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Growing Romaine Lettuce or Cos Lettuce in Hydroponics

What lettuce comes to your mind, when I say the word lettuce? Go on, take a minute. If you thought Iceberg lettuce, you aren’t alone. Iceberg is (or used to be) the defacto standard when it comes lettuce.  Iceberg lettuce has its crunch but if you look beyond the crunch, nutrient values that is, you will […]




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Guide to Trellising tomato plants – How to train tomato plants

Trellising tomatoes using the tomato hook and tomato clips Please check out this video I made on Trellising tomato plants. If you are growing indeterminate or vine tomatoes, they will have to be supported due to their tall growing nature. Trellising tomato plants is done either by a stick or a twine. Twine is the […]




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BeepUAE, A Promising, Instant Cash Car Buying Service Launches in Dubai

BeepUAE guarantees to finalize all of their car buying deals in just 30 minutes while paying the seller with instant cash at the rendezvous.




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AVIONICS to Launch Indiegogo Campaign Offering Unique Electric Bike at 40% Discount

Indiegogo campaign will launch on September 20, 2017.




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MO Doesn't Have to Be Last in Safety Rankings, Said Columbia Injury Attorney

Columbia attorney Mark Evans encourages drivers and lawmakers alike to improve Missouri's poor record on road safety.




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Burt Brothers' Utah Auto Repair Shops Host Racing Legend, Mario Andretti

Burt Brothers announces an exciting weekend as they welcome Mario Andretti to celebrate the opening of their 10th Utah auto repair shop. To complement the events, BIGFOOT will be on location for a car crush and photo opportunities.




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Motorcycle Ride for TBI Raises $1,098

D. Miller & Associates, PLLC hosted the third annual motorcycle ride to raise money for those affected by traumatic brain injury.




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Car Sell Zone Debuts New Car-Buying Options for Customers in Dubai

One-stop destination for selling cars now also offers deals on pre-owned vehicles




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Locksmith 2 U Remains Open And In Operation For Riverside Area During COVID-19 Outbreak

Mobile 24/7 Locksmith Offers Key Replacement And Key Duplication Services For Residences, Commercial Businesses, Automobiles, High-Security Safes, And More In Riverside, California




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New And Notable: Cities For People, Transportation Infrastructure Security, Railway Noise And Vibration

For more than forty years Jan Gehl has helped to transform urban environments around the world based on his research into the ways people actually use — or could use — the spaces where they live and work.


In Cities For People (Washington : Island Press, 2010), his revolutionary new book, Gehl presents his latest work creating (or recreating) cityscapes on a human scale. He clearly explains the methods and tools he uses to reconfigure unworkable cityscapes into the landscapes he believes they should be: cities for people.


Taking into account changing demographics and changing lifestyles, Gehl explains how to develop cities that are lively, safe, sustainable, and healthy.


“Jan Gehl is our greatest observer of urban quality and an indispensable philosopher of cities as solutions to the environmental and health crises that we face. With over half the world’s population now in urban areas, the entire planet needs to learn the lessons he offers in Cities for People.” --Janette Sadik-Khan, Commissioner of the New York City Department of Transportation


The book is extensively illustrated with over 700 photos and drawings of examples from Gehl’s work around the globe. Jan Gehl is based in Copenhagen.

Intelligent Transportation Systems, or ITS, integrates different computing, control, and communication technologies to help monitor and manage traffic management that helps reduce congestion while saving lives, time, and money.

While mobility and safety are the primary objectives of any good transportation system, security has also become an equally important consideration in their design and operation.

This new work, Transportation Infrastructure Security Utilizing Intelligent Transportation Systems (Hoboken, NJ : Wiley, 2008), provides a comprehensive treatment of techniques to leverage ITS in support of security and safety for surface transportation infrastructure.

Through the book's multidisciplinary approach, readers gain a comprehensive introduction to the diverse aspects of transportation infrastructure security as well as how ITS can reduce risks and be protected from threats with such topics as computer systems, risk analysis, and multi-modal transportation systems.

This book, which will serve as a textbook and guide, provides:

  • Current ITS approaches to security issues such as freight security, disaster and evacuation response, HAZMAT incidents, rail security, and ITS Wide Area Alerts
  • Guidance on the development of a regional transportation security plan
  • Securing ITS itself and privacy issues involved in any collection and use of personally identifiable tracking data
  • Exercises, question-and-answer sections, and other helpful review tools for the reader
Filling a gap in the practical application of security, this book offers both students and transportation professionals valuable insights into the new security challenges encountered and how to manage these challenges with the use of computerized transportation systems.


Railways are an environmentally friendly means of transport well suited to modern society.


However, noise and vibration are key obstacles to further development of the railway networks for high-speed intercity traffic, for freight and for suburban metros and light-rail.


Railway Noise And Vibration: Mechanisms, Modelling And Means Of Control (Amsterdam : Elsevier, 2009) brings together coverage of the theory of railway noise and vibration with practical applications of noise control technology at source to solve noise and vibration problems from railways.


Each source of noise and vibration is described in a systematic way: rolling noise, curve squeal, bridge noise, aerodynamic noise, ground vibration and ground-borne noise, and vehicle interior noise.


This work also discusses in full the theoretical background and practical workings of railway noise, including the latest research findings, and forms an extended case study in the application of noise control techniques.


Author David Thompson is Professor of Railway Noise and Vibration at the Institute of Sound and Vibration Research, University of Southampton (U.K.).




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New And Notable: Transport For Suburbia, ArcGIS & High Speed Passenger Rail

The need for effective public transport is greater than ever in the 21st century. With countries like China and India moving towards mass-automobility, we face the prospects of an environmental and urban health disaster unless alternatives are found--it is time to move beyond the automobile age.

