Greater City Providence

News & Notes

Street Furniture in Guangzhou [UrbanPhoto]

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Photo © Christopher DeWolf | urbanphoto.net

It turns out Hong Kong has got nothing on Guangzhou. In that city’s ancient Liwan District, where leafy, winding streets are lined by family-run wholesale businesses, just about every shop has a jumble of tables and chairs outside. They’re used for meals, boisterous card games and, in the middle of the afternoon, a kind of furtive siesta. (Unlike in southern Europe, most businesses in southeastern Asia don’t close in the afternoon – workers just sleep on the job.)


Local bike paths mean higher house prices [Crikey]

On April Fool’s Day Fairfax Media posted a video affirming that the new inner Sydney cycleways have had a positive effect on property prices. It was no joke. It seems that having a bikeway right outside your front door is good for your health and the value of your house.


New England urbanists look for the silver lining in the ‘New Austerity’ [New Urban News]

With jobs scarce, young people “are much more open to going to many other places than Boston, San Francisco,” and other stars of the urban firmament, said David Dixon, head of urban planning for the Boston design firm Goody, Clancy & Associates. That’s welcome news for smaller urban areas, he suggested. Energetic young adults may settle in some of those smaller cities and start enterprises there.


NYC: Meet Your New Taxi [The Atlantic]

New Yorkers will be hailing a very different-looking cab than they’re used to in a few years. Nissan announced today that it won the decade-long exclusive contract to supply the U.S.’s largest city with its taxis starting in 2013. The Nissan NV200 sort of resembles a boxy van — it looks nothing like the Ford Crown Victoria sedan cabs most prevalent on the streets of NYC today.


Gondola service pondered for N.W. Calgary [CBC News]

The gondola, similar to those used at ski resorts, could have several stops, covering three to five kilometres in a horseshoe shape, said Neil McKendrick Calgary’s manager of transit planning.

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