Exactly one year after the Tribute in Light at ground zero drew thousands of migrating birds into its beams, the night of September 11 passed without avian incident.
New York City Audubon volunteers who monitored the lights all night reported a peak of about 100 birds around 2 a.m., and about 700 altogether. It was a far cry from last year, when an estimated 10,000 birds were caught over the course of the night, circling in confusion until the lights were temporarily shuttered five separate times.
That night was almost perfectly designed to lure birds traveling down the Atlantic Flyway, one of North America’s four major conduits for birds migrating to South and Central America. Several nights of storms kept birds grounded in the wetlands north of New York City; on the night of Sept. 11, a favorable tailwind released them, but dense cloudcover hid the stars birds use to navigate and calibrate inborn geomagnetic compasses. The Tribute in Light’s bank of 88 7,000-watt xenon searchlights dominated the sky.
“Attraction to light is deep in the ancestral instinct, especially in a situation where there’s cloud cover,” said ornithologist Andrew Farnsworth of Cornell University. “A bright light trumps all.” In the birds came.
Though not in direct physical danger from the lights, a night spent circling can be tiring. In previous years, before the New York Audubon Society started monitoring the lights, reports of Manhattanites waking to find exhausted migrants resting on their balconies were not uncommon.
On this Sept. 11, very different conditions prevailed, said Farnsworth. The weather over several previous nights was favorable for flight, so there was no buildup. On the night of 9/11, light winds from the south, blowing against the birds, discouraged flight. “It’s early in the season,” Farnsworth said. “They’re in no tremendous rush.”
The night was partially cloudy, but not so cloudy as to confuse birds, which last year included various species of tanagers, warblers, thrushes and orioles. The 2 a.m. buildup occurred during a moment of cloudiness, but “the moon popped out for a second, and away they went,” said New York City Audubon volunteer Adriana Palmer.
Tuesday, 13 September 2011
Friday, 9 September 2011
Peru's stadium facade lighting responds to football fever
Peru's National Stadium's interactive LED lighting system captures the audio levels of the stadium crowd and depicts it visually on a dynamic facade.
Cinimod Studio, a London, UK-based architecture and lighting design firm, has delivered the interactive lighting control system for Peru National Stadium in Lima.
The system gathers the crowd’s noise levels in real-time and translates the audible signal into a visual map that is depicted on the facade’s lighting display.
Cinimod Studio worked as part of an international design and delivery team including lighting designer CAM and software designer ArquiLEDS, both of Lima, Peru, e:cue lighting control company of Paderborn, Germany, and Traxon Technologies, a lighting designer based in Hong Kong.
The facade lighting begins with a network of customized microphones deployed along the stadium’s roof line. This data is then processed by Cinimod’s custom processing hardware and software located in the stadium’s main communications room.
The audible data is analyzed using mathematic calculations and self-calibrating algorithms. The software then communicates a 'mood state' to the e:cue lighting controller, which transmits the relevant DMX control signal to the lighting fixtures on the building’s facade.
The external lighting scheme is designed to integrate seamlessly within the architectural framework of the building. The majority of the lights are laid out as fans of flames that wrap upwards around the form of the structure. The facade’s patterns vary in color, speed, brightness and scale.
The software runs perpetually, constantly evaluating the mood, which varies between celebration at one end of the spectrum to disappointed at the other.
The main mood states include boring, a neutral mood; dxcitement, accompanying a surge in crowd noise and pitch; celebration, typically triggered by a goal and followed by a further rise in noise level; and disappointed, triggered by an excited state followed by a rapid decline in noise level.
The scale of the stadium facade necessitated a very large array of color- and pixel-addressable fittings. The lighting controller provides 62 universes of DMX lighting control output.
Cinimod Studio, a London, UK-based architecture and lighting design firm, has delivered the interactive lighting control system for Peru National Stadium in Lima.
The system gathers the crowd’s noise levels in real-time and translates the audible signal into a visual map that is depicted on the facade’s lighting display.
Cinimod Studio worked as part of an international design and delivery team including lighting designer CAM and software designer ArquiLEDS, both of Lima, Peru, e:cue lighting control company of Paderborn, Germany, and Traxon Technologies, a lighting designer based in Hong Kong.
The facade lighting begins with a network of customized microphones deployed along the stadium’s roof line. This data is then processed by Cinimod’s custom processing hardware and software located in the stadium’s main communications room.
The audible data is analyzed using mathematic calculations and self-calibrating algorithms. The software then communicates a 'mood state' to the e:cue lighting controller, which transmits the relevant DMX control signal to the lighting fixtures on the building’s facade.