But while public transport has worked well in the dense cores of some big cities, the problem is that most residents of developed countries now live in dispersed suburbs and smaller cities and towns. These places usually have little or no public transport, and most transport commentators have given up on the task of changing this: it all seems too hard.

Transport For Suburbia: Beyond The Automobile Age (London: Earthscan, 2010) argues that the secret of European-style public transport lies in a generalizable model of network planning that has worked in places as diverse as rural Switzerland, the Brazilian city of Curitiba and the Canadian cities of Toronto and Vancouver. It shows how this model can be adapted to suburban, exurban and even rural areas to provide a genuine alternative to the car, and outlines the governance, funding and service planning policies that underpin the success of the world's best public transport systems.

Getting To Know ArcGIS Desktop (Redlands, Calif.: ESRI Press, 2010) introduces principles of GIS as it teaches the mechanics of using ESRI’s leading technology.

Key concepts are combined with detailed illustrations and step-by-step exercises to acquaint readers with the building blocks of ArcGIS Desktop including ArcMap, for displaying and querying maps, ArcCatalog, for organizing geographic data, and ModelBuilder, for diagramming and processing solutions to complex spatial analysis problems.

Its broad scope, simple style, and practical orientation make this book an ideal classroom text and an excellent resource for those learning GIS on their own.

The factors affecting the economic viability of high speed rail lines include the level of expected riders, costs, and public benefits, which are influenced by a line's corridor and service characteristics.

High speed rail tends to attract riders in dense, highly populated corridors, especially when there is congestion on existing transportation modes.

Characteristics of the proposed service are also key considerations, as high speed rail attracts riders where it compares favorably to travel alternatives with regard to door-to-door trip times, prices, frequency of service, reliability and safety.

In High Speed Passenger Rail: Viability, Challenges And Federal Role (New York: Nova Science Publishers, 2010), a strategic vision for high speed rail is offered, particularly in relation to the role that high speed rail can play in the national transportation system, clearly identifying potential objectives and goals for high speed rail systems and the roles that federal and other stakeholders should play in achieving each objective and goal.

The recently enacted Passenger Rail Investment and Improvement Act of 2008 will likely increase the federal role in the development of high speed rail, as will the newly enacted American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009.

This book consists of public documents which have been located, gathered, combined, reformatted, and enhanced with a subject index, selectively edited and bound to provide easy access.




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New & Notable: Inventing L.A.'s Autopia, Rival Trancontinental Rails, Rules For Sustainable Communities & Transportation Privatization

In 1920, as its population began to explode, Los Angeles was a largely pastoral city of bungalows and palm trees. Thirty years later, choked with smog and traffic, the city had become synonymous with urban sprawl and unplanned growth.

Yet Los Angeles was anything but unplanned, as Jeremiah B.C. Axelrod reveals in this compelling, visually oriented history of the metropolis during its formative years. In a deft mix of cultural and intellectual history that brilliantly illuminates the profound relationship between imagination and place, Inventing Autopia: Dreams And Visions Of The Modern Metropolis In Jazz Age Los Angeles (Berkeley: University Of California Press, 2009) shows how the clash of irreconcilable utopian visions and dreams resulted in the invention of an unforeseen new form of urbanism--sprawling, illegible, fractured--that would reshape not only Southern California but much of the nation in the years to come.

At 401 pages, it could seem like a daunting read, but those interested in Los Angeles history, urbanization, or the rise of the automobile will find this enjoyable. It's a great compliment to the Metro Library's historic transit and transportation studies collection. Many of these documents, which date back to 1911, have been digitized and are available on our website in full-text PDF.

Axelrod focuses on the 1920s when Los Angeles was growing at a fast clip. As we noted back in July, the number of automobile registrations in Los Angeles County quadrupled between 1914 and 1922 - making it very clear that the city's embrace of the auto would set the stage for decades of congestion and other issues.

Going back further in history is another equally seminal story about transportation in the West. Acclaimed historian Walter R. Borneman has written a dazzling account of the battle to build the first transportation system across America.

Rival Rails: The Race To Build America's Greatest Transcontinental Railroad (New York: Random House, 2010) is an action-packed epic of how an empire was born—and the remarkable men who made it happen.

After the completion of the first transcontinental railroad in 1869, the rest of the country was up for grabs, and the race was on. The prize: a better, shorter, less snowy route through the corridors of the American Southwest, linking Los Angeles to Chicago.

Borneman lays out in compelling detail the sectional rivalries, contested routes, political posturing, and ambitious business dealings that unfolded as an increasing number of lines pushed their way across the country.

The author brings to life the legendary business geniuses and so-called robber barons who made millions and fought the elements—and one another—to move America, including:

William Jackson Palmer, whose leadership of the Denver and Rio Grande Western Railroad relied on innovative narrow gauge trains that could climb steeper grades and take tighter curves;

Collis P. Huntington of the Central Pacific and Southern Pacific lines, a magnate insatiably obsessed with trains—and who was not above bribing congressmen to satisfy his passion;

Edward Payson Ripley, visionary president of the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe, whose fiscal conservatism and smarts brought the industry back from the brink; and

Jay Gould, ultrasecretive, strong-armer and one-man powerhouse.

In addition, Borneman captures the herculean efforts required to construct these roads—the laborers who did the back-breaking work, boring tunnels through mountains and throwing bridges across unruly rivers, the brakemen who ran atop moving cars, the tracklayers crushed and killed by runaway trains.

From backroom deals in Washington, D.C., to armed robberies of trains in the wild deserts, from glorified cattle cars to streamliners and Super Chiefs, all the great incidents and innovations of a mighty American era are re-created with unprecedented power in this new work destined to be a classic.

