Enjoys cultivating geekery.
Stroud Green, London
Joined July 2011
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Ben Myring retweeted
Quinlan Terry’s triumphant Richmond Riverside (1988). It’s so good that the first time I saw it 15 years ago I had no idea it wasn’t an authentic Georgian grouping. It now fits in as if it always belonged.
Ben Myring retweeted
More than a century ago, Santa Barbara decided that it wanted to be a Spanish Revival city, building with intention & concentrating those efforts in the core.
Now, it's one of the most beautiful places in America, building wonderful projects like this every year, all by choice!
Ben Myring retweeted
It’s that time of year to remind everyone that snow shows us how most of our urban streets could have narrower carriageways & wider pavements. In ..
Famous GIF via @otucis & @BrentToderian
This would be absolutely ruinous. There's a night & day difference between Greek islands that are mobbed by cruise daytrippers and islands that have a slower, more traditional pace and focus on eco-friendly tourism. Must we destroy every single place?
theguardian.com/travel/2024/…
Ben Myring retweeted
And this is another of the most beautiful, perhaps the most beautiful train ever made: the 12.004 (La Douce), a sumptuous steam locomotive, with François Schuiten, who was inspired by it, posing next to it
Ben Myring retweeted
One of the most beautiful trains ever made, the ‘Mercury’ streamliner, designed in Art Deco-style by Henry Dreyfuss for the New York Central Railroad. Here's one captured in Chicago in 1936 (colorization by Patty Allison) – at Rome, Lazio
Ben Myring retweeted
Stefan Zweig on Europe’s capitals at the turn of the century is interesting - and entirely at odds with today’s common sense: he says they became more beautiful, and more densely populated, at the same time. (Written in 1942).
Ben Myring retweeted
The famous Ritz Hotel is replacing an ugly postwar block with an extension in the style of the original Mewès and Davis 1906 building. These are matching perspectives: it looks to be a huge improvement for Arlington Street. Building works currently underway.
Ben Myring retweeted
Good to see @TheGreenParty has finally dropped its opposition to HS2 and will now support rail travel as an alternative to planes.
🛫 The government has approved London City airport expansion... in a time of climate crisis 🤯
🚉 We think prioritising clean, affordable train travel is a no-brainer. Labour has other ideas...
ALT REAL HOPE. REAL CHANGE. PLANES VS TRAINS? Green Party Promoted by Chris Willams on behalf of The Green Party, both at PO Box 78066, London SE16 9GQ
Readers added context they thought people might want to know
The Green Party has repeatedly opposed plans to improve the UK railway network.
newstatesman.com/comment/2023/1…
Ben Myring retweeted
Map by 🔒 @Lefaucheux75 summarizing the origins of American county names.
His caveats, in his words: "Probably has some mistakes, could use more details, could make better distinctions", but I personally think it's brilliant.
Ben Myring retweeted
BREAKING: China's CO2 emissions dropped 1% in Q2 of 2024, the first quarterly drop since Covid-19
The new analysis by @laurimyllyvirta for @CarbonBrief shows China remains on track for a fall in annual CO2 this year, meaning emissions would've peaked in 2023
🌄🚗🏙️Key drivers are record growth of solar / wind, as well as EVs and China's real-estate slowdown
⚡️Drop in 2024 depends on electricity demand growth easing in H2, per industry projections
⛰️🏭Strong demand from coal-to-chemicals, industry, has been raising energy use ahead of pre-Covid trends
⚖️If this pace of growth continues, CO2 would be flat in 2024 rather than falling
Full details in the article ↘️
carbonbrief.org/analysis-chi…
This brilliantly captures how traditional urbanism beats car-focused sprawl on every metric worth caring about.
This quoted post is unavailable.
Ben Myring retweeted
Useful thread. A key path to more homes is to legalise attractive intensification on existing streets by right, no risk, as long as you follow certain locally agreed rules.
Ben Myring retweeted
Precisely. What people like. Where they feel at home. Where it is safe and pleasurable to walk and mingle with your neighbours is remarkably easy to predict.
Surprisingly beautiful environments are more predictable than you’d expect nature.com/articles/srep1689…
Ben Myring retweeted
Emm. We’re not expert in methodologies for target-setting but if you DID want to build FAR more homes in London you would legalise by right intensification of existing streets to Pimlico or Islington style terraced houses or Marleybone style mansion blocks. All would need to follow strict locally popular design codes. There are existing mechanisms to do that within current law if we wish to…… (LDO, SDO, NDO, PD, PiP, backed up by area or authority wide design codes)