The external lighting scheme is designed to integrate seamlessly within the architectural framework of the building. The majority of the lights are laid out as fans of flames that wrap upwards around the form of the structure. The facade’s patterns vary in color, speed, brightness and scale.
The software runs perpetually, constantly evaluating the mood, which varies between celebration at one end of the spectrum to disappointed at the other.
The main mood states include boring, a neutral mood; dxcitement, accompanying a surge in crowd noise and pitch; celebration, typically triggered by a goal and followed by a further rise in noise level; and disappointed, triggered by an excited state followed by a rapid decline in noise level.
The scale of the stadium facade necessitated a very large array of color- and pixel-addressable fittings. The lighting controller provides 62 universes of DMX lighting control output.
Thursday, 8 September 2011
Reflections on Labor Day
For the vast majority of human history, our ability to do work was limited by our muscles or the muscles of animals. Only through the industrial revolution and the harnessing of massive amounts of energy are we able to enjoy the technologies and comforts of modern life.
In the past, to live a life of opulence, it took hundreds of people working to provide the kind of luxuries that we take for granted. For example, it took 498 people to prepare each meal for King Louis XIV at Versailles in 1700. Today, the typical supermarket has far more food choices than King Louis XIV imagined and he was King in the world’s richest city. Today’s energy-powered transportation and communications options would also be were also unimaginable to the world’s richest people of the past and yet today even homeless people sometimes have cell phones.
To better appreciate how the use of energy saves human labor, some researched calculated how many humans it would take to generate the energy we consume on a daily basis. According to data from 2005, Jennifer Barker found that a fit person can average a sustained output of about one-tenth of a horsepower. This means that average American would have approximately 147 energy slaves working around the clock to generate the energy necessary for modern life.
Now think about your energy slaves as you go about your day. Every time you leave a 75 Watt light bulb burning, one of these very strong energy slaves is pedaling away as hard as he can to keep it going for you. If that 25 mpg car has a 100 horsepower motor, it’s the equivalent of 1,000 strong people.
If you add up all the power we Americans use, on average, to Bicycle light and heat our homes, transport us, etc. and convert it to the human energy equivalent, it’s an unimaginable opulence by the standards of all the humans who came before us. It is as if our well-being were measured by the number of energy slaves we have learned to command.
The transition from human power to animal power to machine power has made energy the master resource. “Energy will do anything that can be done in the world,” stated Johann Wolfgang von Goethe during the Industrial Revolution. The labor-enhancing, labor-saving characteristic of energy-enabled machinery was described by Erich Zimmermann in the mid-twentieth century as follows:
The shift to machine power changed America from a rural agricultural nation to an industrial giant. It also made men’s lives easier and richer. In 1850, the average American worked seventy hours a week. Today he works forty-three. In 1850, our average American produced about 27 cents’ worth of goods in an hour. Today he produces about $1.40 worth in dollars of the same purchasing power.
In the past, to live a life of opulence, it took hundreds of people working to provide the kind of luxuries that we take for granted. For example, it took 498 people to prepare each meal for King Louis XIV at Versailles in 1700. Today, the typical supermarket has far more food choices than King Louis XIV imagined and he was King in the world’s richest city. Today’s energy-powered transportation and communications options would also be were also unimaginable to the world’s richest people of the past and yet today even homeless people sometimes have cell phones.
To better appreciate how the use of energy saves human labor, some researched calculated how many humans it would take to generate the energy we consume on a daily basis. According to data from 2005, Jennifer Barker found that a fit person can average a sustained output of about one-tenth of a horsepower. This means that average American would have approximately 147 energy slaves working around the clock to generate the energy necessary for modern life.
Now think about your energy slaves as you go about your day. Every time you leave a 75 Watt light bulb burning, one of these very strong energy slaves is pedaling away as hard as he can to keep it going for you. If that 25 mpg car has a 100 horsepower motor, it’s the equivalent of 1,000 strong people.
If you add up all the power we Americans use, on average, to Bicycle light and heat our homes, transport us, etc. and convert it to the human energy equivalent, it’s an unimaginable opulence by the standards of all the humans who came before us. It is as if our well-being were measured by the number of energy slaves we have learned to command.
The transition from human power to animal power to machine power has made energy the master resource. “Energy will do anything that can be done in the world,” stated Johann Wolfgang von Goethe during the Industrial Revolution. The labor-enhancing, labor-saving characteristic of energy-enabled machinery was described by Erich Zimmermann in the mid-twentieth century as follows:
The shift to machine power changed America from a rural agricultural nation to an industrial giant. It also made men’s lives easier and richer. In 1850, the average American worked seventy hours a week. Today he works forty-three. In 1850, our average American produced about 27 cents’ worth of goods in an hour. Today he produces about $1.40 worth in dollars of the same purchasing power.
