Fun links of the day!

Mapping Every Single New York City Pedestrian Plaza



"New Yorkers do a lot of walking, most of it very quickly. After all, there are places to go, people to see, and things to do. But there are rare occasions when there is the time and desire for a leisurely stroll. Enter the pedestrian plaza—those stretches, often subsuming actual vehicular roadways, where one can walk, sit, and (occasionally) do a whole host of other things."

from: https://ny.curbed.com/maps/mapping-every-single-new-york-city-pedestrian-plaza

"Everything about gentrification is controversial — even its definition. One recent study by sociologist Michael Barton compared how the New York Times and researchers used the term to talk about city neighborhoods; he found very little agreement about where change was happening. That’s not the only thing we can’t agree on. Gentrification is painted alternately as a destroyer of neighborhoods or a savior of cities. These competing views are driven in part by misconceptions about what the word means and what it entails."

from: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/five-myths-about-gentrification/2016/06/03/b6c80e56-1ba5-11e6-8c7b-6931e66333e7_story.html

and:

http://newurbannetwork.com/ten-tips-planners-convert-shopping-center-village-center/

Public space

"Generally speaking, a public space is a place that is accessible to the public at any time of day, such as parks, beaches, squares, roads, sidewalks, etc. These spaces all serve different functions, and can easily just be seen in spatial terms. Yet with the effort of communities, they can be turned into lively, creative spaces that bring people together. While there are plenty of reasons why public space is important, here are the top five."



from: https://culturedays.ca/blog/2015/09/10/top-five-reasons-public-space-important/

Places for people downtown

"Rethinking alleys matters because livable gathering places in the heart of city blocks sparks neighbor-to-neighbor engagement, and cities grow healthier with more person-to-person interaction in public spaces full of life."

from: http://alleyactivation.org/

Alleys acts a thoroughfares for pedestrians. They are mid-block connections and can become livable spaces, acting like make-shift parks and places for public art and more.

The City of Vancouver is looking for ideas from the public to improve its downtown places. "Vancouver’s public spaces – our plazas, squares, streets, laneways, pathways, and waterfront – are where public life happens."

from: http://vancouver.ca/home-property-development/places-for-people-downtown.aspx

Alley Oop is only of those places:

#pink and #yellow #downtownimprovement in #vancouver #placesforpeoplevan

A post shared by Cherish (@cherish2028) on Jul 20, 2017 at 2:30pm PDT

For more information, see: http://hcma.ca/project/more-awesome-now/

And it is not just Vancouver. "2017 seems to be the “Year of the Alley Activation” in Seattle. Two separate alley activation projects just wrapped up in Chinatown and the University District, and two more projects are still on the way for Pioneer Square later this year. The most successful and beloved active alley known to Seattleites and visitors alike is Post Alley, which weaves its way through the Pike Place Market Historic District featuring a mix of restaurants and specialty shops, the famous gum wall, and its iconic namesake signage."

from: https://www.theurbanist.org/2017/06/30/alley-activation/

Maps of Canada

"It’s always a surprise when people first learn that the very tip of southwestern Ontario is at a lower latitude than parts of California—which got us wondering: How do other parts of the country line up with the rest of the world? Here are the results, using Earthtools.org. Most of the cities on this map, and their global counterparts, lie within less than 50 km of each other, latitudinally speaking, of course. Only Quebec-Ulan Bator and Fort McMurray-Moscow are a full degree apart."



"Here’s a different way to look at Canada’s population. The circles represent the relative population density of each province. And yes, we know people do live in the Northwest Territories and Nunavut, but there are so few of them, and their geographies so vast, that you’d have to go a couple of decimal places before they’d register."



from: http://www.macleans.ca/news/canada/putting-canada-on-the-map/