Turning now to urban planning, author Patrick Condon discusses transportation, housing equity, job distribution, economic development, and ecological systems issues and synthesizes his knowledge and research into a simple-to-understand set of urban design rules that can, if followed, help save the planet.


Seven Rules For Sustainable Communities: Design Strategies For The Post Carbon World (Washington, D.C.: Island Press, 2010) clearly connects the form of our cities to their ecological, economic, and social consequences. This book takes on a wide range of complex and contentious issues and distills them down to convincing and practical solutions.


Of particular importance is how city form affects the production of planet-warming greenhouse gases. The author explains this relationship in an accessible way, and goes on to show how conforming to seven simple rules for community design could literally do a world of good. Each chapter in the book explains one rule in depth, adding a wealth of research to support each claim. If widely used, Condon argues, these rules would lead to a much more livable world for future generations—a world that is not unlike the better parts of our own.


In Last Exit: Privatization And Deregulation Of The U.S. Transportation System (Washington, D.C.: Brookings, 2010), Clifford Winston reminds us that transportation services and infrastructure in the United States were originally introduced by private firms.

The case for subsequent public ownership and management of the system was weak, in his view, and here he assesses the case for privatization and deregulation to greatly improve Americans satisfaction with their transportation systems. How can this be done?

Writing in the New York Times, Harvard University economics professor Edward L. Glaeser points out that:

Because the public sector controls almost all roads, airports and urban transit, we see the downsides of public control on a daily basis, but we don’t experience the social costs that could accompany privatization. A private airport operator might try to exploit its monopoly power over a particular market or cut costs in a way that increases the probability of very costly, but rare, disaster.

The complexity and risks of switching to private provision means that Mr. Winston is wise to call for experimentation rather than wholesale privatization. An incremental process of trying things out will provide information and build public support.

Yet many of Mr. Winston’s recommendations are incremental and can be done without privatization or much risk.

The book covers privatization and deregulation of roads, airports, air traffic control, mass transit, intercity buses and railway networks.




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New & Notable: America's Failing Infrastructure, "Climatopolis," & Why Do Shepherds Need A Bush?

In August 2007, the I-35W Bridge in Minneapolis, MN, collapsed, killing 13 and injuring 145 others. Investigations following the tragedy revealed that it could have been prevented. The grave reality is that it is a tragedy that threatens to be repeated at many of the thousands of bridges located across the nation.

In Too Big To Fall: America's Failing Infrastructure And The Way Forward (New York: Foster, 2010), author Barry LePatner chronicles the problems that led to the I-35W catastrophe — poor bridge design,shoddy maintenance, ignored expert repair recommendations, and misallocated funding — and digs through the National Transportation Safety Board’s report on the tragedy, which failed to present the full story.

From there LePatner evaluates what the I-35W Bridge collapse means for the country as a whole — outlining the possibility of a nationwide infrastructure breakdown.

He exposes government failure on a national as well as state level, explains why we must maintain an effective infrastructure system — including how it plays a central role in supporting both our nation’s economic strength and our national security — and rounds out the book by providing his own well-researched solutions.

Too Big to Fall presents an eye-opening critique of a bureaucratic system that has allowed political best interests to trump those of the American people. It contains special comments by James Oberstar, the outgoing Chairman of the U.S. House Committee on Transportation & Infrastructure.

Cities are the engines of the economic growth and the foundation of our prosperity. But what will become of them as our world gets hotter?

In Climatopolis: How Our Cities Will Thrive In The Hotter Future (New York: Basic, 2010), Matthew Kahn, one of the world's foremost experts on the economics of the environment and of cities, argues that our future lies in our ability to adapt. Cities and regions will slowly transform as we change our behaviors and our surroundings in response to the changing climate. Kahn - professor at the UCLA Institute of the Environment and Sustainability, the UCLA School of Public Affairs' Department of Public Policy, and a research associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research - shows us how this will happen.

The author is optimistic about the quality of our lives in the cities of the future, despite a high chance of less hospitable climate conditions than we face today. At the heart of his conviction in a bright future is our individual freedom of choice. This personal freedom will reveal pathways that will greatly help urbanites cope with climate change.

Taking the reader on a tour of the world's cities - from New York to Los Angeles, Beijing to Mumbai - Kahn's clear-eyed, engaging, and optomistic messages presents a positive yet realistic picture of what our urban future will look like.

An entire chapter is devoted to Los Angeles, including sub-sections titled "Los Angeles Has A Subway?" and "Could Public Transit Become Hip In Los Angeles?"

The names of the 300 or so London underground stations are often quite unusual, yet so familiar that Tube riders take them for granted.


We hardly ever question their meanings or origins—yet these well-known names are almost always linked with fascinating stories of bygone times.


In Why Do Shepherds Need A Bush?: London's Underground History Of Tube Station Names (Stroud, Eng.: History Press, 2010), author David Hilliam not only uncovers the little-known history behind the station stops below ground, but also explores the eccentric etymology of some of London's landmarks, offering trivia boxes that will surely amuse.


Until the mid-19th century, London was almost unbelievably rural, with names belonging to a countryside we could never recognize or imagine today.


Who in the 21st century, thinks of a real flesh-and-blood shepherd lolling back on a specially-trimmed hawthorn bush, when traveling through Shepherd's Bush underground station?


And who, traveling through Totteridge and Whetstone on the Northern Line, imagines medieval soldiers sharpening their swords and daggers at the aptly named Whetstone just before engaging in the appallingly bloody battle of Barnet?


This entertaining book will ensure that readers never view their normal Tube journey the same way again.




