At least that is what H.G. Wells thought, too bad he was a little off.
With a nice long warm weekend coming up, what better to do then break out your bike and go for a ride.
Not sure where to go, well then you should visit RideTheCity. RideTheCity is a website similar to MapQuest or HopStop, enter your location and your destination and it will draw up a route for you, you can even pick if you’d rather take the ‘Safest Route,’ the ‘Safe Route’ or the “Most Direct Route.” There are two main reason syou are going to want to use RideTheCity instead of, say, Google Maps “First, RTC excludes roads that aren’t meant for biking, like the BQE and the Queens Midtown tunnel. Second, RTC tries to locate routes that maximize the use of bike lanes and greenways.”
Pretty nifty, especially if you have ever ridden your bike in traffic.
Right now it is only for New York City, plus you need to cut them some slack because they are still in their Beta Release, so go, check it out, show them some love and enjoy your nice long weekend.
Two people climbed the NYTimes building today. The initial reports seem to focus on the first ascender, a green activist with some stupid message about global warming, as if global warming needs any more media attention. However, soon after the first ascent, Renaldo Clarke began an ascent with a decidedly different message about a cause that actually doesn’t get much media attention, Malaria.
Rey wore a shirt that said “Malaria No More,” and actively promoted the eradication of the disease during his arrest, after completing the 52 story climb. Naturally, the Times got the best shots of Rey’s Climb, and they are preparing a full story for tomorrow’s paper. There’s also an interesting story on the reaction of Rey’s father to the news in the Atlanta Journal Constitution. In honor of a worthy cause, here are the stats on Malaria.
Malaria is one of the most severe public health problems worldwide. It is a leading cause of death and disease in many developing countries. It kills over a million people each year – mostly children living in Sub-Saharan Africa.
According to the World Health Organization’s World Malaria Report 2005:
- At the end of 2004, some 3.2 billion people lived in areas at risk of malaria transmission in 107 countries and territories.
- Between 350 and 500 million clinical episodes of malaria occur every year.
- At least one million deaths occur every year due to malaria.
- About 60% of the cases of malaria worldwide and more than 80% of the malaria deaths worldwide occur in Africa south of the Sahara.
Malaria kills mostly Africans, so it does not get much media attention from privileged white liberals like the first climber. These types tend to be more concerned with enacting policies, which will make the cost of energy and food so expensive that the majority of the world’s population will simply starve and die.
Let’s hope that Rey’s message about Malaria can move the needle a bit on a controllable disease, which has become a pandemic through neglect. With 1 million dead babies every year, I think it is about time we rethink our irrational fears about DDT and explore all options available to fight Malaria.
I was strolling through Soho last weekend and I came across the Back to the Future car. I’ve got no idea how you get up to 88 mph on those cobblestones. Anyway, here are the pics.
I’ve written often on this site about the propaganda tactics used to create the false impression of a scientific consensus about the effect of C02 on the earth’s climate. Because of this many people probably don’t see me as an environmentalist, but the truth is that I do care deeply about creating a clean environment where humans can live in relative symbiosis with nature. Part of my motivation for moving to New York City was the fact that urban dwelling just seemed like logical best approach to living in a world which will have 9 billion inhabitants in the not too distant future.
That being said, I was rather disappointed to see Mayor Bloomberg’s congestion pricing plan go down in flames. Unlike his Olympic Bid and the West Side stadium, this proposal actually seemed to make sense. New York City is simply not designed to support massive numbers of vehicles. If most people did not already take public transport, the system would not work at all. As the population swells and more and more cars try to jam themselves into the The City the system will break down.
I’d like to ride my bike on my city’s streets without having to fear for my life. I’d like to be able to ride on a public transportation system that isn’t a relic from 1965 (The $350 million for public transport that Albany denied us will ensure that this does not happen). I’d like to be able to breath cleaner air.
The Legislature in Albany, who always seem to have New York City’s worst interests at heart, have denied me and other New Yorkers the right to live in a decent environment, so that they can drive their stinking SUVs into The City whenever they feel like it, without paying a toll for the misery it causes the rest of us.
Okay, well maybe not pregnant… Apparently the NY Times is all up in arms over the “discovery” of the conditions under which NYC manhole covers are made in India. A photo on the cover of the times (and right there to the right) shows bare foot, bare-chested, Indian men working in iron foundries producing New York’s manhole covers.
The article questions the safety conditions under which these guys are working. No protective clothes, no eye wear, and yes, no shoes even. Con Edison officials, the folks purchasing the manhole covers said they were surprised by the lack of safety precautions and said they take them very seriously. The foundry, which forges the manhole covers out of molten iron, claims to have had no accidents, though other officials say that a lot of the accidents go unreported. Read more »
