I sat through a very interesting lecture by Anders Wilhelmson about the New Kiruna Project. Kiruna is a mining city in the far north of Sweden that will disappear in its current place in 100 yrs. The iron ore that supports the city runs under the city itself and creates a need to move the city by 2050. Wilhelmson’s firm produced these city plans using a hyper-rationalism approach to produce very interesting and organic results. For more information visit the wilhelmson website. I highly suggest downloading the pdf [though it is swedish, you get a better sense. please ask me about the project]

The ‘bacteria’ form of the city blocks was derived from the turning radius of various forms of transportation and the needs of traveling on steep terrain. I particularly like how this forms a large number of small parks, a la the Savannah downtown.

An other interesting note is that taking public transportation actually has a lower carbon footprint that taking a bike due to the extra food needed to sustain someone who cycles.

❝ Eat less, ride busses more ❞