of unique fruit and vegetable varietals were lost, spurned in favor of heartier and easier to ship breeds. The Chicago Rarities Orchard Project, or CROP, is a new initiative that seeks to reclaim this lost biodiversity (along [...]
“Where you live is probably a bigger determinant of your health than whether you have health insurance,” as quoted in a Bay Area Regional Health Inequities Initiative (BARHII) report from 2008. In West Oakland, where 45% of the residents make under $25,000 a year, according to statistics from Mandela Market Place, liquor stores outnumber food [...]
CityCamp events are considered by many urban enthusiasts around the world as one of the best opportunities to meet different actors that work for the improvement of urban space. CityCamp evolved from its Buenos Aires edition into a larger, open-sourced community focused on promoting an exchange of experiences and establishing guidelines for coordinated work between [...]
Affordable housing is scarce in the city of San Francisco. Low-income residents and students a-like struggle to get by in a city that is so full of opportunity, yet so economically biased. One viable option towards solving this crisis is utilizing secondary dwelling units, aka “in-law units,” as a way to provide living opportunities that [...]
A typical three-story walkup building in Chicago Urban planners the world over recognize that affordable housing is crucial for neighborhood stability, as well as workforce diversity and the economic sustainability of a given region. But in the summer of 2012, the tight rental market in major cities like Chicago meant that landlords could get record [...]
It is May 28th, 1953, and Sir Edmund Hillary becomes the first man to reach Mount Everest’s peak. It is July 21st, 1969, and Neil Armstrong becomes the first man to traverse the moon’s surface. It is September 3rd, 2012, and Jim Hallsey consecrates the 35th anniversary of the NC Mountains-to-Sea Trail by hiking, biking, [...]
I began writing for The GRID after re-locating from Albuquerque, NM to Mammoth Lakes, CA. While I have always found blogging to be an exceptional outlet for personal use and staying connected with family and friends, I had never considered the benefit I could derive from it professionally until I joined Global Site Plans. For [...]
In spirit of the burgeoning backlash to the North Carolina legislature’s contentious support for fracking, as presented in my previous article, this piece will review the state’s particular advocacy for “Save the Outer Banks.” A polemic released in July of 2008 spells out with retrospectively astonishing accuracy the threats to North Carolina’s coast; ones that [...]
Writing is a vehicle. And it continues to drive me, from the place I began, to where I am heading today. Hard to believe, but six months have passed since I began my blogging position with The Grid. Just a few months ago, I was a senior in college, interested in pursuing a path that [...]
Economic development is the practice of inspiring private investment, retaining, and creating jobs. Economic development specialists and urban planners focus on economic development, work towards promoting entrepreneurship and small business development, implementing tax incentives for development projects, and expanding employment opportunities for local residents. In Mammoth Lakes, CA the current economic development strategy is to [...]
At the corner of 6th Avenue and Toole Avenue in Tucson, Arizona, you can find a 20-foot high kinetic sculpture, which is a butterfly with a 6 ½-foot wingspan. This fancy public art, created by Bevel Butterfly Company, is a highlight of the Tucson Warehouse Art District; it is a newly completed, two-month old, installation. [...]
The Town of Mammoth Lakes, CA, in the eastern sierra region of California, is surrounded by earthquake faults. In addition, Mammoth Mountain is an actual active volcano on the rim of the Long Valley Caldera. This caldera is one of the most seismically active regions of California. In 1980, Mammoth Lakes experienced 81 tremors of [...]
“What happens to the water happens to the people” is the call to action by supporters of Coldwater Spring in Minneapolis, Minnesota. September 2012 marks the opening of the redesigned Coldwater Park, Birthplace of Minnesota and traditional ceremonial site of local Native American tribes. From pre-contact hunting territory, to a U.S. military base, to a [...]
On opposite sides of the country are two of Canada’s iconic cities: Vancouver, British Columbia and Toronto, Ontario. In this age of green building practices and sustainable development, both cities are pushing forward to be leaders in environmentally conscious city planning and design. Toronto has adopted a green roof strategy and passed bylaws to require [...]
Have ever you tried to get services without using any regular exchange tools like money? Have you been to a bank where your savings are deposited as in units of “time?” Zumbara is a social platform where you exchange services with other people and are paid by time as currency instead of money. Saved hours [...]
June Mountain is located approximately 20 miles (31 kilometers) north of the town of Mammoth Lakes, California. Opened in 1961, the ski area provides the economic epicenter of June Lake, CA, a small, unincorporated community in Mono County. Unfortunately, on June 21, 2012, the day that the mountain was supposed to open for summer activities, [...]
According to the EPA, in 2010, Americans generated about 250 million tons of trash and recycled materials, while composting over 85 million tons of material. Environmental sustainability and responsible resource use are important political and urban planning topics. A study conducted by the Ecology Center of Ann Arbor revealed that Detroit is the only major [...]
Istanbul, one of the oldest cities in the world, is often considered to be amongst the most beautiful ones. The city served as a capital for Byzantium, East Roman, and Ottoman Emperors, as well as the most popular for the Turkish Republic. All along, Istanbul’s seven hills, serpentine waterside, dark cypress trees, and vertically slender minarets break [...]
Since Camp Quixote began in February 2007, as a protest on a city-owned plot of land in downtown Olympia, it has moved from church-to-church across the city – every few months. In 2010 Camp Quixote began to take steps to establish a permanent settlement that would provide living, community, and gardening space for the homeless. [...]
When Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan announced that the current government, Justice and Development Party (AKP), will undergo the biggest project of all times for Istanbul, aptly named “The Crazy Project” by Istanbulites, no one ever thought it would be an artificial sea-level waterway crossing through the entire European side of Istanbul, connecting the [...]