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Light Rail On Wilshire? Why, That Would Be Illegal!

The recent selection of a route alignment for the Westside Subway Extension, as well as the release of the Wilshire Boulevard Bus Rapid Transit final environmental impact report started us thinking about something we read aways back regarding Wilshire Boulevard.

It was in Kevin Roderick's Wilshire Boulevard: Grand Concourse Of Los Angeles (Santa Monica: Angel City Press, 2005). The author briefly mentions (on page 20):

"New subdivisions around the periphery of Los Angeles were not unusual in the mid-1890s, but the Wilshires had grander ambitions. Across the center of their land, they promised to grade a generous, one-hundred-twenty-foot-wide graveled boulevard.

It would stretch just four blocks between the two parks, but the brothers believed that even a short stub of remarkable avenue would attract lot buyers.

To spur sales, they lobbied to encircle the tract with special streetcar lines, but insisted that the city council forbid the laying of tracks - forever - on their boulevard."

Forbid the laying of tracks?

Forever?

Really?

We had to determine if this had actually been codified, and turned to the City of Los Angeles Municipal Code to investigate.

Sure enough, we discovered in SEC. 62.129. PUBLIC BOULEVARDS - USE OF:

That the following regulations shall apply to those certain streets in this City, known as Wilshire Boulevard, from Park View Avenue to the west City limits; Adams Street from Grand Avenue to Hoover Street; Boyle Avenue from Whittier Boulevard to First Street; Alvarado Street from Seventh Street to Hoover Street; and Occidental Boulevard from First Street to Sixth Street; which have been heretofore dedicated as open, public boulevards:

(a) No railroad or pipe line franchise shall ever be granted, and no railroad track or pipe line shall ever be laid or constructed, except water pipes, sewers, gas mains and conduits for telephone and electric wires, for service of the property fronting on said boulevards and house connections and connections of water, sewers, and gas pipe lines, or conduits for telephone and electric wires on intersecting streets.

The early developers of Wilshire were successful in banishing rail lines from the Boulevard forever. Despite having the greatest urban rail system in the world in its heyday, no streetcars ever rumbled down Los Angeles' grandest street.

This 1925 Kelker DeLeuw City/County Comprehensive Rapid Transit Plan Urban Map shows nothing on Wilshire - cross-town streetcars were designated for Pico Boulevard, 3rd Street, and Hollywood Boulevard.

A 1938 Los Angeles Railway map depicts cross-town streetcars on several east-west lines: 3rd Street (R), 10th Street / Olympic Boulevard (L), Pico "Street" (P), Washington Boulevard (W), and Jefferson Boulevard (J). Only motor coaches served Wilshire Boulevard.

Wilshire still became the city's grandest boulevard despite its lack of "rapid transit" - or perhaps because of it - and Rodericks' book is a fascinating account of Los Angeles' iconic boulevard and how one street can influence such a large city.

We can't know how the street or city would have developed had streetcars run along it, but Wilshire Boulevard never got stuck with overhead transit either.

We might be thankful we didn't end up with a Wilshire monorail, as one proposal depicted the intersection of Wilshire & Fairfax here.

Meanwhile, this Saturday marks the annual Great Los Angeles Walk, which goes back to its roots this year.

The day-long trek will take participants 15.6 miles along the entire length of Wilshire Boulevard, from Pershing Square downtown to its west end at the Pacific Ocean in Santa Monica.

The L.A. Conservancy has a wonderful interactive website that helps visitors create their own customized tours of Wilshire Boulevard's past and present.





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New And Notable: Sprawl Repair Manual, Republic Of Drivers & Urban Mass Transit's Life Story

There is a wealth of research and literature explaining suburban sprawl and the urgent need to retrofit suburbia. However, until now there has been no single guide that directly explains how to repair typical sprawl elements.


Sprawl Repair Manual demonstrates a step-by-step design process for the re-balancing and re-urbanization of suburbia into more sustainable, economical, energy- and resource-efficient patterns, from the region and the community to the block and the individual building. (Even more information can be found at the Sprawl Repair Manual website).


Author Galina Tachieva asserts in this exceptionally useful (and exceptionaly handsome) book that sprawl repair will require a proactive and aggressive approach, focused on design, regulation and incentives.


The work provides much-needed, single-volume reference for fixing sprawl, incorporating changes into the regulatory system, and implementing repairs through incentives and permitting strategies. It draws on more than two decades of practical experience in the field of repairing and building communities to analyze the current pattern of sprawl development, disassemble it into its elemental components, and present a process for transforming them into human-scale, sustainable elements.


The techniques are illustrated both two- and three-dimensionally, providing users with clear methodologies for the sprawl repair interventions, some of which are radical, but all of which will produce positive results.


Rising gas prices, sprawl and congestion, global warming, even obesity—driving is a factor in many of the most contentious issues of our time. So how did we get here? How did automobile use become so vital to the identity of Americans?


Republic Of Drivers: A Cultural History Of Automobility In America looks back at the period between 1895 and 1961—from the founding of the first automobile factory in America to the creation of the Interstate Highway System—to find out how driving evolved into a crucial symbol of freedom and agency.


Author Cotten Seiler combs through a vast number of historical, social scientific, philosophical, and literary sources to illustrate the importance of driving to modern American conceptions of the self and the social and political order.


He finds that as the figure of the driver blurred into the figure of the citizen, automobility became a powerful resource for women, African Americans, and others seeking entry into the public sphere.


And yet, he argues, the individualistic but anonymous act of driving has also monopolized our thinking about freedom and democracy, discouraging the crafting of a more sustainable way of life.


As our fantasies of the open road turn into fears of a looming energy crisis, Seiler shows us just how we ended up a republic of drivers—and where we might be headed.


