Archive for March 29, 2008

Floating semi-cities?

March 29, 2008 / Wendy Waters / 6 comments

The Creativity Exchange ran a post this week about The Freedom Ship – a floating city complete with airport, university, office space, and residences priced from $180,000 to $44 million.   The Freedom Ship is supposed to circumnavigate the globe every 12 months, which seems a little challenging — those Atlantic and Pacific storms might be tough to endure.

However, the idea of a stationary floating urban space is intriguing.

Many prosperous world port cities face obstacles to economic and demographic growth from geographic constraint.  Being able to add space off shore could prove valuable.  Here are some ideas for floating urban spaces:

1. A regular suburb.  You would reach it by boat or air, with frequent regular shuttles connecting it to the main city.  The space could contain a park, playground, restaurants, a grocery store, and other amenities that would make it as workable as any bedroom community suburb.  The advantage of living here would be great views, fresh air, and perhaps a short commute to work downtown.  This wouldn’t need to be as big as the floating freedom city, so could fit offshore in many coastal metropolis.

2.  A floating business park, or single occupancy company campus.  Companies like Google, Microsoft, Cisco, Electronic Arts are well known for their university-like campuses containing hundreds of thousands or even millions of square feet of office and amenity space.   As they expand, it becomes harder to find contiguous space.  Moreover, to attract and retain talented people, many of these types of companies face the issue that their employees want to live downtown or in a cool dense, urban area rather than an outlying suburb (ie San Francisco not Mountain View, Vancouver not Burnaby or Surrey).  Perhaps a solution is a floating company campus near to downtown with regular shuttles from major transit hubs and/or urban population centers.  A floating campus could offer great views, lots of natural light and air, and that special funky edge that might appeal to many workers.

3.  A floating “lifestyle centre” -  A high end shopping mall and casual entertainment space such as cafes, restaurants, etc.  along with a limited number of residential units.  Served regularly by small ferries, the merchants would also offer free shipping to a pick up point at a parkade back at the mainland.  So you could shop, then have your parcels sent ashore while you enjoyed a light lunch.

4. A floating university campus.  The new trend is for universities to integrate themselves more into the downtown and broader urban scene.   But, downtowns and urban areas are often by definition full, leaving limited space to add classrooms.  Here’s a solution.

I haven’t looked at costs or feasability.  This is pie in the sky, but intriguing none the less.

Any other ideas?

Category: "back to the center", attracting talent, residential development, urban lifestyles, urban retail trends, urban technologies /

License to car pool

March 24, 2008 / Wendy Waters / 6 comments

A couple weeks back Planetizen ran a short piece on how the small town of Qualicum Beach, BC is considering a mass carpooling system after losing their limited transit system.

The longer newspaper article mentioned that the idea came from The Good Samaritan Ride Program in Washington DC (which I couldn’t find via google, I’m wondering if it has been discontinued?).

In Qualicum Beach, drivers belonging to the program will have special stickers on their cars and riders will carry a special license–a system designed to offer some safety and security. Drivers are not supposed to receive any money for offering the rides.

This got me thinking. What if some modern and up-and-coming technologies could be employed to make carpooling a viable option in other, larger cities.

First, with GPS technology, or cel phone triangulation, drivers and passengers could find each other. A licensed passenger would say that they are at a certain intersection and want a ride to a particular place. In Vancouver, for example, a passenger might be at Granville and Georgia Streets downtown and want a ride to the Tswwassen Ferry Terminal. A licensed carpool driver heading that way would acknowledge on his/her cel phone or special carpool transmitter the need and agree to offer the ride.

Second, you could employ the eBay-like system of rating passengers and drivers. Every time a driver offers a ride, the passenger rates him or her — and the passengers are rated by the drivers. Specific questioned could be asked too about politeness, quality of conversation, respectfulness etc. This way a driver could know more about whom they are picking up — and passengers would know who will be offering a ride as they can always decline.

Third, a special carpooling device (which might just be a special cel phone) could have an “emergency” button. If a driver or passenger needs police assistance now, they press it. With the built in GPS or locational technology, the police would instantly know where they are — and who they are. This would provide a level of safety. (And, to sign up perhaps a criminal background check and personal reference check would be required).

Fourth, perhaps a modest fee would be available to drivers, to compensate them. For example, 10c a kilometer or mile. This fee would be transfered automatically upon conclusion of the ride from the passenger’s account to the driver’s. Again, the locational technology would calculate the distance traveled, so no disputes.

Such a carpooling system could also supplement the transit system on busy routes. Those with cars heading to popular destinations to have their gasoline costs covered simply by offering rides to other, pre-screened people.

As car ownership grows in cost, along with the price of operating a vehicle, offering carpool rides could be a way for some people to afford ownership — especially students, who could offer rides to fellow students. Some drivers and passengers would get to know each other, as they may tend to travel the same directions at the same time — which would further add to the safety of the system.

