RIP Michael Brooks

...now in. My writing beat, what has, for lack of a better term, been called “urban homesteading” is poisoned by that individualism which manifests in a concept of self sufficiency whose ultimate destination is a lonely existence in a doomstead bunker. I’ve always tried to point out that we’re all in this together, that we need to build up our households and our communities. It’s not one or the other. Michael was just beginning to formulate a strateg...

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Hey New York Times Let’s Dump the Wheels Column

...f communities, thanks to the insatiable hunger for space cars claim in our urban spaces. Failing to point out these objective facts makes your auto columns little more propaganda. Where is your bike column? Where is your transit advice column? Where is your walk-ability coverage? Sure, you touch on these issues elsewhere but these subjects have no dedicated column like “Wheels.” Perhaps it’s time to start treating cars the way you might treat ciga...

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Learning to Draw Version 4.0

...and would like to do that again. The takeaway from those classes was the importance of setting time limits and doing sketches that are loose and quick as well as long and detailed. For architectural sketching I’ve been working my way through a new book, Sketch Club Urban Drawing. See above for my warning on shopping for art supplies, but I do really like my Rotring Isograph College Set. It comes with three refillable pens, a mechanical pencil, an...

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Weekend Linkages: Floored

...hut-ins (Podcast) (@edburmila) May 17, 2021 City, Suburb, Server Farm: the Urban Geography of Amazon A private bar where you can drink, hug, and ditch masks? Welcome to Risky Business in North Hollywood Crime App Citizen is Driving a Security Car Around L.A. and Won’t Say Why Build your own bamboo dome-like structure with giant grass’s zome building kit Why are our cities built for 6ft-tall men? The female architects who fought back Narrative Napa...

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