One of the interesting things — and there are definitely many — that you will read about in Kazys Varnelis' paean to the “networked ecologies” of Los Angeles, The Infrastructural City, is the dust control system at Owens Lake.
After decades of monumental water projects that diverted the lake's “life-giving liquid” to quench a distant city's thirsty populace, to ensure the perfect shade of green for their lawns, and to turn their swimming pools into aqueous micro-paradises, the desiccated remains of the lake now threatens the health of the people in the surrounding region.
Wind gusts above twenty miles an hour lifted over fifty tons per second of “Keeler Fog” off the lakebed. Often reaching over two miles high, these dust storms sent 130 times the United States Environmental Protection Agency's limit for particulate matter into the atmosphere, blowing the dust over 250 miles from the lake. Such storms occurred two dozens or more times each year, generally in the spring and fall. Composed of microscopic particles smaller than ten microns (PM10), the dust contains significant levels of toxic metals like selenium, arsenic, and lead along with efflorescent salts. The largest single source of PM10 pollution in the country, these dust storms were a clear threat to the 40,000 people in the immediate region.
The dusts are such a health hazard that they have been linked to “significant health problems in the region, including higher rates of cancer, lung disease, and eye problems.”
To combat these carcinogenic storms, Los Angeles grafted onto the desiccated corpse of the lake a hydro-network as monumental as the existing network responsible for the situation it is tasked to offset: “over 300 miles of pipe (some as large as five feet in diameter), more than 5,000 irrigation bubblers, and hundreds of miles of fiber optic control cables and valves.”
[T]he dust control projects on Owens Lake is roughly equivalent to that of a waterworks for a city of over 220,000 people. Construction of the first five phases, treating the worst thirty square miles of dust-emitting soils on the playa, has cost the City of Los Angeles $425 million dollars to build. But that sum doesn't factor in the lost revenue from the water being appropriated for the project (around $15 million/year) or the operations and maintenance budget, some $10 million per year.
“[R]ising like alien plants on the terraformed lakebed,” the bubblers flood the playa with shallow water, creating the merest suggestion of a lake, a perverse reminder of Lake Owens' former self.
However superficial such observations may be, we couldn't help but see similarities between these bubblers and fountains found in historic gardens.
Firstly, much like the fountains at Versailles, behind these water spouts is a staggering hydrological infrastructure. Among other things, Versailles had the Machine de Marley, considered the greatest engineering marvel of its time; Owens Lake is part of what is probably the greatest water engineering project of the 20th century.
Secondly, since time immemorial, fountains like those at the Alhambra have been creating micro-climates, cooling gardens, palaces and sartorially bedecked aristocrats. The array of bubblers, you could say, is also a type of weather modification system: an anti-dust storm. Moreover, fountains like those at Columbus Circle in Manhattan can provide a sonic barrier, making one unaware of the tumult outside; with some conjecture, probably forced, you could say that the bubblers don't do much to make Los Angelenos more aware of the negative environmental effects their method of living are contributing outside the city.
Thirdly, if one can only speculate that fountains have ameliorative effects on one's mental state, you probably don't need to speculate the positive health effects of the bubblers.
Fourthly, fountains like those in Rome are objects for aesthetic consumption; the ebullient and rather photogenic sprinklers, thanks to CLUI, have been appropriated as part of a staged aesthetic experience.
Lastly, and most significantly, they are the products of a complex network of intermingling social, technological, political, economic and geographical conditions, the manifestations of competing ideologies and agendas. They're not mere water features, in other words.
A propos des "écologies" ou systèmes écologiques en réseau (réseau d'eau, d'énergie, d'information, etc.). Ici un cas particulier, un "tarraforming" ou mise en forme de la Terre (architecture de la Terre) à un niveau écologique et qui consiste en la remise en place artificielle d'un lac naturel afin de contrôler un système climatique...