In Urban Mass Transit: The Life Story Of A Technology, the history of mass transit is vividly illustrated as the technological and social struggles that have accompanied urbanization and the need for an efficient and cost-effective means of transportation in cities.


From the omnibus and horsecar in the 1830s to the renaissance of urban mass transit at the turn of the 21st century, author Robert C. Post depicts mass transit as a technological system that provided an essential complement to industrialization, urbanization and, ultimately, to the rise of consumer culture.


At the heart of the story is the streetcar, a conveyance that played a central role in the development of U.S. cities and towns. Once dominating the urban landscape, the streetcar has all but disappeared. Post traces its evolution and demise, debunking the urban myth that the downfall of the electric streetcar was directly attributable to the corporate malfeasance of General Motors and others from the automotive world.


Post concludes with a meditation on the prospects for mass transit in a postmodern society that must face up to the contradictions of privatized mobility and the reality of dwindling natural resources.






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New And Notable: Los Angeles From The Air Then And Now, Makeshift Metropolis & Down The Asphalt Path

Avid readers of local history are usually intrigued by photos of historic sites juxtaposed against contemporary images. This format of visual history has a particularly strong impact when the subject is Los Angeles: a city that grew up -- and outward -- so quickly.

Those seeking pictorial overviews will likely have checked out aerial photography books as well.

Los Angeles From The Air: Then And Now (San Diego: Thunder Bay Press, 2010) is a hybrid of these two types of pictorial books. It presents decades-old photographs of both familiar and lesser-known landmarks along side more current ones.

This takes the reader on a trip through Los Angeles like never before, featuring inspiring, sky-high then-and-now images of some of LA's most famous locations.

Some of the landmarks' origins are well-known, but the authors provide context for both familiar and hidden pieces of Los Angeles history.

Many of the photos feature snow-capped peaks in the distance -- a testament to our clear Winter days being the best for photography.

Unfortunately, the work falls flat in its description of transportation in downtown Los Angeles. The authors write:

"Metrolink [sic] provides service to Union Station in the form of three rail lines -- Red, Purple, Gold..."

While Metro and Metrolink may sound similar to those outside of Los Angeles (the book is, after all, published in San Diego), it gives one pause that other information found here may not be entirely accurate. Ultimately, one can ignore the text entirely, as these beautiful photos speak for themselves.

In Makeshift Metropolis: Ideas About Cities (New York: Scribner, 2010), noted architecture writer Witold Rybczynski offers a glimpse of an urban future that might very well serve as a template for cities around the world.

Rybczynski integrates history and prediction of the development of the American city in a brisk look back that takes us from colonial town planning to the Garden City and City Beautiful initiatives of the early 20th century and on to the "Big Box Era."

He also examines how contemporary urban designers and planners are revisiting and refreshing older urban ideas, such as bringing gardens to a blighted Brooklyn waterfront.

Rybczynski's study is kept relevant by his focus on what the past can teach us about creating the "cities we want" and "cities we need."

The prose is instructive and always engaging, and the author's enthusiasm for the future of cities and his enduring love of urban settings of all kinds is evident.

He not only writes about what people want from their cities, he inspires the reader to imagine the possibilities.

In Down The Asphalt Path: The Automobile And The American City, author Clay McShane examines the uniquely American relationship between "automobility" and urbanization.

Writing at the cutting edge of urban and technological history, he depicts how new technology, namely the private automobile, and the modernization of the American city redefined each other.

The author motors us across the country -- from Boston to New York, from Milwaukee to Los Angeles and the suburbs in between -- chronicling the urban embrace of the automobile.

The New York Times calls this work "A treat to read, loaded with interesting facts...a notable book about urban transportation."

Barron's wrote that "this fascinating, well-researched history of the automobile industry...is written from a social and cultural perspective rarely included in traditional books about the business."

The Whole Earth Review claims "this fascinating treatise is the most credible look yet at how automobiles have changed American society for better or worse."




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New And Notable: Oil On The Brain, Transport Geographies & Early Downtown Los Angeles

Oil On The Brain: Petroleum's Long, Strange Trip To Your Tank is a smart, surprisingly funny account of the oil industry — the people, economies, and pipelines that bring us petroleum, brilliantly illuminating a world we encounter every day.

Americans buy ten thousand gallons of gasoline a second, without giving it much of a thought. Where does all this gas come from?

Author Lisa Margonelli’s desire to learn took her on a one-hundred thousand mile journey from her local gas station to oil fields half a world away.

In search of the truth behind the myths, she wriggled her way into some of the most off-limits places on earth: the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, the New York Mercantile Exchange’s crude oil market, oil fields from Venezuela, to Texas, to Chad, and even an Iranian oil platform where the United States fought a forgotten one-day battle.

In a story by turns surreal and alarming, Margonelli meets lonely workers on a Texas drilling rig, an oil analyst who almost gave birth on the NYMEX trading floor, Chadian villagers who are said to wander the oil fields in the guise of lions, a Nigerian warlord who changed the world price of oil with a single cell phone call, and Shanghai bureaucrats who dream of creating a new Detroit.

Deftly piecing together the mammoth economy of oil, Margonelli finds a series of stark warning signs for American drivers. Rave reviews for Oil On The Brain include:

“If you drive a car, you must read this book.” —Mary Roach, author of Stiff

“By giving voice to the people who are the links in the global oil chain, Margonelli invites us to leapfrog all the rhetoric, dry statistics, and dire pronouncements about oil in order to truly understand it.” —Fast Company

“Hugely enjoyable, compulsively readable, and brilliantly reported.” —Po Bronson, author of What Should I Do with My Life?

