cars
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Making my neighborhood more walkable, sociable, sustainable, and safe
This weekend, I wrote a somewhat abstract post about how America’s built spaces prevent many Americans from connecting with the supportive social networks essential to health and happiness. Let’s zoom from the lofty down to the concrete. Let’s talk about my neighborhood. I live in the Bitter Lake area of Seattle. (In the early 20th […]
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How to improve a Hummer’s mileage and add retro style
Improving a Hummer’s mileage doesn’t take much. And it doesn’t even require pricey, high-tech electric batteries. Artist Jeremy Dean says you have to go Back to the Futurama, which is more 19th century than lithium-ion centric. But how to actually improve a Hummer’s mileage? Easy: Put two horses in front of it and take it […]
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Everything you need to know about Obama’s new fuel-economy rules
The federal government rolled out new auto fuel-efficiency standards today, capping more than a year of planning and, as the New York Times notes, a 30-year battle between regulators and automakers. The new standards are a big deal—they’ll do more to cut the pollution of heat-trapping gasses than anything the Obama administration has done so […]
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Do Americans really make the connection between transportation, oil use, and environmental impacts?
The national poll that Transportation for America released this week makes it clear that Americans are overwhelmingly in favor of increasing our access to transportation options, no matter where they live in America — big cities, suburbs, small towns, or rural areas. The majority believes that their community — and the country as a whole […]
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Greenpeace takes on iPads, cloud computing, other click-friendly subjects
Greenpeace has a new report out highlighting the climate impact of cloud computing and devices like the Apple iPad that rely on it to stream video, download music, load Greenpeace.org, etc. The “Make IT Green” report calls on Apple and other tech leaders to tackle the problem, noting that carbon pollution from cloud computing is […]
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Leno drives our electric future back from the past [video]
Despite the sexiness of hydrogen options, The Tonight Show host and car aficionado Jay Leno believes electricity is where it’s at for automobile propulsion. Watch as he takes a closer look at the Ford Focus as compared to his own fully electric car—a pretty advanced model, traveling 100 miles on a charge. The kicker? It […]
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Streetfilms: Fixing the car-centric city [video]
“Fixing the Great Mistake” is a new Streetfilms series that examines what went wrong in the early part of the 20th Century, when our cities began catering to the automobile, and how those decisions continue to affect our lives today. In this episode, Transportation Alternatives director Paul Steely White shows how planning for cars drastically […]
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Hop on the bus, texters
A French lad texting in an appropriate venue.Photo: TopheeNearly two-thirds of Millennials, aged 18 to 29, admit to texting while driving, according to a new Pew Research Center report [PDF]. Texting while driving is “insanely dangerous,” Clive Thompson reminds us in Wired. “Studies have found that each time you write or read a text message, […]
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Hummer to hum along no more?
Crash course General Motors has decided to park the ultimate gas guzzler in that big garage in the sky. GM thought its plans to sell Hummer to a Chinese company had the green light, but got run off the road this week by the Chinese government, ironically, over fears of pollution. Enviros who say fuH2 […]
