| |
| |
|
Science Information |
|
|
|
How Do Cities Grow?
You see the cities in America started where there was a river and small populations sprung up, then the railroad steam engines needed a place to fill up the water. Eventually the towns got larger and grew near the rail stations. Then as people moved outward and behind the downtown areas they grew without regards to modern day planning methods, making increased surface transportation rather difficult. Today master planned communities and larger city planners design the outlining areas with ring roads. Yet even with all these modern theories you still get the terms; Spaghetti Bowl, Mixing Bowl, Cluster Muck, by those who have to navigate such areas where major roads all come together. One little fender bender and the entire system breaks down. When cities are built around bodies of water a ring road theory or design fails because ring road concept serves the center, but in the center is only those fish. It will help the Marine Industry, but hurts the flows of civilization. If you look at large cities near bays, the successful ones with transportation flows have concentric rings around the outside of the lake or bay. The traffic flows in Bay Cities is often ill conceived and causes problems with growth and makes for deplorable traffic conditions. Some cities have meandered traffic flows to make sure that all roads lead to the regional mall, auto mall and of course City Hall, in order to collect revenue from the sales tax as consumers buy products in their city. This was the big push in city strategy between the 1980's and 1990's and for the most part it worked but caused local traffic to go around such roads and thus caused other streets traffic issues, but the cities had the money they needed to build parks and maintain high levels of city services. In the 1990's a new fad started the older cities and even newer projects worked to build a downtown with tilt up prefabs like the project in Columbus, Ohio at the Limited Co. mall. These projects go on today in many cities trying to revitalize downtown and for the cities which work to bring people back to downtown and the flow into those areas which have experienced urban flight to "the burbs" it has come with hard fought eventual success. The Smart Growth debate will continue until far into the future, what is of importance is to not lose sight of the flows, which go into the proper growth. Here is a very relevant article which makes this point quite well; http://www.tripnet.org/smartgrowth.htm . Just like the song; The foot bone is connected to the leg bone, the leg bone is collected to the hip bone, the hip bone is connected to the?. In other words all roads are connected in some way to all other roads even if a ferry is in-between. All roads are connected to all bus stations and all railways connect and intersect to all roads. And all airports are connected to one another and to the ground transportation. Ring roads and proper surface street infrastructures separate the good transportation flows from the bad ones. Some cites have done better than others in this regard, but one only has to look at places like San Francisco and the Bay area to see the problems. If you look at 101 and 280 on the West side of the bay you can see attempts at a solution with connecting highways, but they are far and few between. Even down lower in San Jose the last minute expressways are hard to navigate and were put in too late. East Bay is a complete disaster and you can see why BART was necessary. There are many good examples of ring roads which have been done correctly for instance Houston, but when you add people so fast, even a well done system can be overloaded. Most of our major cities are now over loaded with cars and the roads are not handling the flow. And we keep making them and buying them, which is our choice as consumers. The problems are that we are not utilizing our transportation systems correctly, We have peak periods where no one can get anywhere and times when the streets are literally empty. Sometimes we find as cities grow improperly to service the region, we have severe cogs in the flow of transportation. Think on this. "Lance Winslow" - If you have innovative thoughts and unique perspectives, come think with Lance; www.WorldThinkTank.net/wttbbs
MORE RESOURCES:
Science - Google News |
|
|
|
RELATED ARTICLES
The Valuable Individual How can we, as individuals, participate in waste management? Because some of us are so overwhelmed with Earth's problems, we feel that our contributions have no real consequence in the end. For others, social barriers can be an issue. Flying a Beach Ball UFO Recently some NASA Scientists were able to fly a MAV; Micro Air Vehicle using a laser to power it and then chase it around the room with the laser beam? Sounds like kids stuff, yet is has some incredible applications for other things. For instance we could use Whispering Windows and Talking Glass Technologies to propel helium filled beach ball. Using High Altitude Blimp Cell Phone Communication By allowing high altitude Satellite Type Balloons or Blimps with Cell Phone type communications we could have a tremendous secondary back-up for