Wednesday, 7 September 2011
Vanasse Hangen Brustlin, Inc. Acquires Eng-Wong, Taub & Associates
Established in 1988, Eng-Wong, Taub grew into a 40-employee firm and stands out among the region's traffic engineering and planning firms with its extensive work with over 200 public and private sector clients.
The firm has been a call-in consultant to the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey for over 20 years, and worked closely with municipalities, transportation agencies, metropolitan planning organizations, and other public and private interests to solve the region's most complex, high-profile traffic challenges. Their work on projects like the new Yankee Stadium, World Trade Center redevelopment, Second Avenue Subway, Hudson-Bergen Light Rail, Newark Bicycle light Rail, New York City BRT, and East Side Access will transform the region's landscape and transportation network for years to come.
"I am delighted that we've joined forces with a firm so much like ours," said Marty Taub, co-founder of Eng-Wong, Taub and VHB principal. "We joined VHB because there is a great synergy and chemistry between us and a terrific match in skill sets that will benefit our clients. Plus, VHB has always impressed us with their dedication to client service."
VHB is ranked among the nation's top design and transportation engineering firms. Vanasse Hangen Brustlin, Inc. and its New York affiliate, VHB Engineering, Surveying and Landscape Architecture, P.C., provide services for notable projects in the New York/New Jersey region that include Port Authority of New York and New Jersey On-Call Consulting for Airport, Environmental and Financial Services; New York State DOT Construction Inspection Services; Stop & Shop Engineering and Integrated Services, Ronkonkoma Hub Transit Oriented Planning Study, PepsiCo World Headquarters Planning and Permitting, and Princeton University Arts & Transit Neighborhood Engineering.
The merger is effective September 1, 2011. The former Eng-Wong, Taub employees will continue to work from Two Penn Plaza in New York City and One Gateway Center in Newark. Vanasse Hangen Brustlin, Inc. and its New York affiliate, VHB Engineering, Surveying and Landscape Architecture, P.C., serve New York and New Jersey clients through five offices and 100 local employees in Albany, Hauppauge, White Plains, New York City and Edison, N.J.
The firm has been a call-in consultant to the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey for over 20 years, and worked closely with municipalities, transportation agencies, metropolitan planning organizations, and other public and private interests to solve the region's most complex, high-profile traffic challenges. Their work on projects like the new Yankee Stadium, World Trade Center redevelopment, Second Avenue Subway, Hudson-Bergen Light Rail, Newark Bicycle light Rail, New York City BRT, and East Side Access will transform the region's landscape and transportation network for years to come.
"I am delighted that we've joined forces with a firm so much like ours," said Marty Taub, co-founder of Eng-Wong, Taub and VHB principal. "We joined VHB because there is a great synergy and chemistry between us and a terrific match in skill sets that will benefit our clients. Plus, VHB has always impressed us with their dedication to client service."
VHB is ranked among the nation's top design and transportation engineering firms. Vanasse Hangen Brustlin, Inc. and its New York affiliate, VHB Engineering, Surveying and Landscape Architecture, P.C., provide services for notable projects in the New York/New Jersey region that include Port Authority of New York and New Jersey On-Call Consulting for Airport, Environmental and Financial Services; New York State DOT Construction Inspection Services; Stop & Shop Engineering and Integrated Services, Ronkonkoma Hub Transit Oriented Planning Study, PepsiCo World Headquarters Planning and Permitting, and Princeton University Arts & Transit Neighborhood Engineering.
The merger is effective September 1, 2011. The former Eng-Wong, Taub employees will continue to work from Two Penn Plaza in New York City and One Gateway Center in Newark. Vanasse Hangen Brustlin, Inc. and its New York affiliate, VHB Engineering, Surveying and Landscape Architecture, P.C., serve New York and New Jersey clients through five offices and 100 local employees in Albany, Hauppauge, White Plains, New York City and Edison, N.J.
Tuesday, 6 September 2011
The Return of Good Throw Joe
Back in 1996 Ohio State was coming off of a year when it was faced with replacing the Heisman winner at tailback, the Biletnikoff winner at wide receiver and a three-year starter under center. The incumbency was assumed to be a contest between Mark Garcia and Stanley Jackson, but once Garcia was lost to a knee injury junior college transfer Joe Germaine emerged and created the successful platoon that we have been reminded of throughout fall camp.
