Tom Vanderbilt of the The Wilson Quarterly profiles the recently-departed traffic engineer, Hans Monderman, of the "less is more" school of traffic control.
Vanderbilt is the author of the Freakonomics-style book Traffic: Why We Drive the Way We Do (and What It Says About Us).
In the last few years, however, one traffic engineer did achieve a measure of global celebrity, known, if not exactly by name, then by his ideas. His name was Hans Monderman. The idea that made Monderman, who died of cancer in January at the age of 62, most famous is that traditional traffic safety infrastructure—warning signs, traffic lights, metal railings, curbs, painted lines, speed bumps, and so on—is not only often unnecessary, but can endanger those it is meant to protect.The Traffic Guru (Thanks, Barry!)As I drove with Monderman through the northern Dutch province of Friesland several years ago, he repeatedly pointed out offending traffic signs. “Do you really think that no one would perceive there is a bridge over there?” he might ask, about a sign warning that a bridge was ahead. “Why explain it?” He would follow with a characteristic maxim: “When you treat people like idiots, they’ll behave like idiots.” Eventually he drove me to Makkinga, a small village at whose entrance stood a single sign. It welcomed visitors, noted a 30 kilometer-per-hour speed limit, then added: “Free of Traffic Signs.” This was Monderman humor at its finest: a traffic sign announcing the absence of traffic signs.
In a brief faxed statement, the city police information department said "Thomas" and five other foreigners had been apprehended on Tuesday for "upsetting public order", without identifying the six people any further.
Starting with a Chicago-area facility due to open later this year, Microsoft will use an approach in which servers arrive at the data center in a sealed container, already networked together and ready to go. The container itself is then hooked up to power, networking, and air conditioning.
MANY are the inventions devised to insure a dry smoke, but it has remained for a clown appearing with a circus in England to solve the problem. An umbrella over the smoke keeps off water and a spigot drains off excess moisture.
Gary sez, "Pool is a Creative Commons licensed social media project being developed by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. It's a place to share your creative work with the Pool community and ABC producers - upload music, photos, videos, documentaries, interviews, animations and more. It's a collaborative space where audiences become makers."
Chris sez, "Canadian indie artist, and co-host of the CBC radio show Under The Covers, Danny Michel has made the individual tracks from his most recent album available on the web. The raw tracks are provided in a number of formats, ranging from relatively low quality MP3s, up to CD quality WAV files.
Danny invites his audience to do their own remixes of the tunes from the album."
(Photo by Kacper Skowron/For the Sun-Times)
The fries are really good at Custom Burger on 6th Street, but the fucking beer - Corona - is $6. That's just unconscionable. I make my way over to the table where Chris, Omar and Denise are sitting.
First, on a clear, rubbery material the team used a common technique called soft lithography to create a pattern of tiny posts either four or eight millionths of a meter in diameter. On top of these posts, they then deposited several layers of two polymers that together act as the solid electrolyte and battery separator.
