Infrastructure

Wales Gets Its First ‘Dark Sky’ Community

January 13, 2024 Cristen Hemingway Jaynes, EcoWatch. Create! Infrastructure, Light Pollution, Wales, wildlife

Presteigne and Norton, a town and neighboring village in the Welsh county of Powys, have been announced as Wales’ first “dark sky community” by DarkSky International. Lights will be dimmed or turned off earlier in order to lower light pollution in the area, allowing residents to get a clearer view of the night sky, reported BBC News. “The Community has worked tenaciously over the last six years to highlight the benefits of becoming a dark sky community,” said Leigh-Harling Bowen, leader of the Presteigne & Norton Dark Skies Community, a press release from DarkSky International said.

Here’s How Evanston’s Streets Have Become Safer For Cyclists

January 6, 2024 Alex Nitkin, Next City. Create! Bikes, Illinois, Infrastructure, Safety, Transportation

There’s a wide spectrum of cyclists who take to the streets each week with the Evanston Bicycle Club. Newer, lower-speed riders mostly stay inside Evanston and surrounding suburbs, taking advantage of barrier-protected bike lanes and quieter residential streets. Cyclists with a bit more energy and experience go for longer rides up to Wilmette or Glencoe. But only the more advanced groups venture into the city of Chicago, said Al Cubbage, who last month ended a two-year stint as president of the club, which organizes multiple rides per week. Taking Clark Street down through Rogers Park means “taking your life into your own hands,” said Cubbage, a retiree who considers himself an intermediate rider.

While Lahaina Is Destroyed, Honolulu To Construct $60 Million Bridge

September 14, 2023 Ann Wright, Popular Resistance. Educate! colonization, Federal funding, Fires, Hawaii, Infrastructure, Maui

While the island of Maui faces the rebuilding of over 2200 structures in Lahaina and 18 structures in upcountry Kula, on the neighboring island of Oahu, the City and County of Honolulu is going ahead to spend $25 million in federal funds for an unnecessary and controversial pedestrian bridge across the Ala Wai canal. The canal seperates the hotels and condos of Waikiki from the residential area across the canal. In the spirit of Aloha, I suggest that our Honolulu elected officials give the $25 million in Federal funds allocated for the non-essential Ala Wai bridge to Maui for the reconstruction of Lahaina.

Biden Infrastructure Report Pushes ‘Disastrous Water Privatization’

September 3, 2023 Julia Conley, Common Dreams. Educate! Infrastructure, Joe Biden, Privatization, Water

An under-the-radar report by U.S. President Joe Biden's National Infrastructure Advisory Council should not go unnoticed, said the national watchdog Food & Water Watch on Thursday, as buried in the document is a call for the privatization of U.S. water systems, which progressive lawmakers and civil society groups have long opposed. On page 15 of the 38-page report, the advisory council said the federal government should "remove barriers to privatization, concessions, and other nontraditional models of funding community water systems in conjunction with each state's development of best practice."

‘Underground Climate Change’ Is Shifting Chicago’s Foundations

July 20, 2023 Cristen Hemingway Jaynes, Ecowatch. Educate! Chicago, climate crisis, Global Warming, Infrastructure

Climate change is causing global temperatures to rise, leading to droughts, heat waves and wildfires. It is warming the surface of the ocean, intensifying hurricanes and increasing acidity and ecosystem imbalances. But the climate crisis is also happening beneath our feet, in a phenomenon called “underground climate change.” The concept has been studied for years surrounding issues of railroad tracks buckling in the heat and groundwater contamination, according to CNN. However, it was not until recently, in a new study by Alessandro F. Rotta Loria, an assistant professor of civil and environmental engineering at Northwestern University, that the effects of underground climate change — also known as “subsurface heat islands” — on civil infrastructure were examined, a press release from Northwestern University said.

From Bayanihan To Talkoot

May 30, 2023 Jeffrey Andreoni, Grassroots Economic Organizing. Organize! Community, Food and Agriculture, Infrastructure, Mutual Aid

For all of human history, societies have depended on communal work to sustain themselves into the (often unpredictable) future. However, at a certain point, that all changed. Market forces took over, and communal projects ceased to have the same significance. The individual took precedence over the community, and large public works became the purview of burgeoning states. The classic North American example of such communal work projects is the Amish tradition of barn-raising, wherein the community gathers to help a neighbor erect their barn without remuneration or any expectation of reciprocity because, as we’ll see, these acts of generosity benefited everyone, not just the barn owner.

Water Crises Portend Socialism Or Barbarism

October 2, 2022 Signý A., Left Voice. Create! Extreme weather, Floods, Infrastructure, Socialism

It’s 2022 and the climate has changed. Around the world, the new climate is making itself felt via droughts, heatwaves, floods, and storms. Many of these events are record breakers, and their effects go beyond local areas to affect global supply chains and the lives of millions of working-class people. These are more than just “natural” disasters, though: these multiple water crises are driven, sometimes even created, by a capitalist society organized to put short-term profit above long-term sustainability. Our untenable management of water illustrates the impossibility of addressing climate change under capitalism, and shows how only socialism can produce a sustainable and equitable civilization.

Russia Retaliates For Ukrainian Strikes On Electricity Networks

September 12, 2022 Moon of Alabama. Educate! Electricity, Infrastructure, Russia, Ukraine

A typical U.S. attack on a foreign country begins with a swarm of cruise missiles which will disable the countries basic infrastructure. The U.S. attack on Iraq and other countries demonstrated that electricity and water supply will be gone in first days of a U.S. waged war. Over more than 200 days the Russian special military operation in Ukraine had never attacked the basic infrastructure of the country. When the Ukraine used its electrified railway network to bring in weapons from the 'west' the Russian forces only took out electric substations that supplied the railway. But it never attacked the general electricity production for the population. The lights in Ukraine staid on.