By the time he had completed his quarterbacking tenure in 1998, Germaine had solidified his legacy as one of the best quarterbacks the Buckeyes have ever produced. He did this without superior speed, arm strength or exaggerated character emotions.
They definitely did not "break the mold" when Germaine was created. We saw Bauserman emulate his style for the half that he played on Saturday. It was not the exceptional, highlight-reel manner that sends the college football hivemind into Heisman candidacy flagellation.
It was, however, star results without star quality. In light of how the Pryor era concluded, this is a very welcome flavor of quarterback play.
Ironically, for a player who will eventually take seven years to complete his college eligibility, Bauserman will not be afforded enough time to match Germaine in either statistics or legacy. If he fails to demonstrate the capacity to be the offensive custodian waiting for its designated stars to either return or emerge, the preseason clamoring for Miller will return.
At worse case, Bauserman holding onto the lion's share of game snaps only allows Miller to acclimate in his first year without the same fiery baptismal that Pryor found himself in 2008.
However, if he continues to establish himself as an efficient and qualified commander as this long-anticipated season progresses, Bauserman will have done the unthinkable: He will have shifted Ohio State's once-precarious quarterback situation from being the problem nobody wanted to the situation everyone wishes they had.
By the time he had completed his quarterbacking tenure in 1998, Germaine had solidified his legacy as one of the best quarterbacks the Buckeyes have ever produced. He did this without superior speed, arm strength or exaggerated character emotions.
They definitely did not "break the mold" when Germaine was created. We saw Bauserman emulate his style for the half that he played on Saturday. It was not the exceptional, highlight-reel manner that sends the college football hivemind into Heisman candidacy flagellation.
It was, however, star results without star quality. In light of how the Pryor era concluded, this is a very welcome flavor of quarterback play.
Ironically, for a player who will eventually take seven years to complete his college eligibility, Bauserman will not be afforded enough time to match Germaine in either statistics or legacy. If he fails to demonstrate the capacity to be the offensive custodian waiting for its designated stars to either return or emerge, the preseason clamoring for Miller will return.
At worse case, Bauserman holding onto the lion's share of game snaps only allows Miller to acclimate in his first year without the same fiery baptismal that Pryor found himself in 2008.
However, if he continues to establish himself as an efficient and qualified commander as this long-anticipated season progresses, Bauserman will have done the unthinkable: He will have shifted Ohio State's once-precarious quarterback situation from being the problem nobody wanted to the situation everyone wishes they had.
Monday, 5 September 2011
As Sports Medicine Surges, Hope and Hype Outpace Proven Treatments
It took her from doctor to doctor, cost her thousands of dollars and led her to try nearly everything sports medicine has to offer — an M.R.I. to show the extent of the injury, physical therapy that included ultrasound and laser therapy, strength training, an injection of platelet-rich plasma, a cortisone shot, another cortisone shot.
Finally, in February, she gave up.
“I decided this is never going to heal, so let’s get on with it,” she said.
And so Ms. Basle, a 44-year-old digital media consultant who lives in Manhattan, started running anyway. She has lost a lot of speed and endurance. And, she added, “the stupid hamstring is really no better.”
Medical experts say her tale of multiple futile treatments is all too familiar and points to growing problems in sports medicine, a medical subspecialty that has been experiencing explosive growth. Part of the field’s popularity, among patients and doctors alike, stems from the fact that celebrity athletes, desperate to get back to playing after an injury, have been trying unproven treatments, giving the procedures a sort of star appeal.
But now researchers are questioning many of the procedures, including new ones that often have no rigorous studies to back them up. “Everyone wants to get into sports medicine,” said Dr. James Andrews, a sports medicine orthopedist in Gulf Breeze, Fla., and president-elect of the American Orthopaedic Society for Sports Medicine.
Doctors love the specialty and can join it with as little as a year of training after their residency, as compared with the more typical two to four years for other specialty training. They see a large group of patients eager for treatment, ranging from competitive athletes to casual exercisers to retirees spending their time on the golf course or tennis court.
The problem is that most sports injuries, including tears of the hamstring ligament like Ms. Basle’s, have no established treatments.
Finally, in February, she gave up.
“I decided this is never going to heal, so let’s get on with it,” she said.
And so Ms. Basle, a 44-year-old digital media consultant who lives in Manhattan, started running anyway. She has lost a lot of speed and endurance. And, she added, “the stupid hamstring is really no better.”
Medical experts say her tale of multiple futile treatments is all too familiar and points to growing problems in sports medicine, a medical subspecialty that has been experiencing explosive growth. Part of the field’s popularity, among patients and doctors alike, stems from the fact that celebrity athletes, desperate to get back to playing after an injury, have been trying unproven treatments, giving the procedures a sort of star appeal.
