"The light-year-long cosmic squiggle is currently collecting material from an envelope of gas surrounding it. [...] A previous study has called the object, which lies 4,500 light-years away in the constellation Cygnus, a ‘tadpole in an interstellar pond.’ Harsh winds from extremely bright stars are blasting ultraviolet radiation at this 'wanna-be' star, named IRAS 20324+4057, and sculpting the gas and dust into its long shape."
"The image charts 11,967 tropical cyclones that have occurred on Earth since the NOAA began keeping a record in 1842, when data was supplied by ships and lighthouses rather than today’s advanced satellite detection systems."First zoom in on USA...
Global visual of storm intensity... 
"The City of Copenhagen has implemented this double railing simply as a convenience for the cyclists who stop here. A high railing to grasp with your hand and a foot railing for putting your foot up..."
Mark Wagenbuur from BicycleDutch has numerous posts on cycle path details, including Drainage in NL... "With so many people cycling in the Netherlands and with the average amount of precipitation in their country, the Dutch need a system that keeps the infrastructure dry without endangering all those people cycling. And of course the Dutch have such a system. Key difference to some of the other systems of the world is that the openings for rain water to get into the sewer system are not horizontally in the street surface, but vertically set in the kerbs [...] As a cyclist you do not have to ride over these openings that way and that makes all the difference."David Hembrow's View From the Cycle Path spots many details, including latest piece on Bollards, both horrible and acceptable examples...
"Bollards appear primarily where cycling routes meet driving routes. They're also used to prevent minor roads from being used for through journeys (segregating modes without a cycle-path and helping to unravel driving routes from cycling routes) and in other places, for example to discourage parking of cars where they are not wanted."Latest designs include flexible bollards... And this David Hembrow piece on Angled Curbs...
"Parallel kerbs can be quite dangerous for cyclists. A slight lapse of concentration and you can be off your bike, and possibly injured badly [...] The kerb shown here is one of many "forgiving" 45 degree kerbs in use in Assen. These kerbs make it possible to cross from the cycle path to the pedestrian path without falling from your bike. They reduce the risk of injury due to a lapse of concentration."
And here Mark spotlights David's video of NL's red cyclepath construction...
"This makeshift piece of Syria has three hospitals -- meaning that healthcare and mortality rates are significantly better inside the camp than outside -- and there are a number of schools, although attendance is low. Just a quarter go to classes. Entrepreneurial residents have also set up more than 3,000 different shops and businesses along the camp's main roads -- including the humorously named "Champs Elysee" -- selling a wide range of goods and services, from groceries and fresh bread to wedding dresses and mobile phones. There are also taxi services, children's playgrounds and football pitches. [...] Yet, the vast majority of Syria's 1.9 million refugees do not live in Jordan's desert camps, but are instead spread across the region. Most are in Lebanon, followed by Jordan, Turkey, Iraq and Egypt. This is not forgetting the 4.25 million internally displaced people within Syria itself."
I wonder what it would take for Jordan to assimilate the refugees and give them empowerment rights to work and own property and businesses and welcome them to build up the Jordanian economy, including such emerging cities as Aqaba and beyond.
Existing and planned power pool connections... 
And planned power plants... 
Plus, see my earlier Maximizing Progress posts here with maps of African Seaports, Bollore's ports, rail and waterlinks, the planned roadway and current rails, and proposed African Rail Corridors, including special focus on Rail West Africa.
Prof Dave Hodgson, an ecologist at the University of Exeter, and his team embarked on a Slime Watch to find that... "...snails will travel distances of up to 25 metres in a 24-hour period, and seek out areas of shelter, such as long grass, trees or objects, including dogs' toys, left in the garden overnight. The four researchers from Exeter University also discovered that snails move in convoys, piggy-backing on the slime of other snails to conserve energy. It is thought that a snail could use up to 30 per cent of its energy in slime production alone. The study was commissioned by the Be Lungworm Aware campaign as a resource for dog owners, whose pets are at risk from a potentially fatal parasite spread by slugs and snails..."
(See also pieces in Neatorama and at DailyMail)
Nice design by Singapore-MIT team for Sesame Ring, an RFID replacement for the Charlie Card to access public transit (and in principle, much more!) This "One Ring To (Ride) Them All" is now Kickstarting! (See also Jenny Xie's nice writeup in Atlantic Cities)
"...power could escape their grip [...] unless the party eradicates seven subversive currents coursing through Chinese society."These seven perils include...
"China's Yong Sheng is an unremarkable ship that is about to make history. It is the first container-transporting vessel to sail to Europe from China through the Arctic rather than taking the usual southerly route through the Suez Canal, shaving two weeks off the regular travel time in the process. The 19,000-ton Yong Sheng, operated by China's state-controlled Cosco Group, left the port of Dalian Aug. 8 and is scheduled to reach Rotterdam, in the Netherlands, via the Bering Strait Sept. 11. The travel time of about 35 days compares with the average of 48 days it would normally take to journey through the Suez Canal and Mediterranean Sea."
