Tosh K

The Corps is your best source, if you can get them to open up; contemporary practice may be more difficult.  McHarg might be interesting to look into.  Robert E Lee’s service in the Corps may show some examples of what is now landscape architecture (both in war time Mexico and in peace time fortification repairs and the realigning of the flow of t…[Read more]

Tappan Zee is ready to fall apart, the cost to make it structurally sound would be financially irresponsible.  I do like Atlanta’s Beltline project as it has a strategic vision to help distribute the civic resources as a system.
 
I had a few classmates over the years that looked at doing a cycling machine that rode the rails, dunno if it’s more c…[Read more]

1. AutoCAD (Civil 3D), Rhino, for some things SketchUp; have used Microstation in the past.
2. AutoCAD express tools, Rhino make2d (easy conversion to 2D drawings of perspectives and axons for rendering)
3. Lack of clean compatibility, file corruption between platforms; particularly between Revit.
4. AutoCAD b/c of its ability to play with…[Read more]

I’m finding out here in New England, it’s the deer that are “selecting” what plants to let grow (too many deer for the natives to have an outside shot at surviving), we do control the population of deer (first by eliminating predators, and second by protecting them), so are we managing the plant diversity (negatively)? The speed of change is…[Read more]

I’ve seen QR codes in Japan for plant ID, presumably they use it for urban forestry purposes as well.

Bear Market?

Maybe go through design competition entries (highline, freshkills -see praxis issue- and downsview -see monograph- have been critically reviewed so you may find it easier to go through those)- often the design concept revolves around a central idea that’s obvious in their brief. I’m not sure what you mean by “big ideas,” but common conceptual…[Read more]

With the building tech then or now?  Shouldn’t be too difficult even then, though the water well pressure might be a factor… these days it should be a piece of cake.

My experience is that the portfolio sent to specific clients contain more info relevant to the client’s expectations- the websites are more glossy; younger firms will have more conceptual stuff (BIG’s principals are in their 30s I think), as they spend a lot of unbilled hours working on projects so that they might land projects in the future that…[Read more]

Depends on the scale and caliber of work: 
Rhino (VRay,Maxwell,Grasshopper), AutoCAD, Revit, Microstation.
I’d assume FO uses a fair amount of Rhino – look at Penn student work; or better yet their job postings in the past.

De Gaulle airport is horrifyingly energy inefficient in the summer (you get microwave as you travel through the donut hole….’i hate that airport as a passenger.  MVVA/Holl project either does not follow a maintenance regime or didn’t account for weeds (it’s mostly invasives and sadly hasn’t looked that nice in years).  Maybe plant the crap out o…[Read more]

I hate NCARB.  The IDP an ARE process is pathetic,  a total admittance to the fact that their education standards are terrible.  CLARB had to update to computing, some folks get it harder in transition;  well, it’s going to happen to somebody some time.  And why is the PE process so much easier?  By ease of processing I’d take the PE over LA over…[Read more]

I believe unemployment is calculated primarily on those collecting unemployment (previously employed) and looking – recent grads who never got work or are working PT and not actively seeking work aren’t part of that number.

We hve everything to do with healthcare – cleaning up
Inner city contamination (all the lead from gasoline pre1991 does a…[Read more]

Interesting thread to compare against the one on archinect about some firms building staff (by as much as 70), while others go belly up.  I do wonder if some firms will adapt the “staff up for projects, then down size after they end” model some firms seem to love.

We were taught to be billing 3x or 4x while in school; I’ve been at 10x before so 2x seems generous.

Maybe you can get an alum or the school to chip in.  I used saved up miles and crashed a friend’s couch or two attending these things, which made it worth it for me.   It might be a good investment if you see a lineup of lectures and seminars you want to see.  It almost compresses a year’s worth of a lecture series into a weekend.  The opp…[Read more]

Is it easy to get into engineering from LA?  The other way around is easy, and yes it is easier to get interviews for work in certain areas.  Assuming someone is looking to be able to get a PE, that involves pretty much a 3yr engineering pre-reqs from undergrad.
 
maybe environmental management?  seems like a nice niche in consulting that’s gro…[Read more]

I’d love to teach that course for half that cost…
 
In addition to the aforementioned resources many design schools have short how-to handouts available online – might be helpful to browse around through those as well.  Key to learning software is to have a project goal in mind and see how it operates and helps you get there.  InDesign will he…[Read more]

The question a professor of mine once challenged me mid-seminar discussion was:  so you would choose to work and know your project sites?  This during a sustainability seminar where we spoke about the importance of connections between place and people, the culture and the designer.
 
It is nice to see some designers stick to where they know wh…[Read more]

I get the feeling that’s why the credit freeze is tougher to handle for the US economy – by setting up a system that minimizes cash holdings (presumably a holdover from American dislike of aristocratic wealth build up), there is an increase need for credit when the accounts are in the red; frozen credit markets, prevent a free flow of capital…[Read more]