But now researchers are questioning many of the procedures, including new ones that often have no rigorous studies to back them up. “Everyone wants to get into sports medicine,” said Dr. James Andrews, a sports medicine orthopedist in Gulf Breeze, Fla., and president-elect of the American Orthopaedic Society for Sports Medicine.
Doctors love the specialty and can join it with as little as a year of training after their residency, as compared with the more typical two to four years for other specialty training. They see a large group of patients eager for treatment, ranging from competitive athletes to casual exercisers to retirees spending their time on the golf course or tennis court.
The problem is that most sports injuries, including tears of the hamstring ligament like Ms. Basle’s, have no established treatments.
Thursday, 1 September 2011
Party pop princess has no filling
She sang about brushing her teeth with Jack Daniel's, vomiting in the closet and drinking with boys in the basement.
Welcome to Ke$ha's Get $leazy Tour. The princess of trashy pop has been to the top of the charts three times (twice on her own, once being featured on Flo Rida's "Right Round") but now she's trying to graduate to headliner beyond the clubs. Her 80-minute concert Tuesday at Roy Wilkins Auditorium in St.
Paul showed her to be Britney Spears lite on a low budget -- except Ke$ha not only plays instruments but she also sings live (though not that well, frankly). However, she lacks Britney's sense of showwomanship. In fact, Ke$ha's performance was entertaining but less exciting than her cameo as the headliner last year at KDWB's Star Party at the Epic nightclub.
Ke$ha, 24, the daughter of a hit Nashville songwriter, is not much of a dancer, and neither were the four "dancers" accompanying her. They felt more like props in small scenarios than hoofers stepping to the banging beats. Moreover, Ke$ha's little dramas lacked theatricality and focus save for the dark and dramatic "Cannibal," during which she rhymed "goner" with "Jeffrey Dahmer" and plucked the heart out of male dancer and then drank blood from it. Much of the rest of her bits were filled with R-rated props, potty-mouth propositions and pointless horseplay that didn't fill the smaller-than-an arena room.
Ke$ha is all about faux debauchery. The musical equivalent of "Jersey Shore" with beats, she tries to play all the classic rock 'n' roll cards: sex, rebellion, excess and fun. Her songs are smartly dumbed down and as catchy as the flu. Song writing is clearly her strong suit. (She's written tunes for Miley Cyrus, the Veronicas, Kelly Clarkson and Britney Spears.) Her live singing was gratingly shrill and often sharp. Her rapping was, thankfully, limited because she hasn't mastered musical flow. Her playing of keyboards, drums and guitar was superfluous, though that guitar shaped like a rifle was an eyecatcher.
Welcome to Ke$ha's Get $leazy Tour. The princess of trashy pop has been to the top of the charts three times (twice on her own, once being featured on Flo Rida's "Right Round") but now she's trying to graduate to headliner beyond the clubs. Her 80-minute concert Tuesday at Roy Wilkins Auditorium in St.
Paul showed her to be Britney Spears lite on a low budget -- except Ke$ha not only plays instruments but she also sings live (though not that well, frankly). However, she lacks Britney's sense of showwomanship. In fact, Ke$ha's performance was entertaining but less exciting than her cameo as the headliner last year at KDWB's Star Party at the Epic nightclub.
Ke$ha, 24, the daughter of a hit Nashville songwriter, is not much of a dancer, and neither were the four "dancers" accompanying her. They felt more like props in small scenarios than hoofers stepping to the banging beats. Moreover, Ke$ha's little dramas lacked theatricality and focus save for the dark and dramatic "Cannibal," during which she rhymed "goner" with "Jeffrey Dahmer" and plucked the heart out of male dancer and then drank blood from it. Much of the rest of her bits were filled with R-rated props, potty-mouth propositions and pointless horseplay that didn't fill the smaller-than-an arena room.
Ke$ha is all about faux debauchery. The musical equivalent of "Jersey Shore" with beats, she tries to play all the classic rock 'n' roll cards: sex, rebellion, excess and fun. Her songs are smartly dumbed down and as catchy as the flu. Song writing is clearly her strong suit. (She's written tunes for Miley Cyrus, the Veronicas, Kelly Clarkson and Britney Spears.) Her live singing was gratingly shrill and often sharp. Her rapping was, thankfully, limited because she hasn't mastered musical flow. Her playing of keyboards, drums and guitar was superfluous, though that guitar shaped like a rifle was an eyecatcher.
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