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Mapping Our Social Universe

July 31, 2007 | 1 Comment

There are a few new mapping websites that help you find out about your world. Take a look at these cool sites:

Walk Score

WalkScore analyzes your neighborhood (or potential neighborhood) and gives it a score from 1-100. The score is based on how walkable the neighborhood is. It finds the nearby places like restaurants and parks, marks them on the map, and pumps out a score. Take a look:

Factory Farm Map

The Factory Farm Map by Food & Water Watch shows you where factory farms exist in the US and which states and counties pollute the most. Here’s a screen shot:

Super Vegan Restaurant Search

SuperVegan restaurant search plots out vegan and vegetarian restaurants on a map for you. Currently, the site only searches the New York area, but hopefully soon it will search other metro areas, too. Here are the results for a search for Brooklyn vegan restaurants:

Have you found some others? I’d love to know about them.

Rumors About Children

July 31, 2007 | Leave a Comment

I am not pregnant. I’m also not Jewish. Just thought I’d clear that up.

If I were pregnant, I wouldn’t even consider the name “Rainbow.” No offense to anyone named Rainbow, it’s just not a name that’s on my short list. (Same goes for the name “Firefly” for a boy.)

Let me just start another rumor: If a child should enter our lives any time soon, it may come with a name. Yes, we’re considering adoption! :)

If you adopted a child, or are an adoptive child, or know about adoption I’d LOVE to hear your story.

The Economics of Climate Change

July 31, 2007 | Leave a Comment

This graph, from a power point presentation about parking, shows how people’s use of mass transport and carpooling changes when the price of parking increases.

My mom is a retired City Planner and my grandfather was an Architect, so it’s no surprise that I’m interested in design and how it affect human behavior and habits. For example, when streets in a city are narrow, parking is limited and/or expensive, and trees line the streets, people tend to walk more and drive less. When streets are wide, parking is free and aplenty, and shade and noise reduction is no where to be found, people tend to drive more. Not only do they drive more, there is more road rage and more car accidents.

Safe, cheap, and easy mass transportation has an impact on how much people drive, but the simpler solutions, like paying for parking, has a greater impact. When people pay the actual cost for the things they do their habits change dramatically. Low impact living/ reducing your global footprint/ stopping global warming is not about sacrifice, it’s not about limiting your freedoms, and it’s not about communism. It’s about paying for what you use.

Currently, parking is subsidized. Most people do not pay for parking. The costs of parking are tacked onto the costs for running a business, the cost of merchandise, the cost of managing a city. The driver rarely pays these costs, but someone does. Parking spaces don’t magically float into the world from the heavens. Parking buildings don’t grow up from the ground organically like a tree. If drivers paid for the real cost of driving, they’d drive less. Simple.

He Had It Coming

July 31, 2007 | Leave a Comment