Of course, things get even more interesting when you throw in the prospects of trans-Siberian railway links... "So which routes have been tested? [...]
The freight lead times are very good in comparison to sea freight where the usual shipping time can be 36 days or more depending on the end location in Europe. The scale of the railway is immense as it crosses 11 time zones and more than 11,000 km."
- Shanghai China to Duisburg Germany (18 Days)
- Chongqing to Duisburg (16 Days)
- Xiangtang, China, to Hamburg (17 Days)
Jim Robbins in his NYTimes pieces spotlights Birdsourcing... "Tens of thousands of birders are now what the [Cornell Lab of Ornithology] calls “biological sensors,” turning their sightings into digital data by reporting where, when and how many of which species they see. [...] sighting of a dozen herons is a tiny bit of information, but such bits, gathered in the millions, provide scientists with a very big picture: perhaps the first crowdsourced, real-time view of bird populations around the world."Check out BirdCast forecasts!
"Collecting medicine from a hospital or clinic-based dispensary in some of South Africa's townships is no mean feat. There is the cost of transport to the facility, often hours spent queuing, the cost to have someone look after children left at home, or the loss of pay because of missing work. But for the elderly and infirm, it can be a nightmare because they physically find it impossible to travel. Now Sizwe Nzima, a young man from the township of Khayelitsha in Cape Town, has started a business which has seen him win a Forbes Magazine award as one of Africa's best young entrepreneurs."
"In the future everything in a city, from the electricity grid, to the sewer pipes to roads, buildings and cars will be connected to the network. Buildings will turn off the lights for you, self-driving cars will find you that sought-after parking space, even the rubbish bins will be smart. But how do we get to this smarter future. Who will be monitoring and controlling the sensors that will increasingly be on every building, lamp-post and pipe in the city? And is it a future we even want?"
"... the most comprehensive emergency response training facility in the world. At the 52 acre site, Saima Mohsin learns how full-scale reconstructions of collapsed buildings are used to simulate a wide variety of disaster scenarios, from explosions to train crashes and earthquakes. The findings are then usedto equip emergency personnel from across the world with the knowledge and technology to respond effectively in the most challenging situations."
"...Singapore’s successful urbanizationThe ten principles are:
experience -- despite its population density, the city-state has consistently ranked favorably in various surveys measuring the liveability and sustainability of cities around the globe. [...] Each of the 10 principles in the publication reflects Singapore’s integrated model of planning and development, which weaves together the physical, economic, social and environmental aspects of urban living."
"Wicked cool & hands-on online engineering classes [...] Imagine Khan Academy with hardware projects. We are combining online curricula with wicked cool hardware kits to teach introductory engineering topics at the high school and up level. To do so, we are using the edX platform and then developing hardware modules. [...] We want to empower you to go out and make your own things and to spread the “can do” attitude."Check out their Drawbot, a robot arm that sketches and helps kids learn about kinematics, batteries, and more! Kickstarting soon!
What makes Giken so interesting as a company is their enabling technology, harnessing the Press-In Method, for quiet and low environmental-impact construction.
Holger Dambeck asks in DerSpiegel are there Too Many Bikes? Europe's Cycling Boom Sees a Backlash... "More bicycles were supposed to make Europe's cities more livable. Instead, the popularity of two-wheeled travel is causing problems in some cities in Holland and Denmark, where traffic jams and parking shortages are common. [...] Cycling has been heavily promoted, and more and more people are taking to the pedal -- but eventually cycling paths, bike racks and other parking areas have begun to run out of space. The bike boom -- long seen as the universal solution to roads jammed with parked cars, dead inner cities and other urban maladies like noise, smog and lack of exercise -- threatens to choke on its own success."
"...story of students from Tanzania, Rwanda, Zimbabwe and Nigeria as they go through undergraduate studies at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). As they arrive from diverse African backgrounds and immerse themselves in the challenge of rigorous academics and navigating a new world, we embark with them on a unique quest -- for knowledge and for the adults they will become. What happens to them over the next four years as they are molded into first-class engineers at America’s premier technological university?"Plus check out their completed Kickstarter campaign.
I'm also impressed with the dual park+infrastructure waterway greening of Kallang River at Bishan-Ang Mo Kio Park... 
This reminds me of efforts in Los Angeles to revitalize and restore the LA River, Madrid's opening of their Rio, the Room for the River efforts in Netherlands and Europe, and most especially the Daylighting of Seoul's Cheonggyecheon.
Matt Chaban writes in Crain's NY about Modular apartment building rises in 19 days... "Nineteen days. That is all the time it took to put up a 28-unit, six-story apartment building in the Inwood section of Manhattan this summer. The secret? Modular construction."Check out construction timelapse!