Has anyone out there experience with something like this?

Category: transportation /

Cool site – old video footage of cities

March 19, 2008 / Wendy Waters / 2 comments

When you have some time to watch old videos of cities, check out:

http://old-cities.blogspot.com/

It contains links to historic video footage on Youtube of large and small cities from around the world.  You can see a travel video from 1936 on Rio de Janeiro or some historic postcards of Culiacan Mexico set to music or how about Damascas, Syria c. 1920.

The blog author is Ionut Murariu.  Because of my limited ability to read Romanian, I’m not sure if he/she assembled the video clips, or just found links, however I’ve e-mailed to find out and will revise this blog entry when I know more. 

In the meantime, enjoy.

Category: urban history /

Creativity, anarchy and civilization

March 18, 2008 / Wendy Waters / 4 comments

From Journalist Frances Bula’s City States Blog:

My son, who does visuals for DJs … sent me an email from Austin today. He’s of course at the South by Southwest music festival … It seems he also has something to say about city policy.

“we went to a show last night that started at 3am and was on a bridge. like basically imagine if a band played a show on cambie st bridge and 800 people showed up and it didn’t get shut down. i asked a cab driver how it’s possible that all these shows can happen in such crazy locations and he said sxsw funnels something like 30 million dollars into austins economy so the city just turns a blind eye to all these crazy events. i thought it was really funny imagining these bands filling out paperwork to get a permit to play a show on a bridge at 3am but i guess there is none, the city just lets people do whatever they want.

i wish vancouver would relax it’s liquor license laws and take the same attitude, which would promote art and culture, instead of spending millions of dollars trying to force designated “culture” or “club” sections of the city. and only giving liquor licenses to people who can afford the 250 thousand dollars or whatever which only corporate superclubs can really afford. a similar sxsw event could happen in vancouver if only they would do that.

[apparently there is some organization of the spontaneity according to a reply from Gary Etie, an engineer and consultant in Austin]

“I just want to get the word out, because, as you say, it is a very critical issue, that affects the arts, and the ability to party, while preventing disasters that can occur from overcrowding in unsafe buildings, if not done properly and professionally.”

[Bula:] Now that is what I call one dedicated watchdog.

So there is in fact a permit system. But, from the sound of it, it’s a unique and flexible one that Austin has developed so that, yes, it can encourage exuberance and, yes, bands can hold concerts on a public bridge at 3 a.m., but there are also some rules in place so that the city doesn’t end up with bodies floating in the river, major disasters, etc.

For those who want a closer look at Gary’s site and blog, go to www.austincitypermits.com and www.austincitypermits.com/blog.

Urban areas can be like the frontier, where new forms of living or expression can be tried, beyond the reach of the state. Or, cities can be highly prescribed places where order is the main goal of government. It seems that many cities drift back and forth from “over ordered” to a state of nature.

As cities attempt to offer more space for creative expression and fun, I predict many challenges from business, citizens and other organizations to where a city policy will sit on the spectrum between anarchy and boring, excessive order. Austin is known as a “creative” hub, and a festival like this furthers that image, which probably helps attract talented, highly creative people.

***

More semi-random thoughts on this:

I like the idea of relaxing the order for certain occasions, like sxsw, to let creativity reign anywhere and everywhere for a few days so long “as bodies are not showing up in the river” the next morning. Locals can participate or leave for the duration. And, such an event can contribute to a city’s creative “brand.”

To me this approach seems more inspiring than having a designated “entertainment” zone in a city where the anarchy can take place most nights — like the New Orleans French Quarter. The latter almost seems artificial — a disneyland for young adults.

But I also wonder: could the Austin SXSW festival disorder work in cities and places that are normally tightly controlled? Or would the removal of some authority create a situation that many people cannot handle responsibly?
My reasoning (based on perhaps debatable premises) is that places like Texas naturally have less state presence and control so people are accustomed to being more responsible for their actions and looking after themselves, rather than relying on the state. So, relaxing regulations further for a few days isn’t a shock to the system … as it might be elsewhere.

Category: attracting talent, city hall, public spaces /

Interconnecting international cities by rail

March 10, 2008 / Wendy Waters / 10 comments

Travel between  regional urban centres has become more challenging in recent years.  Barriers include high gasoline prices and road congestion, reduced rail options and increasingly cumbersome air travel due to deathly slow security procedures.  These transportation barriers may need a re-think by governments at different levels in the near future.  Some background:

Ryan Avent and Richard Florida have been musing about the importance of interconnected cities to super-regional economic well being.  Avent notes how Philadelphia undergoing a renaissance as an affordable yet cool overflow area for people and business that might want to be connected to New York, but cannot afford it.

