• Energy

Internet + Solar = The Perfect Match

• broadband
• low income communities
• New York City
• solar energy

by Ashira Morris, ODP Staff Writer In the United States, there’s a growing need to scale up high-speed broadband and clean energy infrastructure. A new housing initiative in New York City will take on both with a single project: setting buildings up for solar power, then using the energy cost savings to bring high-speed internet […]

• Land

One Cool Thing: NYC’s New Floating Park

• Hudson River
• Little Park
• New York City

Like most other cities, New York City is starting to come back to life as we emerge from COVID isolation.  And New Yorkers now have a new free attraction to enjoy — a floating park called “Little Island” on the Hudson River at 13th Street.  It was funded by fashion designer Diane von Furstenberg and […]

• Sustainability

COVID Pandemic Stalls NYC Resilience Funding Bill — Minorities Stand to Lose The Most

• #COVID19
• flood
• insurance
• minority communities
• New York City
• sea level rise
• storm surge

Eight years ago Superstorm Sandy killed 44 people in New York City, cost the City approximately $19 billion in damages and lost economic activity according to city officials, and left more than 69,000 residences damaged.  Inside Climate News’ Kristoffer Tigue reported that earlier this year the New York state legislature was poised to pass a $3b bill called the “Restore Mother Nature Bond Act,” which would have allowed the state to issued bonds to help fund projects specifically geared toward reducing New York’s flood risk.  

Why This Matters:  Advocates argue that this delay in climate adaptation funding will hurt New York City’s low-income communities of color, which already bear a disproportionate burden of climate impacts.

• Sustainability

Climate Change Impacts Roads, May Make Traffic Worse Unless We Adapt Them

• adaptation
• climate change
• New York City
• resilience
• transportation

Climate change will impact roads, bridges and other transportation infrastructure in ways you may not have realized, writes Matt Alderton in The Washington Post over the weekend.  Infrastructure is built to withstand certain weather conditions and extremes: “the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials has guidelines that say asphalt should be engineered to withstand the hottest week on record during a certain historical period — say, 1970 and 2000.”

Why This Matters:  We need to adapt our roads to withstand future conditions, otherwise drivers will experience much worse road conditions and traffic, not to mention the huge expense for taxpayers for repairs due to ineffective design.

• Sustainability

Imagining a Future Of Cities With Many Fewer Or Even Without Cars

• air pollution
• bikes
• cars
• New York City

The New York Times’ opinion writer Farhad Manjoo penned a fantastic story (the graphics are amazing) that visualizes a carless future for NYC and asks the fundamental question “why do cities waste so much space on cars.” 

Why This Matters:  Now is the time to reimagine urban spaces — particularly if, as Manjoo predicts, more people worry that the only way to safely get around in cities is in their own car.

• Sustainability

One NYC Trashy Thing: The Best Bin Won!

• New York City
• trash

There are more than 23,000 trash cans scattered around New York City and they have been virtually unchanged in design since the 1930s — way before we even thought about plastic, much less recycling it.  NYC decided to have a competition to select the best new bin design to replace the old bins — the […]