Search

I am interested in the Macro scale and the macro effects evident at a city-scale level. I remember visiting New Orleans in 2016 and vividly remember seeing several signs with a large 'No' symbol drawn and the text  "neighbors not tourists" printed on the sign. Recently, as part of my research into New Orleans, I stumbled on this piece by the Guardian on how short-term rentals through platforms such as Airbnb are leading to gentrification in New Orleans. Highlighted in the article is how several Airbnb hosts do not reside on the listed premises. I remember the place we stayed, as we were a large party, having a 617 prefix number.  The prefix stood out as I knew the code 617 represented Boston and was curious what someone with ties to Boston doing in New Orleans as a host. In a similar vein, the article also highlights the problem of absentee hosts, hosts who acquire property for the sole purpose of setting up the property as an Airbnb site.

To tackle the problem, one councilwoman passed a law that required any Airbnb hosts in residential zones to have a homestead exemption verifying they live on site. In this case, a city-wide measure was taken and passed into law affecting the micro. It is common to have one host having several properties in different residential areas in New Orleans. From a technical standpoint, it could be viewed that Airbnb as technology is developed and presented as a scalable product. With no limits to reproducibility. Meanwhile, real-life discontinuities exist in the form of such homestead laws. It is impossible to live in more than one homestead at the same time. In other words, the concept of the human is not scalable.
Likewise, neither is cultural heritage. The city of New Orleans positions its self as a city with great cultural heritage. It is through this heritage that they seek to draw more and more tourists. How do cities think of scaling up successful initiatives and how do they navigate the political, social, ecological, or economic entanglements. At what point is downscaling necessary? Is culture scalable?

[1]https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/mar/13/new-orleans-airbnb-trem…

I am currently a Ph.D. student interested in exploring the entanglements of scale, especially in the context of environmental sensing.  My primary research seeks to engage in discourse around the value of scalability that is presented as inherent in computation. While the term scale-up is almost synonymous with computation, sustainability; on the other hand, is known as a problem of scale. Take for example, the discourse on climate change where the actions required to combat climate change requires interventions at different scales. In this context, demanding changes at individual scales while no corresponding changes happen at larger scales would not yield much.

In looking at New Orleans, I came across a video on IoT cameras developed by Cisco, the networking giant. What struck me other than the apparent rise of surveillance capitalism was the narrative of one of the police officers highlighted in the video. The officer mentions that it is not feasible for the city to place police officers on every corner. In the context of scale, the police officer is implying that cameras are useful as they extend the police officer's ability to surveil the city. In other words, cameras and the networks help scale up the police officer, making it possible for them to cover a larger scale than before.

One of the police officers, in the video, also mentions that New Orleans is a tourist and hospitable town. Which brings up the question at any given period, what scale of visitors can New Orleans support without stretching the city's resources? Several other cities in the world have made efforts to limit visitors, in order not stretch city resources. The recent crisis at Mount Everest is an excellent example of what happens when resources are stretched to accommodate the increasing number of local visitors. How could something of this nature similarly impact New Orleans?

At the communication center where the video feed is analyzed, the IT manager provides reasons as to why they chose Cisco as their vendor. One of the reasons he gives was that the system is easily expandable, allowing the ability to scale out/up the network.

The kind of technology and/or infrastructure that they rely on are one big road map. Having an eye on each area as a whole not only helps the organization aide in seeing where the problem relys, but also has the commuities be able to keep an eye out to pinpoint the exacy areas that have the problems. This also helps by not only the organizations but also the communities being able to come up with better and quicker solutions.

The numbers and totals on the damage done by the hurricane were given out by total occupied after the storm had hit. Most importantly then the numbers, the pictures of the storm before/after is what occupied the whole research. More then words the pictures spoke on how big this really was, and then the numbers of the damage were also given which made it complete on how big of a damge this had really caused.

Although reducing air pollution is very hard nowadays, however people can take precaution especailly in the way in which they use means of transportation in their daily lives. Eliminating air pollution is not possible but their are many ways in which we can reduce it. First off by choosing a better transportation method everyday, instead taking public transport, or driving your car when not needed. Suppose you want to make a quick food run to a place nearby, why not walk there or maybe even ride your bike, saving fuel and the emissions that would be emitted from them when you use those transportations. It is small steps that each person can take in their daily lives that would help reduce pollution overtime. Also getting out there and supporting causes that push for cleaner air, if each person played their part in their own communities instead of leaving it up to others, we would definitley elimiante a lot of waster. 

The aim of this organization is to address the problem of sewage overflows in the cities of New Jersey. They want to address these issues combining alongwith the aiding in water conservation, flooding resiliency measures, and solutions to innovative financing. 

• At least 56 people in the U.S. were killed and another 67 in the Caribbean.
• Cost estimates have ranged as high as $60 billion so far.
• More than 4 million people remain without power, as crews from across the country converge on the Northeast to restore electricity.

In an industrial city like Newark, although prevention of air pollution is hard, but control can be in our hands. By identifying the areas with the higher risks and also the people being affected by the poor air quailty, we can further give the community more clear information regarding the risks and also in turn influencing policy makers and the stakeholders of the community. Being correctly informed on the topic not only helps the community members, but also the people in charge of making decisions for their communities, making this a better way to work together to build a healthier ans safer community in areas like these. 

Yes, individual communities should determine the air quality standards for their areas because each area would have a different standard. For example the Newark area air quality standard would be much lower then the other tri-state areas of New Jersey. If Newark's air quality was measured with standards that are kept for the whole state then the results would be much lower and wouldn't be right to compare the two. Having different standards per each area helps in diffrentiating between each one.

Local and surrounding areas has turned their heads to think about the disaster and health for the communities. Perth Amboy, has three outfalls, and the city is continually trying to improve ways in which upgrade their water systems. The plans being implaced are for long term, so the only way to help implement them to make them work is for the to start right now. There are so many communities that have to be dealt with so starting now was the best thing to do, thought out by them.