This is a big one! A poet wrote a 3 kilometer-wide message - visible from space - in the desert of northwest Chile. The message says "ni pena ni miedo" which translates in English to "neither shame nor fear". The poet's name is Raúl Zurita, and he used a bull dozer to write the message in the desert sand. According to an interview at Jacket Magazine (about half-way down the article), the poet "...doesn’t like abstract poetry. He says that in those days of brutality and distrust and terror, the reign of Pinochet, he began to imagine writing poems in the sky, on the faces of cliffs, in the desert. His words...are gradually fading away, joining thousands of men, women, and children who disappeared in fear and pain during the Pinochet years." Fortunately, his words are now immortalized in satellite photos and Google Earth! Check out the entire message in Google Earth. It's huge, and it's really there - not a photoshop.
The house has built-in single and double beds and a veranda with a sealed-off area housing a shower and lavatory
The property market is in the doldrums, mortgages are elusive but there is still some hope for the first-time buyer: the paper house.
Retailing for about $5,000 (£3,375), the house is supposed to brighten up Third World shantytowns and provide quick shelter for long-term refugees. The Universal World House can be used almost anywhere: light, easily assembled, environmentally friendly, earthquake-proof and, crucially in the age of recession, a bit of a bargain.
Gerd Niemoeller, its inventor, says that the 36sq m paper house weighs barely 800kg (1,763lb) — lighter than a VW Golf. “Without the foundation block, the whole house actually weighs in at about 400kg,” says the design engineer. It will not, however, simply blow away. The basic material is resin-soaked cellulose recovered from recycled cardboard and newspapers.
Add heat and pressure and the paper becomes extremely stable. The interior of the prefabricated building panels resemble honeycombs; an air vacuum fills each of the units. The result: a strong and stable exterior wall, well insulated. A similar construction technique is used in aircraft and high-speed yachts.
“But they are working with aluminium and other alloys, which is expensive, time consuming, energy intensive,” said Mr Niemoeller, who has patented the invention under the name of his Swiss-based company The Wall AG. “That’s not suitable for the Third World.” The prime purpose is to create intelligent housing settlements almost instantly for the displaced and the urban poor.
“People don’t want to flee their countries, they’ve been driven to leave their homes out of the need to survive,” said the 58-year-old engineer. “The number of migrants, refugees living in improvised housing, is going to grow with climate change, and we offer an alternative.” An alternative, that is, to the corrugated-iron sheds and lean-tos so often seen in the slums of the developing world.
The house has eight built-in single and double beds and a veranda with a sealed-off area housing a shower and a lavatory. It has been designed together with the German development aid agency GTZ, and with the architect Dirk Donath, from the Bauhaus University in Weimar.
Apart from the sleeping area, there are shelves, a table and benches. “It has been designed so that a family can slaughter an animal on the veranda, wash it in the shower and hang it, along with fish, on an integrated washing line.” The whole wall of the kitchen can be tipped open to let air in and to blur the distinction between inside and outside.
First inquiries have come from the Delta State oil developers in Nigeria, and from Angola. More than 2,000 houses have been ordered by another Nigerian company. Development aid agencies are considering whether the houses could be used to accommodate those fleeing from the cholera epidemic in Zimbabwe. South America, too, is interested.
The aim is to build the machines in northern Germany, near Kiel, and then send them, along with the raw materials, to the target country. The houses are then put together on the spot, creating local jobs and reducing transport costs.
But there is no reason why the paper houses should not be used in Europe.
The panels are rain resistant — and it is not compulsory to butcher a goat on the veranda.
Dubai may have the only 7-star hotel, but Switzerland now has the only 0-star. In these modest times less luxurious accommodations may be preferred, so say hello to Null Stern Hotel, in St.Gallen, Switzerland. Via Dwell
On en avait déjà entendu parler, il s'agit en réalité d'un projet d'artistes suisse-allemands. Mais l'hôtel reste fonctionnel, au cas où vous souhaiteriez passer une nuit pas chère ("confort minimum mais sécurité maximum") dans l'ancien abri-atomique d'une commune perdue!
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