communication. Also we could use this high altitude blimp to send out frequencies good for health, such as the Earth's frequency of 7. Precognition Shock to Prevent Bullet Strike It is a pretty well known fact and has been proven that the body seems to pre-adjust to changes in advance of events by a second or two. For instance there have been studies of test subjects with finger sensors, which would show the subjects pulse or adrenaline spiked right before they were to be shocked. Making Diamonds Using The Earth We can make diamonds using the Earth's inner forces, extreme pressure and heat. We simply send Carbon Blocks in tubes, which have been drilled into the Earth's Mantle. Cloaking a UAV in Flight If you will recall the Klingon Space Craft and Warship cloaked it's self as it attacked the USS Enterprise under Captain James T. Kirk. UAV Blimps Powered By Hydro-Electric Motors Using Hydro and Fluid Dynamic Theory I believe it is possible to design a pilot-less hydro-electric blimp which would have a propulsion system which never requires fuel and would be based on a Perpetual Motion Machine which uses fluid dynamics in a hydro-electric. First the shape of this thing would be similar to the new shopping mall shade cover on the Las Vegas Strip. The Intricacies of a Compound Microscope Have you ever used a compound microscope? Your first thought may be to answer "no" but chances are if you had Biology in high school or college that you have used a compound microscope. What do you remember about this microscope? You may remember what it looks like but can you recall how it worked? If not, this article is for you!A compound microscope uses light to illuminate the sample or object so that you can see it with your eye. Crop Circles and Genetic Knowledge The crop circle enigma is not always a hoax. I am not able to see how someone could do a massive design overnight in the cases where the plants have their stems broken from within. Feb. 12 is Darwin Day -- Secular Americans Celebrate Bday of Evolution Champ This Feb. 12 marks the 196th anniversary of Charles Darwin's birth!The day has special significance for America's nearly 30 million nonreligious people. Reverse Osmosis and Deionized Water Filtration Let's face it if you are in a business needing de-ionized water or reverse osmosis water you are always concerned about the quality of your water. I know as a mobile detailing business that when we have ultra clean water in our tanks we are a happy camper. How to Build a Mechanical Bullet Which Turns A Mechanical bullet, which will turn in flight is well within our technical capabilities. The premise is to have a bullet, which is preset to turn a corner can be achieved thru a small gear setting on the bullet or a preset finger on the barrel or in the chamber which can be dialed in prior to discharge. We Have Come Along Way in Our Exploitation of Transportation We sure have come along way since the horse and buggy or the first Model T that left the assembly line. We have attempted to build unbelievable transportation items and prototypes for instance; the Spouse Goose, jet powered bullet trains, under water autonomous vehicles and those X-Planes. Organic Decoy Devices for Warfare (ODDW) We can genetically modify a rat to be the same body temperature as a humans, then parachute in several thousand rats into enemy territory. These rats will pick up the enemies advanced warning and intrusion sensors by way of heat signature. Aerodynamics of a Flying Disk or Flying Sphere Aerodynamics of a flying sphere. It has been said that in the future we maybe flying around anti-gravity type spheres, but this does not mean it will not have to deal with relative wind in our own atmosphere. Secrets of The Mathematical Symmetry of Nature and Patterns of Erosion As scientists and theorists study patterns, design, chaos, complexity they often turn to nature for examples and there is plenty of examples in nature too. The stripes on a zebra, patterns on a butterfly, spider webs, leafs on a tree, scales on a fish, seashells, brain waves, muscle structure, texture of granite, spider webs, Earth cycles, waves on the ocean, wind flow, clouds in the sky, Rainbows, Solar System, structure of a meteorite and even DNA itself. Shooting Down a UAV in Flight Shooting Down an Enemy UAV so it cannot give away military movement intelligence.We know that with any new innovation in warfare or any new theme that comes along or borrowed technology from another industry to help in the ongoing struggle and conflict of man is short lived. Human Motion, Walking, Running and Gait for Identification Identifying a human gait, walking patterns, running exists. Can such records be of value? Many think so. Underground Cities, Save the Humans Perhaps we should design tunneling robots, which can dig out an underground city. Unmanned Tunneling robots to build underground cookie cutter cities to save mankind from possible future calamity. RFID Sensors to Protect Water Supplies Recently the US Military has developed a special set of sensors for water supplies for troops. Any time a base camp is set up it is important to monitor the water supplies and test them.
|
| home | site map |
| © 2006 |
