General @ 05 Jun 2008 12:27 pm by Robert Schmidl
German Federal Office for Building and Regional Planning (BBR) has observed the phenomenon of young and well-educated woman leaving their home regions (mainly rural regions) in East Germany in a report called “Women – men – spaces”.
The political change in Eastern Germany and in Eastern Europe 16 years ago was the beginning of dramatic social and economic transformations with impacts of demographic change in Eastern Germany. There has been a significant change in the population structure. The biggest labour migrant group included those between 18 and 35 years old, most of them women, and many well-educated. Besides the fact of a generally sinking birth rate in Germany as a whole (with the most severe decline experienced in the regions of the former GDR), labour migration impacts have narrowed the base of regional population pyramids - especially rural areas and in smaller towns. Not only are there greater numbers of older people than younger people but also fewer children today mean even fewer in the future. As a consequence, the population of eastern Germany is aging rapidly and cities are shrinking.
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General @ 19 May 2008 08:27 am by Robert Schmidl
Our world is rapidly ageing. According to the United Nations, when the percentage of population of people over 65 years old is more than seven percent, such a society will be called "ageing society”. Therefore, as the number of the elderly people increase, the demand for medical care and welfare services will increase, and it will be necessary to provide those services properly.
In our fast ageing world, older people are increasingly playing a crucial role - by volunteering work, transmitting experience and knowledge, helping their families with caring responsibilities or in paid work. These contributions can only be ensured if older persons enjoy good health and if societies address their needs.
But how can cities of tomorrow handle the challenges of an ageing society?
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Which infrastructural improvements do you anticipate for the districts, in which such arenas are going to be built?
Less infrastructure. More on site sustainability. More functional off grid built space.
Which personal benefits could be a result, in your opinion, from potential changes in social structure and job market situation?
Individual and community independence. Live and work.
In how far does a new arena change the skyline of a city? Do you know any example personally?
The skyline i see does not extend above the canopy. I see most of the built space in the US to become non functional in the next thirty years minus discovery of new energy source equal to oil.
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Ever since our cities became areas of continuous interaction and ever-expanding exchange the term “exotic” - understood as counterpart to the “local”, the “native” or even the “authentic” - has become a rather vague term. Who – in actual fact - is still able to distinguish between the one and the other, between the exotic and the local? Who would be interested anyway? Yet, once again, there seems to be an increasing fascination with, and interest in, importing and seeing certain urban elements from other parts of the world in our own cities. There are, apparently, more Japanese people visiting the fake Eiffel Tower in Las Vegas than the original in Paris. What makes this displacement so interesting today?
The fascination with the “exotic” and its appearance in our cities has a long history, although at first merely going in one direction: from the “West” to the “East”. Interest in the exotic by the Western World was first stimulated by trade with the Eastern World back in the 16th century. But right from the start there has always been this intriguing contradiction in the term “exotic” as being on the one hand associated with fantasies of opulence and barbaric splendour, yet on the other hand considered as integer, uncorrupted and tasteful. The charm of the unfamiliar with its thrill of menace hasn’t lost its attraction even today and has been turned into a global phenomenon that can no longer be discussed within the narrow-minded Orient – Occident dialectic. These days, all kinds of foreign urban elements evoke the atmosphere of far-off lands all over the world. A finish sauna can be as exotic in Sao Paulo as Islamic ornamental motifs on a building in New York City.
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These days everyone is talking about the current environment problems and how to solve them. Everyone is advised to behave in an earth friendly way. Actually you can find a “Combating Global Warming Mind Map” which outlines approaches to solving Global Warming. The focus is on doing something.
Map © Jane Genovese
This works well for every single one of us. It is easy to understand and more or less to implement these hints in everybody’s everyday life.
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Which infrastructural improvements do you anticipate for the districts, in which such arenas are going to be built?
Proper roads of good quality and sufficient width to take up vehicle population for next 20 years, good drainage and santiation conditions, proper planning, identifying locations for industries, housing, recreation, etc.
Which personal benefits could be a result, in your opinion, from potential changes in social structure and job market situation?
Better standards of living, increase in avarage age of life, finance and economy of the individualand the nation will go high, reduction in journey time and journey cost
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User Interview @ 20 Mar 2008 10:12 am by Peter Baker
Which infrastructural improvements do you anticipate for the districts, in which such arenas are going to be built?
Improved access by road and train. More green areas. Better cycle paths and more decorative traffic signs, such as the heart shaped pedestrian lights in Prenzlauer Berg.
Which personal benefits could be a result, in your opinion, from potential changes in social structure and job market situation?
A wider range of cheap restaurants.
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Which infrastructural improvements do you anticipate for the districts, in which such arenas are going to be built?
Well, supporting services like transport, and public services always improve in the areas where arenas such as this are built. So I would think that these same improvements would be made in the areas that these arenas are built.
Which personal benefits could be a result, in your opinion, from potential changes in social structure and job market situation?
Well these services that are improved will need people to run them, so there is the potential to create new jobs and new forms of employment.
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General @ 28 Feb 2008 08:30 am by Daniel Appell
Sustainability has to do with behaviors that allow us to survive. In general, increased sustainability allows us to survive longer. The primary motive for this change in behavior is to avoid a world wide crisis. The crisis was first described by Thomas Robert Malthus in 1798. The crisis results from an increasing human population running out of the resources that will allow our planet to continue supporting life. Sustainable design would also provide for an increase in wealth by facilitating improved productivity.
Three sets of behavior are associated with sustainability; 1) consume less, 2) produce more, 3) waste nothing. This sounds simple, but it requires a dramatic change in a North American lifestyle, a radical redesign of our urban centres, reformation of the means we use to produce goods and fundamental shifts in provincial and federal policies.
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