Interesting. I didn’t recognize the Stoicism in the philosophers who’ve most influenced my ethics (Deleuze, Nietzsche and Spinoza) but it’s clearly there. Deleuze’s whole reading of joy, as making real your power of action, and sadness as feeling like you had some capacity but it was blocked or frustrated, is a beautiful (and quite Stoic) concept. What I particularly like about this ethical system is that it goes beyond simply your power of action in the world. Rather it’s based on affect; your power to affect and, importantly, to be affected. I find adding the power to be affected is the most important part. Most applications of domination are power without affection (or being affected). A bureaucrat who decides that thousands of people get kicked off welfare and go deeper into poverty isn’t affected by their power of action. On social media we don’t see the faces of those we shame and humiliate. Drone pilots sees the grainy silhouettes of the people they bomb but are insulated from the violence in a way traditional soldiers are not. We have effect but not affection. Introducing affection into power of action gives us responsibility in the true sense of the word, an ability to respond and to be changed by that which we are changing.
Saturday, February 10, 2018
Friday, February 9, 2018
I take it that 1) Keeping energy flowing smoothly along its current lines, using the same roads, materials, processes is the most affordable? 2) The best option for the environment is to keep current fossil fuel businesses patronized without the necessity for them to spend more energy to mine new sources and set up new delivery infrastructure 3) Using existing manufactured materials–plastic roofs, drywall, joining tape, staples, etc. that are currently available in hardware stores is consistent with 1 & 2. 4) using existing materials from the store and modifying them with readily available industrial materials is a beneficial way to create housing.
Thursday, February 8, 2018
CULTURE YARDS
Cheap or free housing (including work to create it) should not be impossible to do. There are endless large abandoned structures to supply work adapting for housing and home based enterprises. These are places where drug counselling, small-animal care and horticulture could all complement each other. Not being able to see how straightforward a "solution" this could be is an incredibly huge shortcoming in the way our society is able to imagine and believe.
Cheap or free housing (including work to create it) should not be impossible to do. There are endless large abandoned structures to supply work adapting for housing and home based enterprises. These are places where drug counselling, small-animal care and horticulture could all complement each other. Not being able to see how straightforward a "solution" this could be is an incredibly huge shortcoming in the way our society is able to imagine and believe.
CULTURE YARD
Trevor Burrowes Is this Culture Yard 2? Can this building (see 0:57 on) where he lived be a shrine to Bunny Wailer? There are very handsome and solid features about it, like the steps, the concrete plinths, the window frames... Underneath the surface, the building looks solid. The quality of this scene, with its trees, its history, its low environmental impact is the best that I've ever seen. This might well be the very BEST urban space in the world. What if, after being meticulously photographed and measured, it was restored to the state that Mr. Livingston remembers? What if the people living there now are enabled to remain there...with improved education and "structure" for the children? What if that education centered on how to fix and maintain the site along the lines of its present assets...and then be able to teach other similar communities elsewhere to do likewise? Is there anyone interested in seeing this done?
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=756832854519915&set=pcb.756837137852820&type=3&theater&ifg=1
Trevor Burrowes Is this Culture Yard 2? Can this building (see 0:57 on) where he lived be a shrine to Bunny Wailer? There are very handsome and solid features about it, like the steps, the concrete plinths, the window frames... Underneath the surface, the building looks solid. The quality of this scene, with its trees, its history, its low environmental impact is the best that I've ever seen. This might well be the very BEST urban space in the world. What if, after being meticulously photographed and measured, it was restored to the state that Mr. Livingston remembers? What if the people living there now are enabled to remain there...with improved education and "structure" for the children? What if that education centered on how to fix and maintain the site along the lines of its present assets...and then be able to teach other similar communities elsewhere to do likewise? Is there anyone interested in seeing this done?
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=756832854519915&set=pcb.756837137852820&type=3&theater&ifg=1
Wednesday, February 7, 2018
ADVANTAGES OF SMALL CITIES
Garbar argues there are good reasons why people are moving less. "This is not as easy as it sounds: Yale law professor, David Schleicher, has laid out three issues that have contributed to Americans’ declining geographic mobility: zoning restrictions that raise housing prices in coastal cities, occupational licensing requirements that make it hard for professionals to cross state lines, and welfare benefits that are difficult to take from place to place," Garbar writes.
hat's more, these cities effort distinct advantages. "They’re small enough for regular people to participate in politics and make a mark oncivic life; small enough for responsive, local ownership over institutions and infrastructure like banks, broadband, retail, and food production; small enough for short commutes and easy access to nature," Garbar argues.
