Archinect - News

New York is making rat infestation an issue for construction site managers across the city

2022-11-04T09:00:00-04:00

The New York City Council passed the Rat Action Plan Thursday, a package of four bills that set new pest management standards. Among other measures, it will require applicants for certain construction work permits in the city to certify that a licensed exterminator was retained to effectively treat the premises for rodent extermination.

The city is currently enduring a spike in its world-renowned rodent population, as rat sightings in all five boroughs have gone up by a total of 71% when compared to last year. Outdoor dining sheds are at least partially to blame, but the city’s public sanitation standards and its now record-breaking number of construction sites are also contributors, prompting the city to put forward the new plan.

“New construction is still booming, anytime you cut open the ground you usually open nests of rats, that would really be a big part of it, as far as sightings,” a local pest control specialist explained to the Daily News recently. The new requirement only applies to job sites in “designated rat mitigation zones” and will take effect in April. An annual report from the city's Department of Health and Mental Hygiene will chart the success of the efforts and be made publicly available no later than November 1st of the same year.

COVID-19’s spatial impacts: Big or small?

2020-04-27T21:00:00-04:00

What will be the impact of the COVID-19 crisis on the built environment? Of course, anything can happen and we should be skeptical of anyone offering predictions for what even tomorrow might bring, but that has not stopped architectural thinkers from positing the world as it might come to be.

A case in point, two dueling perspectives were recently published that offer differing visions of how our cities, daily lives, and homes might change in response to the coronavirus pandemic.

Writing in The Los Angeles Times, author and architecture critic Sam Lubell highlights six aspects of daily life—modular construction, adaptive reuse, lightweight architecture, healthy buildings, work, and public spaces—that are likely to be impacted by the crisis.

Previously on Archinect: 2,500-bed hospital conversion at NYC’s Javits Center opens. Photo By: K.C. Wilsey, FEMA.

Among the least discussed arenas so far that might find new relevance amid the COVID-19 crisis, according to Lubell, is modular co...

This is New York City's new and improved urban trash can

2019-12-10T12:22:00-05:00

The NYC has announced that Group Project is the winner of the BetterBin Competition, which called for designers to reimagine New York City's classic green, wire mesh waste basket. The two finalist each produced 12 prototypes that were tested in three NYC neighborhoods over a 90 day period. Based on the performance of those prototypes together with public response and feedback from Sanitation workers, a winner was chosen.

The new bin is designed to be lightweight, making it easier for workers to handle, and nests inside a durable stand. Group Project will continue to work with the Department of Sanitation to further develop the design and move towards mass production.

How one architect is working to fix Mexico City's faulty water supply infrastructure

2016-03-23T18:42:00-04:00

'Mexico City’s water system goes against its own functional essence. The city is dehydrating itself. We’re mixing our water with poisonous waste and then pumping it out through a complex network of pipes. Just like what happens when a human is dehydrated, Mexico City has diarrhea.' — Elias Cattan

"In a mega-metropolis with a deep history of corrupt leaders and state-sanctioned misinformation, [architect Elias Cattan of Taller 13] believes awareness is the first step. That’s why he’s part of a growing movement of environmental scientists, activists, designers and engineers determined to redesign Mexico City’s water supply management while educating its 9 million residents in the process."

More related to public health issues on Archinect:

EPA study finds no evidence that fracking has lead to polluted drinking water

Should the children of Flint be resettled?

Dispatch from Flint: How architects can help, on Archinect Sessions #54

One CEO's plan to supply water to drought-stricken CA cities, and obviously profit from it

Hyperloop, but for New York City's trash

2016-02-04T13:43:00-05:00

[A former sanitation policy director for New York City, Ben] Miller is working with his partners at the planning firm Closed Loops, with funding from state grants, to bring pneumatic tubes to New York’s High Line. Rather than rotting in landfills, carrot peels and apple cores from nearby restaurants could travel under the feet of unsuspecting tourists through pneumatic tubes hung below the elevated park. A small facility could turn them into compost right there in the neighborhood.

