More lessons from school than those within the walls

Edited 2 April 2008
My wife and I have been confronted with a choice — one that is available mostly to those in our privileged social condition, but a difficult one: where should we send our children to school?
Just a few years ago, we wouldn’t have had this difficulty. We’d have sent the kids to [...]

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Will the Ice Park exclude children, elderly, and the poor?

If you read the News-Miner on March 24, or their editorial the next day, you’ve probably found out that Ice Alaska is planning to move our beloved Ice Park south of town, to the Tanana Lakes Recreation Area.
Currently, I’m just close enough to walk to the Ice Park. It’s in the range of 30 or [...]

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One down, two to go

(Corrected 21 April 2008.)
Hoorah! The FNSB Planning Commission voted unanimously last night (Tuesday) to endorse the Vision Fairbanks plan for downtown’s revitalization. While the Planning Commission doesn’t pass ordinances, their endorsement is key (as is that of the Fairbanks City Council) to getting the Assembly to adopt the plan.
Roughly a dozen citizens gave [...]

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The “Fairbanks Citizenship Tax” (testimony before the FNSB Planning Commission)

Tonight (Tuesday, March 25), the FNSB Planning Commission will have a public hearing on the Vision Fairbanks plan for downtown’s revitalization. Below is my prepared testimony. (I’ll have to keep the pace up to deliver this in under three minutes.)
***
Good Commissioners,
I realize that matters of taxation fall outside your official purview, but you [...]

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The dread “exercise”: or, Living with integration

My fellow Fairbanks blogger Discontinuous Permafrost recently reported that he was ordered by his doctor to “[incorporate] a ‘healthy diet and exercise’ or suffer the consequences down the road.” I felt so sorry for him. Little repulses me more than the prospect of having to “exercise”.
I don’t mean to say that I prefer sloth [...]

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ACTION ALERT (CHANGE OF PLANS): City Council action postponed

The public hearing on Vision Fairbanks has been postponed.  The City Council will consider it in a “work session” at 6:00 on March 24, but it will not be an item on the agenda.  The tentative date for consideration is now April 7.
I apologize for putting out information that has turned out to be incorrect.  [...]

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ACTION ALERT: Support a revitalized, pedestrian-friendly downtown March 24!

[UPDATE, THURSDAY, MARCH 20: The public hearing has been postponed.  The City Council will consider Vision Fairbanks in a "work session" at 6:00 on March 24, but it will not be an item on the agenda.  The tentative date for consideration is now April 7.  I will post an update when this date becomes more [...]

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Alaska’s most walkable city?

As readers of Dermot Cole’s column may have heard, Prevention Magazine, in association with the American Podiatric Medical Association, named Fairbanks the best city in Alaska for walkers. The APMA developed the Best Walking Cities Competition in part “to educate the public on the health benefits of walking.” However, as an educational [...]

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Hosting, guesting, and “third places”

My wife and I host a monthly “soup night” to which twenty or thirty of our friends, plus their partners and children, have a standing invitation. They know that, on such-and-such a day, every month, they’re welcome to stop in for as long as they like.
Besides cleaning the house and trying to prepare ample soup [...]

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Will the folding, stacking car give us more public space?

A family member just sent me an article titled “MIT tackles urban gridlock with foldable car idea“. Apparently, scientists at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology have designed a compact two-seater (about the size of a golf cart) capable of finding other cars like itself to stack up with, folding in half, and parking itself. [...]

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