The PBS Newshour conducted an extensive interview with the author, which can be found here.

Transport Geographies: Mobilities, Flows And Spaces brings together a formidable range of expert insight to introduce the key ideas, concepts and themes of transport geography.

Using an issues-based, qualitative approach, the contributors feature a wide range of case-study material.

This work explores the relationship between transport geography and wider geographical concerns, as well as connections to other areas of study -- economics, engineering, environmental studies, political science, psychology, spatial planning, sociology and transport studies.

The book highlights the role of transport geography in globalization, and its interplay with economic, social and environmental geographies at a range of spatial scales. It reviews contemporary policy and the role transport geographers can play in policy debates.

Both empirically informed and theoretically robust, this compelling text shows the significance of transport in terms of the needs and demands of future travel.

Growing south from the plaza where the city of Los Angeles was founded as a tiny pueblo in 1781, the area now known as downtown L.A. was first developed in the late 1800s as a residential neighborhood, complete with churches and schools.

As the population surged at the turn of the 20th century, the downtown area was transformed into a busy business and entertainment center of shops, banks, hotels, and theaters.

The explosion of the postcard craze in the early 1900s coincided with this period of downtown's tremendous growth toward a formidable metropolis.

Early Downtown Los Angeles
is a collection of vintage postcard images offers a glimpse into the changing city through the 1940s. Transportation is afforded its own chapter.

It includes rarely seen images of La Grande Station, the passenger terminal constructed by the Santa Fe Railroad in 1893. Santa Fe and Southern Pacific's competitive rail pricing fueled the real estate boom and unprecedented population growth throughout the region in the late 1800s and early 1900s.

Early interior images of Union Station, Angels Flight, and other rail lines are of particular topical interest.




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Recent Research: Urban Congestion Trends, High-Speed Rail Lessons & Travel Assistance Device Deployment


Is traffic congestion getting better or worse? The Federal Highway Administration collects various statistics each year to help us understand whether traffic is improving or increasing.

We wanted to take a closer look at a document titled 2009 Urban Congestion Trends: How Operations Is Solving Congestion Problems (8p. PDF).

Of course, we need to understand what we're looking at. Congestion is defined as the amount of time when freeways operate below 50mph. The FHA statistics show that "whatever the day of the week, whatever the time of day, mobility has improved -- almost across the board." When looking at the three primary performance measures,, improvement can be seen in at least one of them in 20 of 23 monitored regions.

But...how much? And why?

First off, there is less traffic on the road. Whether people are using public transit, telecommuting, combining trips, spending more time with family, consciously lowering their fuel consumption or are simply out of work, we see fewer cars on the roads travelling shorter distances.

Additionally, the economic downtown of the past few years has also played a role in congestion reduction in the United States.

Finally, traffic operations are playing a role in congestion management. The document contains a number of success stories detailing how state and local agencies reduced the effects of congestion in their locales.

As America moves toward construction of new high-speed rail networks in regions throughout the country, we have much to learn from experiences abroad.

In A Track Record Of Success: High-Speed Rail Around The World And Its Promise For America (53p. PDF), the U.S. PIRG Educational Fund reports on the wealth of information about what the United States can expect from high-speed rail and how we can receive the greatest possible benefits from our investment.

They base their report on
the track record of high-speed rail lines that have operated for more than 45 years in Japan and for three decades in Europe -- with some exciting conclusions.

Indeed, the experience of high-speed rail lines abroad, as well as America’s limited experience with high-speed rail on the East Coast, suggests that the United States can expect great benefits from investing in a high-speed passenger rail system, particularly if it makes steady commitments to rail improvements and designs the system wisely.

High-speed rail systems in other nations have been able to dramatically reduce the volume of short-haul flights between nearby cities and significantly reduce inter-city car travel.

Some particularly interested examples include:

The number of air passengers between London and Paris has been cut in half since high-speed rail service was introduced.

High-Speed rail service between Madrid and Seville reduced the share of car travel between the two cities from 60% to 34%, and service between Madrid and Barcelona, once the world's busiest passenger air route, has been cut by one-third.
The ability to travel where and when one desires is a basic requirement for independent living that most people take for
granted.

To travel independently, a transit rider practices at least 23 skills including finding the route, arriving at the correct stop on time, and determining when to exit at destination.

The University of South Florida's National Center for Transit Research has published Travel Assistance Device Deployment To Transit Agencies (103p. PDF) which discusses the successful deployment of devices assisting those with cognitive challenges in these tasks.

Travel trainers who provide one-on-one instruction on public
transportation, report that recognizing a landmark near the desired bus stop, requesting a stop at the proper time, and exiting the bus at the destination stop are among the most challenging skills to master for individuals with cognitive disabilities.

Parents/guardians are often reluctant to encourage the use of fixed-route transit due to their own hesitations about a person's abilities and well being.

Prior studies by the research team developed the Travel Assistance Device (TAD)
mobile phone software application that addresses these challenges and supplements the trainer’s instruction.

TAD provides various informational prompts including the audio messages “Get ready” and “Pull the cord now!” and vibrates to alert the rider to pull the stop cord. These prompts are delivered to the rider in real-time as he or she rides the bus using the embedded global positioning system (GPS) technology in off-the-shelf cell phones.

TAD’s real-time location of the rider can be viewed by the travel trainer or family member through a Web page.

This document reviews how the TAD application has been successfully deployed in the Hillsborough (FL) Area Regional Transit (HART) bus system.




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Carol, HaL is over now. But the pattern is availab...

Carol, HaL is over now. But the pattern is available. Please check HAL ateneo group on fb for the pattern.. you will have to join there.. or it should be there on Mamen’s blog .. cant post a link.. just google HAL ateneo.. you should be able to find it.




