Monthly Archives

October 2010

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MetroUrban
October 27, 2010

Bneid alGar

There is a great opportunity for the metro to revive Bneid alGar into a sort of transit oriented corridor. The area is very linear and you can walk the width of it without a problem, meaning that a metro stop at the Fahaheel Expressway side…
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October 26, 2010

Ushahidi

I was just watching Clay Shirky's recent TED talk and he talked about the Ushahidi project, which is a free, open-source platform that allows people to set up websites that can collect and aggregate data sent in by people using their mobile phones with SMS…
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Other
October 24, 2010

What if?

What would happen if it costs 18KD to fill up your SUV? Would your life be ruined? I don't think so. What will happen is that you will adjust your lifestyle to meet this new reality. You might reconsider buying a new SUV, and maybe…
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Metro
October 24, 2010

Kuwait Metro: Progress

Kuwait signed an $8 million contract with Ernst and Young to provide "consultancy services" for the Metro project. It's weird, because E&Y are an auditor, as far as I know, and they're not really the first name one thinks of for master-planning expertise and designing…
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Other
October 17, 2010

Twitter

re:kuwait is now on Twitter. You can follow me by clicking on the link in the sidebar. The most recent tweets will be on there as well. I'm not sure how it will be used eventually, but it seems like a great tool for quick…
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October 17, 2010

Old Salhiya

In a recent post, Dr. Thomas Modeen talks about his observations of old Salhiya. He describes its ambience and says that because the place is truly cosmopolitan and free that you can just be yourself there: "It's the only urban locale in Kuwait that, at…
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Architecture
October 16, 2010

Desert Architecture

Kuwait is a desert, yet you wouldn't know this by looking at our architecture. What does it mean to design for a desert climate? The most important thing is to understand three basic rules: Understand the movement of the sun Know how different materials react…
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Urban
October 15, 2010

City Traffic Alternative

That previous post by Jasem got me thinking about a solution to the traffic and parking problem within the city. Most of the cars that are driving around are actually people looking for a place to park. That's a fact. The problem is made worse…
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Urban
October 15, 2010

First Ring Road

Kuwait has grown over the past five decades with rapid speed. The growth was tied to its financial prosperity. During the first boom years of the independence days of the early 1960’s till the late 1970’s, Kuwait grew as a vast urban sprawl to accommodate…
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Neighborhood
October 6, 2010

Crowdsourced Activism

Wikipedia works because of the energetic voluteerism of a dedicated core of users. We can harness this same crowdsourced dedication in Kuwait to help improve our public spaces. Everyone has a camera-phone now, and most newer models have the ability of adding geotagging information on…
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