City Planning

I am a bit of a nerd for good city planning, I guess that is one of the many reasons why I love NYC. This beautiful big city is probably this country's greatest example of city planning. From Central Park to the Brooklyn Bridge to Rockefeller Center to (my one of my favorite places) theHighline. Well now in Brooklyn the city is working on extending the Brooklyn Bridge Park on the pier south of the bridge. Below is a rendering of the design:

And this video was part of a segment on WNYC's Brian Lehrer show called Cityscapes where they have been looking at different aspects of NYC and how it has evolved.

These types of projects add to the greatness of the city and make it livable.

Nikola Tesla and NYC

I didn't know that much about Nikola Tesla (just something about electricity, a car, and a band) but yesterday as I spent 2 hours traveling to my sisters for thanksgiving dinner I was listening to Studio 360 with Kurt Anderson and this weeks program focused on the "Strange Genius of Nikola Tesla." I would really recommend you listen to the program as Tesla was a very fascinating man.

(Hear the whole show here)

The thing that most surprised me about Tesla was that he spent most of his life here in NYC. Tesla spent a lot of time feeding pigeons in Bryant Park and 40th and 6th Ave is Nikola Tesla Corner. Tesla's first lab was on 175 Grand Street. He lived in the New Yorker Hotel in room 3327 and 3328. And there is lots more that he did in NYC (including his earthquake machine that he created in his lab on Houston). 

There is a great interactive map with pictures and audio clips on the WNYC page (the Mayor Fiorello La Guardia eulogy of Tesla is a great listen). This is one of those times I really wish the iPhone supported flash as I would really like to take an interactive tour of Tesla's NYC. I guess I can visit and read the stories, I just can't listen to the great clips.

Longest run of the year

This isn't saying much mostly because I have barely run at all this year. I did a 4.5 mile loop and felt sluggish most of the way. Hopefully, over the next couple of weeks my runs get a little faster and I get through them easier.  Today I listened to the latest episode of Radiolab a fantastic show about science and social science on WNYC. The show is really smart and always interesting. Below is the map of my run:





I am going to do some research into iPhone apps that use the GPS to track runs and see how they work. Hopefully I can find a good one and use that to blog/log runs moving forward. Lastly, I am not going blog all my runs I am just doing it to start so that it helps keep my running and blogging on track.