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How to Find Motivation In Your Day During Uncertainty


The following is a guest post about how to find motivation in your day during uncertainty from regular contributor, Kristin at The Gold Project.  Sometimes, life throws you a curve ball. Last month, I had all intention of sharing another budgeting post. The information was already flowing through my head too. I was excited about […]

If you're seeing How to Find Motivation In Your Day During Uncertainty anywhere other than on I'm an Organizing Junkie (or via my email list or a feed reader) it is being used by someone else without my permission. Please let me know, thank you!




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ZuCoinChain All Set to Launch ZUwallet

A multi-functional & multi-utility state-of-the-art Ethereum MainNet wallet




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Pathways to a Sustainable US-Pakistan Relationship

The Middle East Institute explores "Pathways to a Sustainable US-Pakistan Relationship" in discussion with Ali Jehangir Siddiqui




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The IRS Provides Good News for Certain American Expats

Are you an American who has lived or worked outside the US and own Foreign Trusts?




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Amidst Market Volatility From Coronavirus Hype, Beverage Alcohol Investing Remains Strong

ONE ROQ Vodka, ONEROQClub.com, Raises $1M from 2500+ investors to expand industry-first brand experience and membership platform




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Fairfield County's Community Foundation Announces New COVID-19 Resiliency Fund

More Than $500,000 Already Raised to Support Local Rapid Response Grants




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Ackerman Retail Completes Land Transactions for Popeyes Expansion in South Georgia

Vice President Stephen Lapierre represents developer Verdad Real Estate in acquisition of properties for two Popeyes restaurants




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FarmVisionAI™ Installations Double and Help Farmers Manage COVID-19 Restrictions

Illumitex's FarmVisionAI provides remote visualization, AI analysis, and labor management alleviating COVID-19 driven operational constraints




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Social Media for Goal Setting, Documenting Activities Progress and Video Resume. A Post Pandemic Branding Platform kickstarter Campaign

WorkParrrots brand people online persona as Goal Achievers by providing social tools to set goals, collaborate and track Schedule. Employers Swipe resume Video Pitch to hire




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CBD Sparkling Water Company Infuzed Brands Intends to Raise $28M in Reg A+ Launch

New funding round follows a successful Reg D round




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Xbox E3 Recap Part 1 (With Kumail Nanjiani)

Film and TV star Kumail Nanjiani (Silicon Valley, The Big Sick, Men in Black: International, Stuber) joins our live-from-E3 episode to recap Microsoft's biggest Xbox E3 announcements. We'll deep-dive into the rest on the next episode!




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Xbox Scarlett vs. PS5: More Details Emerge

New PlayStation 5 details emerge – particularly about the controller – so we discuss what it might mean for the Scarlett's gamepad. Plus: Brandin finished reviewing Ghost Recon Breakpoint and talks at length about his likes and dislikes, Ryan gives his impressions of the Oxenfree developer's new game Afterparty, and more!




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Cyberpunk 2077 on Xbox Scarlett Will Have to Wait

Lots of Scarlett next-gen talk this week! Hear why Cyberpunk 2077 won't be coming to Scarlett as soon as we think - and neither will VR. Plus: leaked concept art gives us our first glimpse of Playground's next-gen Fable reboot (allegedly...), Resident Evil 3 might be getting remade, Saints Row will return, and more!




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Temporary Road Closure - Main Beach

Streets affected: Breaker Street (full road closure local traffic access only) between Cronin Avenue and Tedder Avenue

Region:

Category:

Date: 
Monday, May 11, 2020 - 16:30 to Sunday, May 31, 2020 - 04:30
planned: 
1
Read more: 

Also affected: Tedder Avenue (full road closure local traffic access only) between Cronin Avenue and Gold Coast Highway

Start date: 11 May 2020

End date: 30 May 2020

Duration: 6:30am – 6:30pm

Reason: To facilitate road profiling and wearing course layering




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Fighting Coronavirus With AI: Improving Testing with Deep Learning and Computer Vision

This post will cover how testing is done for the coronavirus, why it's important in battling the pandemic, and how deep learning tools for medical imaging can help us improve the quality of COVID-19 testing.




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Google Open Sources SimCLR, A Framework for Self-Supervised and Semi-Supervised Image Training

The new framework uses contrastive learning to improve image analysis in unlabeled datasets.




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How AI Can Help Manage Infectious Diseases

With the capability to analyze huge amounts of data, including medical information, human behavior patterns, and environmental conditions, big data tools can be invaluable in dealing with deadly outbreaks.




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How Data Scientists Can Train and Updates Models to Prepare for COVID-19 Recovery

The COVID-19 pandemic has affected everything, and building predictions during this time is difficult. Data science teams need to update their models to prepare for the recovery, and know how to properly train 2020 data models to learn from the coronavirus anomaly.




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Introducing Brain Simulator II: A New Platform for AGI Experimentation

A growing consensus of researchers contend that new algorithms are needed to transform narrow AI to AGI. Brain Simulator II is free software for new algorithm development targeted at AGI that you can experiment with and participate in its development.




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Demystifying the AI Infrastructure Stack

AI tools and services are expanding at a rapid clip, and keeping a handle on this evolving ecosystem is crucial for the success of your AI projects. This framework will help you build your technical stack to deploy AI projects faster and at scale.




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Explaining “Blackbox” Machine Learning Models: Practical Application of SHAP

Train a "blackbox" GBM model on a real dataset and make it explainable with SHAP.




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People choosing trusted brands, but marketers are pulling brand campaigns

Marketers seem to be favoring performance marketing even as brand may be gaining in consumer importance.

Please visit Marketing Land for the full article.