Avent:

 For Philly, part of the reason is its presence in an area with great market potential. The city has excellent connections to other booming cities, which makes it a natural place for firms and people to locate. It also benefits from being one of the low cost options in its neighborhood. Need a full service city close to the northeast action and can’t afford New York? Head to Philadelphia.

The Rust Belt has plenty of capable cities, but they’re a lot farther apart than the ones in the northeast.  … New York to Washington is only 200 miles, between which is a lot of stuff. Chicago to Detroit is closer to 300 miles, and there’s a lot less in between, because so much of the Rust Belt urban geography is clustered along the lake shore. In general, the Rust Belt is a much looser and poorer version of the northeast….

To rejuvenate the Rust Belt economy, then, governments have to find ways to allow their citizens to punch above their weight. That has to mean improved connections within and across Rust Belt cities. Deep, connected pools of human capital fuel the economy of the northeast, and the midwest has to try to marshal and mobilize its resources by moving them closer together.

Florida adds the comment that decades ago, many cities in the “rust belt” northern mid west were more connected than they are today.  People travelled by rail, sometimes overnight, to do business in another city the next day.   He also mentioned the Toronto-Buffalo megalopolis, an economic region with a troublesome international border to navigate if citizens and businesses on both sides of the border are to take full advantage of their mutual proximity.

Seattle and Vancouver  and even stretching into Portland face similar challenges.  Montreal and Boston could perhaps mutually reinforce each other in certain clusters, if travel were easier.

Rail seems to be a solution.  Even on conventional tracks rather than new “high speed” technology, better use of trains seems like an obvious way to better connect people and commerce (and non-profits and really any type of organization) in different cities.

First, train travel doesn’t need the level of security screening that airline travel now does.  It can take 90 minutes+ to go through the combination of checking in and security screening at some US airports.  For a short hop flight, this is ridiculous.  To fly from Canada to the US, you need to add time for the customs and immigration screen too.  The flight from Vancouver to Seattle takes about 45 minutes the rest of the procedure about 90 minutes, for a 2.5 to 3 hour epic (making it quicker to drive — if not for the border line up).

Second, with new wireless technology many people can be productive on the train ride if they so choose.  Cell phone conversations are allowed, and I’m sure the technology exists to offer internet connections during at least some of the journey.

Finally, on international train routes crossing the US-Canada border, customs and immigration procedures could be carried out for passengers while on board the train.  On the way to the border, an immigration screen could take place with individuals not acceptable to enter the other country left behind during a brief stop at the border.  During the rest of the journey customs officials could do their inspections of individuals and their luggage.  A version of this is done now on the Amtrack between Seattle and Vancouver.  But it could be even faster.   This way, you could hop on a train in Vancouver at say 7 AM, it would arrive in downtown Seattle at around 9 AM, and all border formalities would be carried out en route.

Similar for a trip from Buffalo or Rochester to Toronto.  Or Montreal to Boston.
In fact, trains could have sealed cars for Nexus pass holders (people pre-screened by US and Canadian customs and immigration services to cross the border without inspection).  This would reduce requirements for immigration and customs work and allow individuals with business ties faster, less intrusive travel.

In some parts of North America, for citizens of certain cities to “pull more than their economic weight” will require better cross-border connections to nearby big cities on the other side of the border.  Rail and train travel may be the solution.

Category: economic development, revitalization, transportation /

Clusters and (health) company towns

March 4, 2008 / Wendy Waters / 5 comments

In the 19th and early 20th century many towns and small cities were dominated by one industry or even one company – the factory town. For example: Flint, MI and General Motors or Dearborn, MI and Ford.

Now, in the early 21st century some new company towns are emerging in the US — ones centred around providing superior health care and even health tourism of the most expensive variety: A “hospital town” instead of a factory town.

A recent Economist article featured Rochester MN, home of the Mayo Clinic, and Cleveland, OH home of the Cleveland Clinic.

They asked the question:

What happens when a clinic takes over a metropolis?

And noted a couple of intriguing differences from the factory town era.

1 . The town needs a lot more hotel rooms per capital.  Rochester, much smaller than Minneapolis has the same number of hotel rooms.  These serve medical conference attendees as well as patients, and their families.

2. A much more skilled workforce is needed.  Doctors, nurses, lab techs, physical therapists, etc. and all sub-specialties within them have to be attracted and retained in the hospital town (not to mention the semi-skill work involved such as cleaning, food prep, etc.)

It’s Cleveland’s answer to #2 that’s intriguing.   They are now reaching out into the high schools, educating students on the variety of health care careers available.  Essentially, they are trying to grow their own talent in the town.

As city governments and business communities compete for talented workers, it seems that reaching younger people already in the city would make sense.  Give them early exposure to career options.  Maybe hire some high school students in the summer to help in various capacities.  Offer good, affordable education programs — subsidize them if you must.  And, although some will depart for other cities, many people with family ties in the area will stay — or will return once they start their own family.

Category: attracting talent, clusters, economic development, urban history /