Start with Las Vegas and figure out how you would improve things - hardest thing would be replacing the mob as the source of funding.
Plans for a new city in the American desert
161–170 of 268 posts
Re: Plans for a new city in the American desert
#162Earlier quoted context omitted.
Savannah, Georgia is a pretty city, based on the Oglethorpe Plan back in 1733. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oglethorpe_Plan
Looking at https://www.travelsafe-abroad.com/united-states/savannah/ So... How Safe Is Savannah Really? Savannah is a reasonably unsafe city. The crime index ranges from medium to high. The main problems here are robberies and assaults, car theft and theft, vandalism, violent crime, and drug problems. Nevertheless, the historic Savannah district is entirely safe for exploring the area day and night. Better to be in a…
That website looks like machine-generated nonsense. For example, they imply the terrorist risk is significant and worse for foreigners.
Re: Plans for a new city in the American desert
#163Earlier quoted context omitted.
> The cleanliness of Tokyo is 100% because of cultural issues, not because the government did anything special Social disapproval over time, including that expressed through government policy, has effect on culture. So, while it may not result particularly from the government doing something immediate to cause the cleanliness, I would be hesitant to assert it is independent of government action merely because it is c…
Government policy reflects the culture. I have spent 30% of the last 20 years of my life in Japan, on and off again. One of the highest compliments paid to me by a group of Japanese friends was, “you must not do X again, you are Japanese and know better now.” I.E. as a foreigner I would get a pass, but my understanding of the culture reached a point where they expected better. I was both very highly embarrassed and a…
> Government policy reflects the culture
In general, sure. It also is one of many things that influences it. Culture doesn't just arrive ex nihilo with no influence from concrete experience.
Re: Plans for a new city in the American desert
#164I'm very curious, have there ever been any "cities from the ground up" projects that don't turn out to be total shit that end up just reflecting the urban planning fallacies of the day? (Looking at you, Brasilia) I mean, all of the cities that are most "livable" in my mind are old cities that were designed before the car and thus have enough density and public transportation to make things both close and also the kin…
Suburbs most likely. They are close to places people want to be. Cities in the middle of nnowhere don't work.
Re: Plans for a new city in the American desert
#165Earlier quoted context omitted.
What would it take for the middle class homeowners of America to prioritize housing for everyone rather than the price of their home?
Do you think anyone else should act against their own interests, or just the middle class?
Not OP, but yes I think everyone should act against their own interests (when they are selfish) and instead act for the good of everyone
Re: Plans for a new city in the American desert
#166Earlier quoted context omitted.
This. The western half of the US is going to become useless for farming in the next 50 years because all the aquifers are drying up and they take tens of thousands of years to recharge. Which is another way of saying that farming in the western US has only been possible because it harvested fossil water that's now almost gone.
This is not quite true. Most western US (well, say CA central valley back to the plains) agriculture has been made possible by large scale irrigation systems backed by the construction of substantial reservoirs. From time to time, it has been necessary to pull from groundwater, and from time to time, some farmers have done so even when it wasn't necessary. But in general, most of the agricultural expansion has been b…
Correct. I overgeneralized; the coastal western states might be able to continue some farming. Assuming cities like LA don't continue to appropriate more and more water that fell to the ground hundreds of miles away.
Re: Plans for a new city in the American desert
#167Start with Las Vegas and figure out how you would improve things - hardest thing would be replacing the mob as the source of funding.
The mob funds jack shit, the gambling tourists do all the funding. The mob is a parasite.
Re: Plans for a new city in the American desert
#168Earlier quoted context omitted.
Building human-comfortable areas in a desert is quite environmentally friendly, given a source of water (and I don't want to brush this one under the rug; it's actually fairly difficult). Things about a desert that make energy use lower: - Evaporative cooling can decrease cooling needs. Using a fan or an evaporative cooler is much more feasible in dry environments. - Hot days and cool nights mean it's fairly simple t…
What is viability of storing thermal energy for cooking? Out-side very few specific scenarios like sous-vide proteins, the temperatures generally used are too high for efficient energy transfer.
Sous-vide (and heating the water through solar energy) is indeed one way to do it. Another way in a sunny area:
Try to grab a solar parabolic dish (an example is the Haines Cooker [1]) and place something with a large thermal mass inside. An example of this is firebrick, but regular brick will do (regular brick has a lower heat capacity). Firebrick has a heat capacity [2] of 0.5 MWh / m^3. As the sun sets, put something with high thermal conductivity atop the heated firebricks, and use that to cook. A practical item that works is a cast iron pot or grill.
Another way to cook like this is to use thermal cookers ([3], [4]). Thermal cookers work by wrapping a pot with a large layer of insulation, keeping the food cooking over time. They're popular in East Asia to make porridges (congee) and slow-boiled vegetable/meat dishes (nabe). If you can make your pot come to a boil in something like a Haines cooker and plop the pot inside the insulated chamber, then you can have a hot meal ready by evening.
Of course the most "comfortable" way to cook on clean energy would probably be to store the excess generated solar energy in large batteries and discharge through an induction stove or into a modern PID-based slow/pressure cooker (like the Instant Pot). You're dealing with the losses in battery storage and energy transmission, but that allows people to cook with the "flow" that they expect (e.g. turn a knob and wait for your burner to come to temperature.) There's also a world of biomass stoves out there but if there's enough surplus solar, it's best to stick to an induction stove powered through solar.
[1]: https://hainessolarcookers.com
[2]: https://inldigitallibrary.inl.gov/sites/sti/sti/Sort_8882.pd...
[3]: https://www.wonderbagworld.com/
[4]: https://www.thermos.com.sg/thermos/products/shuttle-chef/tcr...
Re: Plans for a new city in the American desert
#169I'm very curious, have there ever been any "cities from the ground up" projects that don't turn out to be total shit that end up just reflecting the urban planning fallacies of the day? (Looking at you, Brasilia) I mean, all of the cities that are most "livable" in my mind are old cities that were designed before the car and thus have enough density and public transportation to make things both close and also the kin…
Agreed that the most liveable cities really exist already, and they are all older, walkable, and predate cars. These new ecotechnic utopian proposals fetishize efficiency and convenience. They also completely fail to capture what makes a city great.
It's sad, because in the US, there are actually a lot of good templates for new cities, designed for growth on the outset, that strike a balance between dense and verdant. The oldest part of places like Savannah, Charleston, New Orleans, smaller college towns, streetcar suburbs, ... It's so weird that when new suburbs are built, why they are not just straight up copying those 19th century templates.
Re: Plans for a new city in the American desert
#170Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't think this work as this is just rent controlled housing. Better to cut the unnecessary red tape and let developers build more housing. Also, I think penalizing vacant properties would also be a good idea.
I'm curious to hear why you think it doesn't work. I'm not necessarily disagreeing, just would like to know more.
If "affordable housing" means "under market price", in practice AH means that it goes to the connected at that price. If they can, they resell at market later, if they can't, well, they just got subsidized housing.
Remember, housing prices in high-priced areas are driven by location, location, location, location, location (yes, two more locations than ordinary housing), so "it's small" doesn't translate to "the market price is low." (It's just less expensive than big.)
When the "market price" exceeds the cash price, the folks who get to buy are the ones who have some way to pay outside the system.