San Francisco reflections (part two)

This post continues “San Francisco reflections (part one)“. I’d like to show a few of my photos of San Francisco, and to discuss some relevant points about city planning and public spaces. Perhaps the first thing is a peculiar attitude among many Fairbanksans: that living in close proximity to others is somehow undignified.  I say: [...]

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Why do we hate teenagers?

Why do we hate teenagers so much? What made them an acceptable target for disenfranchisement? On one of my professional e-mail lists, somebody brought up a problem with teenage skateboarders: they love to use the covered walkway in front of a facility frequented by senior citizens with visual and mobility challenges. Too often (I presume) [...]

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The bench test

My travels sometimes take me to Anchorage — often enough, by car. It was on one of those trips, in the past year or two, that I devised a simple measure of a place’s pedestrian-friendliness: the bench test. I drove in on the George Parks Highway, entered the city at Muldoon Road, and turned west [...]

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