[ExI] 10 mega construction projects that could save the environment and the economy

[Adrian Tymes]

The ones that require people to live in them, are often not designed with
adequate consideration that people will want to travel to and interact with
the world outside.

Look at any large city: is it a gated community?  No, and it became
large (and thrives) precisely because it is not.  Massive amounts of
people and products move in and out of the city at every hour.  Sure,
there are many who rarely leave the city - even quite a few who stay
entirely within it for years at a time.  The majority, though, travel to
suburbs or beyond some of the time - and then there is the transient
population, only there at certain hours of the day (such as workers in
the many offices, who live in suburbs beyond the city).  And then there
are the raw and manufactured goods: imports to sustain the city and
exports of what it produces.

Not that redesign to solve this is impossible.  Take that pyramid city
in Tokyo Bay - or, possibly, one could consider it at certain points
in the San Francisco Bay (though environmentalists would have a fit
about habitat destruction, unless one could do this within land not
currently suitable for wildlife).  Start by tying it into car traffic, and
designing the first parts as a housing community, with the
seaward-facing side a cargo port.  Add in commerce and light
industry, but first and foremost, make it a residential area for the
housing-tight existing community, with the expectation that, at least
at first, most of the residents will be commuting outside - and even
after the city is going, there will still be massive commute.

But the projects won't work if they are designed to exist in
isolation.  No megaproject humanity has done thus far has worked
well sealed into its own thing, instead of interacting with the world
that already existed.

On Thu, Dec 1, 2011 at 3:42 PM, John Grigg <possiblepaths2050 at gmail.com> wrote:
> I am very curious to know what list members think of these ideas...
>
>
> http://io9.com/5863422/10-mega+construction-projects-that-could-save-the-environment--and-the-economy?tag=daily-10
>
>
> John
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