More on garbage disruption and the very pressing problem of waste management worldwide:

Designing Bathrooms for the Homeless (and Everyone Else)

2014-09-02T15:22:00-04:00

In the U.S., homeless-rights advocates say that in most cities it is difficult to find public toilets — making sanitation an issue that homeless people face on a daily basis [...] Even if there are public bathrooms, many are not open around the clock, leaving the homeless with no other option but to go in public areas — an act that is criminalized in most cities. Critics say such policies unfairly punish homeless people for life-sustaining actions.

Often restricted private bathrooms in restaurants or cafes, homeless people have very few options but to defecate in public – a dehumanizing and unsanitary situation. American cities are not particularly well-known for creating infrastructure and urban furniture that accommodates their sizeable homeless populations. Often designers are complicit in creating exclusionary devices rather than using their skills to open the city and make it more livable for even the most marginalized populations. Last month, we looked at unwelcoming bench designs as a tactic of exclusion as well as various counter-designs. The city of Santa Monica should be added to that list, after replacing benches at Big Blue Bus stations with stools designed by Lorcan O'Herlihy Architects. The uncomfortable stools, pictured below, have caused a small controversy. Big Blue Bus explicitly admitted they were intended to prevent "loitering."

Like loitering laws that criminalize a basic, life-sustaining activity (sleepin...

India's prime minister promising to make old cities "smart"

2014-06-24T13:49:00-04:00

Old Indian cities like Varanasi, Amritsar, Kolkata and even Delhi, could be in for a facelift over the next few years with the Narendra Modi government planning to develop modern satellite towns around these cities under the 100 Smart City programme, while upgrading the decaying infrastructure of the old towns. [...] All new cities will have integrated transport — modern bus systems, trams, metro rail and bicycle tracks — aided by satellite mapping, garbage disposal and solid waste management.

Before becoming India's prime minister and promising to make cities smart, Narendra Modi's campaign was focused on a slightly less lofty goal: "toilets before temples":

The BJP leader is quite right to declare that India should spend less money on devotion and more on sanitation. According to 2011 census data, nearly half of households have no access to a toilet, forcing inhabitants to defecate in the open. More Indians own a mobile phone than a lavatory of their own. Poor hygiene, not lack of food, is the main reason that 40 per cent of children are malnourished. Much of Mr Modi’s appeal, which has swept through India like a brush fire, lies in his promise to conjure the growth that will eradicate such dire conditions and set his supporters on the road to a middle-class life.

- David Pilling for the Financial Times

The Canadian Company Drowning in Phnom Penh’s Garbage

2014-06-09T13:22:00-04:00

In 2002, CINTRI, a branch of Canadian firm Cintec Environment Inc., was granted an exclusive 50-year contract to collect commercial and residential waste in Phnom Penh and keep the city’s main streets clean. The exact details of the company’s agreement with city hall have never been made public, but since the deal was inked, Phnom Penh’s population has swelled from just over one million to two million people. The population boom and its attendant urban sprawl seem to have caught CINTRI off-guard

Let’s get our sh*t together and reinvent the toilet

2011-07-21T12:57:27-04:00

The sanitation revolution has done more to save lives and improve health than any public health intervention in the past 200 years. But the flush toilet has only reached one-third of the world’s population. Clearly, we need to encourage new ideas and new approaches to accelerate safe and affordable access to sanitation for everyone.

The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation announced the launch of a strategy to help bring safe, clean sanitation services to millions of poor people in the developing world. The foundation also announced $42 million in new sanitation grants that aim to spur innovations in the capture and storage of waste, as well as its processing into reusable energy, fertilizer, and fresh water. In addition, the foundation will support work with local communities to end open defecation and increase access to affordable, long-term sanitation solutions that people will want to use.

Who Gives A Crap? Sanitation, Energy and Entrepreneurship in Kenya

2011-05-23T13:19:58-04:00

Sanergy, a year-old for-profit social enterprise that manufactures high-quality, yet low-cost and compact toilets for urban slums in the developing world and then uses human waste to produce energy and fertilizer. It is an “affordable, accessible and hygienic sanitation” solution for millions that live in places without sewage or electricity. They are places where the street is the bathroom. And that’s precisely the problem.