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But wouldn’t an increase in more walkable neighborhoods or dense housing lead to less need for residential landscape architects?

There would be overall less area of residential lots that need landscaping, so there would be less of that sort of design work, but making walkable neighborhoods includes the creation of streets that are attractive and…[Read more]

“Greatest misallocation of resources in the history of the world” -The ever pessimistic James Howard Kunstler

I admittedly just skimmed, so sorry if you mentioned this, but I don’t think it’s so much the mid-century suburbs that planners and archs detest so much as the trend over the last twenty years or so.

Alot of the suburban neighborhoods planned post WW2 through to about the 70’s/80’s have gridded/narrower streets, smaller more compact homes and a…[Read more]

There’s plenty of negative externalities associated with “green” energy. All these large scale, highly subsidized solar and wind projects have massive footprints. We’re talking potentially millions of acres of previously unmodified habitat disturbed, much of it in fragile desert areas, and much of it presently used to connect species to protected…[Read more]

The underlying point here (in case it wasn’t obvious) is that the subsidies and economic drivers of the “green economy” are a tiny drop in the bucket compared to the factors that are propping up the traditional economy.

Take high speed rail as an example. If the teabaggers don’t block it, as much as $8,000,000,000 could be spent upgrading and…[Read more]

I think you’re absolutely right Ben, except that we probably wouldn’t have to worry about economic collapse as the armed insurrection at instantly exorbinant gas prices would most likely be the main concern.

Just the slight increase in gas prices to over $4/gal a few years ago led to more public transit ridership in many places (including here in…[Read more]

killer article, Ben! thanks for posting that!

If it happened quickly, it would affect us by collapsing out entire way of life. If gas were truly $15 (1998 dollars as the article poses as a high guess), commerce would screech to a halt. There would be demand for better designed communities, but there would be no funding to build them.

That’s why it’s important to find alternatives to an oil…[Read more]

Well I didn’t exactly delve into that so much because I’m at work (not doing LA by the way). But the point of the article I believe is that because of things like oil subsidies the real price of energy is hidden. If the taxes and increased insurance premiums were passed directly through the gas pump rather than spread out in ways that are not…[Read more]

The clean air act was not signed at swordpoint, nor was Brown v. board signed under duress..I ho pe it is possible for us to act rather than react..Although the progress on climate change legislation seems to support your point, or even worse – we don’t even act when the waters are swirling around our heads, but just go under..slowly..The frog in…[Read more]

This article clearly explains many of the factors that are not accounted for in the apparent price of gasoline-
http://www.icta.org/doc/Real%20Price%20of%20Gasoline.pdf

Ironically, it’s from 1998, when gas was around $1.00 a gallon.

So yes, we truly are paying the real price of oil, but it is though taxes and government debt rather than at the pump.

Andrew,
Have you heard of the economic term “externality” (We’re learning about economics in my bioregional planning class this week. That’s the only reason I’ve heard of it.)? An externality is when there are physical impacts from an activity on individuals not directly involved in an activity. Pollution (according to the article I read for…[Read more]

I don’t see what all the commotion is regarding a shortage of jobs. As I recall, the feds passed a near trillion dollar stimulus bill a year ago that continues to create MILLIONS of jobs, and we recently finished the “Summer of Recovery” just as the administration predicted. Just get on the USAJOBS website and with no trouble at all you’ll get an…[Read more]

hm..you know, of course, that Obama just ordered some changes to the USA jobs stuff, to try to streamline the process.
Can’t really argue with you..The only thing about those TYPES of jobs, ie, site p lan reviewer, stormwater reviewer, is that east coast is WAY more local than west coast – that was a shock to me..I really can’t comment on…[Read more]

If you haven’t read it, Zinn’s last chapter in The Peoples History of the US elaborates beautifully on what you are saying.

I used the program a bit and I think it’s excellent especially for planting design. For other things like modeling and site planning, it’s obviously limited in functionality but like I said, I think it’s worth it just for planting design.

I wasn’t saying we never move forward. I was saying we need to get kicked in the ass to do it. Read what I wrote. The Magna Carta was signed at sword point!

Rob, I have to say, I can think of hundreds of progressive acts that were done because they were the right thing to do – the bill of rights, the civil war against slavery, Brown vs. Board of Education, the code of hamurabi, the Magna Carta, the clean air act, the clean water act – these were decisions society made to move forward, instead of backwards..

Oil is subsidized artificially by our government in too many ways to count, Andrews – road building, construction loans, our whole society is built around oil subsidies – not to speak of drilling subsidies on public lands..
The real cost should mean no government subsidies, plus add in the destruction of the natural world, the air pollution, water…[Read more]

First, there is being responsible and practical which is not separate from development with or without claims of being green. Lots and lots of green practices make sense whether or not you think think the planet is about to boil over and we are all going to die, or not. Believing that the green movement is not going to drive the economy is not the…[Read more]