Garbar argues there are good reasons why people are moving less. "This is not as easy as it sounds: Yale law professor, David Schleicher, has laid out three issues that have contributed to Americans’ declining geographic mobility: zoning restrictions that raise housing prices in coastal cities, occupational licensing requirements that make it hard for professionals to cross state lines, and welfare benefits that are difficult to take from place to place," Garbar writes.
hat's more, these cities effort distinct advantages. "They’re small enough for regular people to participate in politics and make a mark on
Friday, February 2, 2018
LETTER TO THE EDITOR--TRANSPRTATION
I don’t live in the city of Atlanta, so I am not all that familiar with the particular developments. Jobs are scattered very widely over the Atlanta metropolitan area. MARTA covers only a very small portion of it. I expect the area MARTA covers is maybe 10% or 15% of the Atlanta metropolitan area.
These new developments seem to be connected by rail to the Five Points area in downtown Atlanta. One of my sons works at Five Points. (Lots of pan handlers there!) He takes an express bus twice a day. This is the only kind of transit available to the city from our suburb. He works in the building with the State of Georgia workers. (He is a subcontractor, not an employee). Marta does run quite a long distance North, but we don’t live North. I suppose if our son wanted to live in the city, this might be an option. But with a contract job, there is a question whether he would want to sign a lease for at least a year, when his contract will run out this summer.
I haven’t looked at the economics of these developments.
Artleads says:+++++++++++++- Artleads says:It’s relatively advanced when you can get to work by bus at all. There’s a free shuttle in my county (part of a regional shuttle service shared by northern NM and southern CO), but it arrives here at 11:30, long after commuters have gone to work. So they’re often near empty. They drop you off in the city at a mall where you can switch to a city bus to get to the city destination. But if you’re old or feeling poorly, you don’t want the hassle of asking all the drivers if they’re going your way. Somebody to advise you as you get off the shuttle would help. That person could be what I call a “synapse connector.”The shuttle drops you off in the city at a somewhat sleepy mall that has no supermarket. Folks coming in from the county village with no major food supply are often heading for the supermarket. There is a supermarket across a very busy, fast, wide street from the mall, and even a young person is living dangerously trying to cross it on foot. A synapse connector could take you in another shuttle to that supermarket across the street and return you for your shuttle when ready. The trouble is that the next shuttle back to the county leaves at 4:15, four hours after you got to the mall. But fixing that with small (maybe station wagon size) shuttles that operated at slightly better times with slightly better frequency doesn’t seem like too high of an expectation.
Thursday, February 1, 2018
LETTER TO THE EDITOR
s Among the items to be discussed, I don't see planning itself. We have two documents that are Sustainable something. One is a plan and the other is a code to implement the plan. The residents of Santa Fe county who understand any of this are very few. There are planning issues emerging in the field that contrast "land use" planning with "form based" planning. I think what we have here is land use planning, which groups developments into different uses, such as industrial, light-industrial, residential, and so forth. This is an old formula of planning dating from the height of smoke stack era and the 1950's explosion of car travel. This outdated form of planning--not suited to our climate realities, among much else in today's world--is the paradigm which Ms. Penny Ellis-Green, the chief county planner, has championed and is expert on. It is, however, inappropriate for the county, and indeed for most places today. Form based planning is visual and shows how development is allowed to look in a given area. But it doesn't prohibit various uses within those spaces. Mixed use zoning seems to be an improvement over single use zoning. For instance, Rancho Viejo exemplifies single use residential zoning, while south Cerrillos in SF exemplifies single use commercial zoning. Single use zoning exacerbates commute traffic, since it requires automobile travel for employees to reach work. How form based planning and mixed use zoning intersect needs to be studied. Each might have considerable improvements to offer over what we have now.
s Among the items to be discussed, I don't see planning itself. We have two documents that are Sustainable something. One is a plan and the other is a code to implement the plan. The residents of Santa Fe county who understand any of this are very few. There are planning issues emerging in the field that contrast "land use" planning with "form based" planning. I think what we have here is land use planning, which groups developments into different uses, such as industrial, light-industrial, residential, and so forth. This is an old formula of planning dating from the height of smoke stack era and the 1950's explosion of car travel. This outdated form of planning--not suited to our climate realities, among much else in today's world--is the paradigm which Ms. Penny Ellis-Green, the chief county planner, has championed and is expert on. It is, however, inappropriate for the county, and indeed for most places today. Form based planning is visual and shows how development is allowed to look in a given area. But it doesn't prohibit various uses within those spaces. Mixed use zoning seems to be an improvement over single use zoning. For instance, Rancho Viejo exemplifies single use residential zoning, while south Cerrillos in SF exemplifies single use commercial zoning. Single use zoning exacerbates commute traffic, since it requires automobile travel for employees to reach work. How form based planning and mixed use zoning intersect needs to be studied. Each might have considerable improvements to offer over what we have now.
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