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EartherSaudi Crown Prince Asks, Answers What if a City, But It’s a 105-Mile Line
Vicious Saudi autocrat Mohamed bin Salman has a new vision for Neom, his plan for a massive, $500 billion, AI-powered, nominally legally independent city-state of the future on the border with Egypt and Jordan. When we last left the crown prince, he had reportedly commissioned 2,300-pages’ worth of proposals from Boston Consulting Group, McKinsey & … Continued
By Tom McKay -
EartherCitiesAsphalt Could Be Making Summer Air Pollution Worse
There’s a lot of asphalt in the U.S.—approximately 18 billion tons, according to the National Asphalt Pavement Association. Unfortunately, it turns out all that asphalt is the source of harmful air pollution, especially in the summer heat. In a new study, published in Science Advances on Wednesday, researchers from Yale looked into asphalt as a … Continued
By Dharna Noor -
Tech NewsAmerica Needs New Names for the State Alliances Forming to Circumvent Trump
In the early 1980s, Washington Post editor Joel Garreau wrote about how he would redraw the map of North America as new countries, giving each region a new name. There was Dixie in the south, Ecotopia in the northwest, and the Breadbasket in the Midwest, among plenty of others. With the U.S. currently splintering into … Continued
By Matt Novak -
EartherConservationCity Dwellers Could Be Key to Saving Monarch Butterflies From Extinction
Since 2014, conservationists have been trying to secure protections for the monarch butterfly under the Endangered Species Act. The butterfly—whose signature black-and-white speckled orange wings are impossible to miss—has seen its numbers drop by 80 percent in North America over the last 20 years. New research, however, paints a promising future for the species in … Continued
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ScienceArchaeologyOne of the World’s Most Ancient Cities Experienced Surprisingly Modern Problems
New archaeological evidence suggests the inhabitants of Çatalhöyük, an ancient city founded over 9,000 years ago in what is now Turkey, were subject to many urban problems we’re familiar with today, including overcrowding, interpersonal violence, and sanitation issues. At its peak some 8,500 years ago, Çatalhöyük (pronounced cha-tal-hoo-yook) was home to an estimated 3,500 to … Continued
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EartherClimate ChangeLA’s New Climate Change Plan Will Radically Overhaul the City’s Car Culture
Cars are as wrapped up in Los Angeles’ identity as tacos, the Hollywood sign, and palm trees. But the auto culture could change dramatically in the next few decades. On Monday, the city introduced its version of a Green New Deal and while it won’t quite ban cars, it will alter transit in the city. … Continued
By Brian Kahn -
EartherClimate ChangeBy the End of the Century, San Francisco’s Climate Could Feel Like LA
When your grandchildren plan a trip to Denver later this century, they’ll need to leave the winter hat at home and instead plan like they’re going to the Texas Panhandle. That’s according to a new study published on Tuesday in Nature Communications, which looked at the future climate of 540 cities in North America and … Continued
By Brian Kahn -
EartherEarth Science
New Research Could Reveal Which Parts of Your City Swelter the Most
Anyone who’s spent time in a city in the summer knows that these bastions of blacktop get uncomfortably hot compared with the surrounding countryside. But even within a city’s bounds, some neighborhoods swelter more than others, and that can have a big effect on who’s most threatened by heatwaves. Which is why citizen scientists are … Continued
By Maddie Stone -
ScienceFrom the LabWhat Scientists Can Learn From New York City’s Freakiest Residents
In a way, cities are giant science labs, providing an environment for organisms that’s unlike anywhere else on the planet. Even though cities have been around for thousands of years, the way that humans are urbanizing our planet in recent decades has become radically transformative for entire ecosystems. Urban living is literally altering the DNA … Continued
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Tech News
Amazon Is Building a New Tech Hub Inside an Old Post Office
In another stunning display of its might, Amazon will be transforming an old post office building into a new Amazon office building. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau just announced that the Seattle-based online retailer will open a new tech hub on the site of a historic Canada Post building in Vancouver. The massive expansion is … Continued
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EartherClimate ChangeSatellites Show How Major Reservoirs Are Drying Up Around the World
Climate change could make drought a way of life in certain parts of the world. Though the prospect of “Day Zero” in Cape Town is being staved off, it’s far from the only city to suffer through a water crisis right now. In a new report, the World Resources Institute (WRI) highlighted four other regions … Continued
By Brian Kahn -
EartherConservation
Why I Will Never Run and Pick Up Trash
There’s a new trend sweeping the nation—the world actually—and it’s called plogging. No, not blogging on platforms (that “plogging” came and went three years ago) but running while picking up trash. Plogging comes from the Swedish phrase “plocka upp,” which means to pick up, and publications from The Washington Post to Men’s Health are picking … Continued
By Ari Phillips -
EartherConservation
Good Urban Planning Could Mean Hotter Cities
Growing up around Washington, D.C., it’s a relief to now live in a city laid out in a coherent fashion, with numbered streets increasing along a cardinal directional axis and being intersected at sensible right angles. Which is why it pains me to say that physics brings some bad news for my fellow gridded city-dwellers: … Continued
By Maddie Stone -
Tech News
Amazon Names 20 Finalist Cities for HQ2 Thunderdome
After what felt like five years of mayoral begging and media gimmicks, we finally know the top 20 finalists in the brutal battle for Amazon’s second headquarters. The cities are about as predictable as you’d think. Basically, all the big ones. Here they are, and among them, there can be only one winner, as the … Continued
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EartherClimate Change
Cities Need to Look Beyond Their Borders When Fighting Climate Change
When you’re in a major city, it can be easy to forget about the outside world. But city life is not a hermetic experience—in fact, the environmental footprints of cities can stretch around the world. A new study shows that cities are overlooking a major source of emissions as they craft policies to transition toward … Continued
By Ari Phillips -
EartherUrbanization Is Now One of the Most Dominant Forces of Evolution
When humans settled into larger villages and towns some 12,000 years ago along with the advance of agriculture, wildlife took advantage. Those species “preadapted” to survive in early cities, including mice and rats, grabbed onto the coattails of modern civilization and haven’t looked back since. Now they pretty much depend on the underbelly of human … Continued
By Ari Phillips -
Tech NewsArtificial IntelligenceSaudi Arabia’s Robot Love Is Getting Weird
In the latest example of “Philip K Dick-inspired nightmare becomes real life,” Saudi Arabia just became the first nation to grant citizenship to a robot. The robot’s name is Sophia. It is artificially intelligent, friends with CNBC’s Andrew Ross Sorkin, and, arguably, a glimpse into the dark future that will kill us all. You see, … Continued
