Innovation

The Greening of NYC, as Seen by A Designer
This article talks about Sustainable Cities. My question is: How do you define “Sustainable City?” There is a transition from the Big Apple to the Green Apple, I noticed, when referring to NYC. So, NYC is an example of one of those model cities!! Among all its diverse cultural background and its richness of places and opportunities, some people still find a way to make this place greener. The ecologically interesting places should not be unmentioned. NYC is a place where fascinating events take place, one of them being Earth Day in 1990. And the list of such marvels goes on……
This article talks about how innovative NYC is. The “I Love NYC” t-shirts now make sense to me. What is meant by Sustainable Cities, I ask again. These cities are what we call Sustainable Development hot spots, or places were economy is in harmony with the environment. This article talks about how, because “we” are the world’s top producers, we are compensating that luxury/need/fact with recycling and how to effectively manage waste. On the other hand, there is an academic interest: NYU with its Environmental Management courses and Columbia with its Industrial Ecology projects. Overall, NYC is very healthy. It is a place where walking to go to work is commonplace, and where nature is appreciated in the middle of civilization. And the innovation is like the energizer Bunny…it keeps going and going and going……The Green Apple is indeed an industrial paradise!

Public Architecture and Design-Creating Community The Politics of Open Space Design
Parks are popular social centers in many urban environments. I recall last year reading about Frederick Law Olmstead. After studying in Yale, he traveled to China, and then came back to USA. Olmstead was an ecological visionary and an innovator. Did he or his successors have something to do with the designing of Cornell? This is what I read in “wikipedia” regarding Olmstead contribution to Cornell:
For example, in one of the earliest plans, Frederick Law Olmsted, the designer of Central Park, outlined a "grand terrace" overlooking Cayuga Lake.[19] Because the terrace plan was dropped, McGraw Hall appears to face the wrong direction, facing the Slope rather than the Arts Quad.
This article talks about LA, and how it needs parks. Olmstead will be revived, and his transcendental ideas will be applied to LA, a place with a lot of natural beauty.

The Solaire, Live Green
The theme this week is innovation. A blink of the future. What’s to be trendy: water will be recycled, buildings will have rooftop gardens. Think and live green! Sustainability at its apex! Great ideas, now lets get to business….how much does it cost to live this dream? …because, unless one has the Big Green Dollar to make it a reality, this is only really fantastic for the rest of the population. How can this become accessible to all, and is this possible? Somehow!?!