States Propose Expanding Highways With Federal Infrastructure Funds

September 10, 2022 Paige Bennett, EcoWatch. Educate! climate crisis, Environment, Infrastructure, Transportation

In November 2021, President Joe Biden signed the Bipartisan Infrastructure Package into law, which allocates $1.2 trillion toward infrastructure and was meant to reduce transportation emissions. While the federal government is guiding states to use the funding toward public transit and other improvements, like increased bike lanes, a new report finds that state and local governments may lean toward using the money toward highway expansions instead. The report from U.S. Public Interest Research Group, a nonprofit organization, maps out highway projects across the country that could use up infrastructure funding while making climate change worse.

How To Green Our Parched Farmlands And Finance Critical Infrastructure

September 3, 2022 Ellen Brown, Scheer Post. Create! Banking, Environment, Finance and the Economy, Infrastructure

Congress has passed two major infrastructure bills in the last year, but imminent needs in infrastructure funding remain. The 2021 Bipartisan Infrastructure Law chiefly focused on conventional highway programs, and the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 (IRA) mainly centered on energy security and combating climate change. According to the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE), over $2 trillion in much-needed infrastructure is still unfunded, including projects to address drought, affordable housing, high-speed rail, and power transmission lines. By 2039, per the ASCE, continued underinvestment at current rates will cost $10 trillion in cumulative lost GDP, more than 3 million jobs in that year, and $2.24 trillion in exports over the next 20 years.

China Forgives 23 Loans For 17 African Countries

August 21, 2022 Ben Norton, Multipolarista. Educate! Africa, China, Infrastructure, Trade

The Chinese government has announced that it is forgiving 23 interest-free loans for 17 African nations, while pledging to deepen its collaboration with the continent. This is in addition to China’s cancellation of more than $3.4 billion in debt and restructuring of around $15 billion of debt in Africa between 2000 and 2019. While Beijing has a repeated history of forgiving loans like this, Western governments have made baseless, politically motivated accusations that China uses “debt-trap diplomacy” in the Global South. The United States has turned Africa into a battleground in its new cold war on China and Russia. And Washington has weaponized dubious claims of Chinese “debt traps” to try to demonize Beijing for its substantial infrastructure projects on the continent. For its part, China has pushed back against the US new cold war.

Venezuela Launches Tech Platform To Quickly Improve Public Services

May 30, 2022 José Luis Granados Ceja, Venezuela Analysis. Create! Democracy, Infrastructure, Technology, Venezuela

The Venezuelan government launched a new app-based initiative to address deteriorated public services that will facilitate a more direct means of communication between the citizenry and the government. President Nicolás Maduro toured the headquarters of a newly-opened rapid-response center, located inside the presidential palace of Miraflores on Saturday, saying the new system would “show the complaint, show the process and show the result, so that people can see processes and results.” Maduro said the aim was to break with the bureaucracy that often serves to delay a quick resolution, adding that issues related to water, education, and healthcare would be given priority.

Earth Overshoot Demands Stronger Civic Infrastructure

April 28, 2022 Matt Leighninger, Resilience. Create! climate crisis, Democracy, Environment, Infrastructure

The challenges we face from climate change, extreme weather, biodiversity loss, and all the other symptoms of “Earth overshoot” are, in part, civic challenges. Our ability to respond effectively is complicated by rampant misinformation and the absence of safe spaces for informed, participatory planning. Older forms of public engagement—attending conventional “three minutes at the microphone” public meetings, signing petitions, writing letters to the editor—are insufficient for meeting these challenges and out of step with how Americans live today. If we want to achieve better environmental resilience, we need to upgrade our civic infrastructure. What do I mean by that? In Public Participation for 21st Century Democracy, Tina Nabatchi and I defined civic infrastructure as “the laws, processes, institutions, and associations that support regular opportunities for people to connect with each other, solve problems, make decisions, and celebrate community.”

Notes From Wartorn Ethiopia

April 17, 2022 Ann Garrison, Black Agenda Report. Educate! Ethiopia, Infrastructure, Internal Displacement, Wars and Militarism

I’m writing from Ethiopia, where the war that began in November 2020 continues, with the US backing their former puppet, the Tigrayan People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), who ruled Ethiopia with an iron fist from 1991 to 2018, when they were finally overthrown by a popular uprising. The TPLF started the war by attacking the national army's five Northern Command bases in Tigray on November 3rd and 4th, 2020, but the West’s dominant state and corporate press narrative quickly became that Prime Minister Abiy had started the war by sending troops into Tigray, alleging the attack as his excuse. This was one of many early indicators that the US, the NATO nations, and their press were backing the TPLF. I’ve been here for eleven days.

What Can A 1970s Farmers’ Uprising Against An Energy Transition Teach Us?

January 4, 2022 Dan Gearino, Inside Climate News. Educate! Energy, Farmers, Infrastructure, Minnesota

If the United States is to make a transition to clean energy, it will need to build many more transmission lines—the thick wires that deliver power from rural areas, where there’s enough open space for wind and solar, to cities where the most power is consumed. But the process of building those lines is likely to be fraught with conflict and delays, because people in rural and suburban communities often don’t want to see wires and tall metal towers in their backyards. Clean energy advocates say that power companies need to do more to understand what fuels public opposition and how best to engage with power line opponents. And one way to start, they say, might be to examine one of the most intense battles over an interstate power line in U.S. history, which unfolded across rural Minnesota for much of the 1970s.

«1 2 3 4 5 6 »

Daily movement news and resources