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New Google ‘Rising Retail Categories’ tool exposes fast-growing product searches

This is the first time Google says it has provided this kind of data to the public.

Please visit Marketing Land for the full article.




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Caution - Rainfall affects recreational water quality

 

Swimming areas have been affected from stormwater run-off due to the recent heavy rainfall across the Gold Coast.

Residents and visitors are reminded that rainfall often washes through our streets, gardens and farms, before it is flushed into our ocean and rivers via the storm water system. Stormwater run-off can increase pathogen levels in the water and make it unsafe for swimming. Popular swimming locations, such as swimming enclosures, rivers, lakes, creeks and beaches – particularly those near stormwater outlets – have been affected.

As a precaution always avoid swimming:

  • one (1) day after heavy rainfall at open beaches
  • three (3) days after heavy rainfall at rivers, lakes and estuarine locations
    • in water that looks discoloured, murky, or smells unpleasant
    • near stormwater drains.

The City will continue to monitor sites across the Gold Coast.

For more information visit http://www.goldcoast.qld.gov.au/environment/recreational-water-quality-20260.html

 

Region:

Date: 
Friday, February 14, 2020 - 14:09 to Sunday, February 16, 2020 - 14:09
planned: 
0




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The Spit, Surfers Paradise and Coolangatta remain closed.

Mayor Tom Tate today announced that beach and car park restrictions would remain in place until next Monday.

"I would like to congratulate Gold Coasters for their efforts over the long weekend with the vast majority of people doing the right thing

"However I have decided to keep the three beaches closed until next Monday. It is still school holidays and we are not in a position to relax just yet. 

"I will review it next Monday."

"It is tough love, but it is still school holidays and the closures are working."

The Spit beach, Coolangatta Beach and Surfers Paradise Beach were closed last week due to high numbers of people continuing to visit beaches despite the warnings from the State and Federal Governments.

The City has also shut car parks beach and oceanside from Broadwater Parklands to Coolangatta.

Feature video: 
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New Committee Chairs announced

Mayor Tom Tate today chaired the first post-election Full Council meeting for the term.

Councillor Donna Gates was re-elected for her third term as Deputy Mayor, making her the longest-running Deputy Mayor in the City’s history.

Councillors Cameron Caldwell and Hermann Vorster were both elected as Acting Mayors of the City, in the event that neither the Mayor nor Deputy Mayor are available. If required to fulfil Mayoral duties the Councillors will operate as Acting Mayor on a rotational basis.

The Planning and Environment Committee will be chaired by Councillor Cameron Caldwell, with Councillor Donna Gates the Deputy Chairperson.

The Economy, Tourism and Events Committee will be chaired by Councillor Bob La Castra, with Councillor Pauline Young the Deputy Chairperson.

The Governance and Administration Committee will be chaired by Councillor William Owen-Jones, with new Division 6 Councillor Brooke Patterson the Deputy Chairperson.

The Lifestyle and Community Committee will be chaired by Councillor Hermann Vorster with new Division 7 Councillor Ryan Bayldon-Lumsden the Deputy Chairperson.

The Transport and Infrastructure Committee will be chaired by Councillor Pauline Young with new Division 10 Councillor Darren Taylor the Deputy Chairperson.

The Water, Waste and Energy Committee will be chaired by Councillor Gail O’Neill with new Division 1 Councillor Mark Hammel the Deputy Chairperson.

The first Committee meetings are scheduled to commence on Tuesday 28 April.

Feature video: 
Not featured




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My Hair Diary – May 2019

Wash Hair when Needed. This is something I often fail at. You have to and must wash your hair as soon as you find your scalp getting greasy, products being too heavy for your hair or even when it is too exposed to environmental factors like sun and pollution. I do not do it and I do find my hair falling a lot more consequently. Where as, if I am regularly washing it, the hair fall is considerably less and even non-existent. Also, use shampoo and conditioner mentioned for your hair type. Improper usage also leads to greasy scalp and stringy looking hair.

The post My Hair Diary – May 2019 appeared first on Perfect Skin Care for you.




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How Men Can Establish and Maintain a Skincare Routine?

Whatever you’re using to cleanse your face and body should be able to remove all that excess dirt and oil you pick up out in the world, clear and unclog your pores, and treat your skin with natural vitamins, antioxidants, and botanicals to help restore and revitalize, not just get the grime off.

The post How Men Can Establish and Maintain a Skincare Routine? appeared first on Perfect Skin Care for you.




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Positive Root Therapy + Advanced Onion Hair Oil

For all its greasy texture, the positive onion hair oil does wash off pretty well in just two washes. I have been using this hair oil for last one month once a week for around 4-5 hours. After washing, the hair does get a lot of volume and bounce. And, it lasts for a good two days which I absolutely love.

The post Positive Root Therapy + Advanced Onion Hair Oil appeared first on Perfect Skin Care for you.




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Sierra Leone’s president accuses main opposition party of inciting violence

FREETOWN (Reuters) - Sierra Leone's president Julius Maada Bio has accused the main opposition party of orchestrating a spate of violent incidents, deepening a political standoff that risks undermining the country's efforts to contain a coronavirus outbreak. At least 18 people have died in three riots in separate parts of the country in recent weeks, including a disturbance at Freetown's central prison on April 29 which started after an inmate tested positive for the virus. In a televised address, Bio claimed members of the All People's Congress (APC) party were behind the violence.

The post Sierra Leone’s president accuses main opposition party of inciting violence appeared first on Firstpost.




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Hidden in Plain Sight

Erich Joachimsthaler, CEO of Vivaldi Partners and author of "Hidden in Plain Sight: How to Find and Execute Your Company's Next Big Growth Strategy."