For Rave Promoters, Overdose Education Tops Drug Enforcement

It was a dark weekend back in August 2013, with a lot of die-hard EDM (electronic dance music, to the uninitiated) fans extremely bummed out about one for their favorite summer events getting canned a day early. The reason? MDMA, aka “molly” or ecstasy, had claimed two lives at NYC’s Electric Zoo.
The same month, another died at the House of Blues in Boston. This year, there has been two more deaths due to the designer drug in Las Vegas and Los Angeles and, according to BuzzFeed, an astonishing 50 people required medical attention at Boston’s TD Garden in June after getting sick from drug use.
So it’s no surprise that this year’s Electric Zoo attendees arrived to find drug dogs patrolling and sniffing at the festival’s entrance, augmenting the familiar pat-down and search process. “It’s very difficult as a producer of large-scale events to control the decisions that people are making prior to even entering the show,” Jennifer Forkish, Vice President of Communications for Insomniac Events, which runs Electric Daisy Carnival, tells The Fader. “If we could stop everyone from making poor choices, we would. But we can’t.”
Lack of law enforcement at Electric Zoo has never been the problem. Even then-mayor Michael Bloomberg in 2013 said the Electric Zoo had “as good procedures as we could think of.” And there were no shortages of arrests at the other shows that drew headlines: at the Las Vegas event 29 people were arrested and at the two-day L.A. festival, more than 150 people were.
So festival promoters are looking for other ways to stem the idea of drug abuse at their events.
Dr. Andrew Bazos, Chairman of the SFX Medical and Safety Committee, is pushing to enhance two non-security related measures that have worked in Europe: harm-reduction and medical. Both the Electric Zoo and Electric Daisy Carnival are on board, handing out water, providing cool-down areas and hiring medical workers to provide discreet aid to anyone that needs it. They’re also investing in making sure everybody is 18 or older, as many of the victims of late have been minors.
As Robbie Kowal of SunsetSF promotions puts it, “There’s no security measure you can take when a kid who’s ignorant does something he shouldn’t before he walks in. So we have to educate them how to do these things safely.”

How .NYC Will Encourage Entrepreneurialism in the Big Apple

Earlier this month, New York City announced a “Landrush.” (And you thought that only happened back in the 1800s.)
The available real estate is not found on Manhattan’s crowded streets but instead online through the city’s newfangled .nyc web domain.
Through Oct. 3, the city is encouraging local businesses, organizations and New Yorkers that have a physical address to pre-register .nyc domain names at OwnIt.nyc, to secure the web address during what Domain.com is referring to as the “Landrush phase.” If multiple people request the same domain, an auction on Oct. 7 will determine its owner. After that, the domains will become available on a first-come, first-serve basis.
The Big Apple becomes the first American city to brand its own top level domain (TLD), after the .nyc extension was approved by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) in May 2013. The goal, according to supporters , is to help local businesses brand themselves and spur economic growth.
“Anyone who’s ever visited Manhattan knows that the city transmits a certain lively entrepreneurial energy that’s catching and contagious,” says Brian Unruh, General Manager for Domain.com. “New York City represents unlimited possibility. This first ever .NYC Landrush is a momentous, once-in-a-generation opportunity for New Yorkers to indelibly link themselves to the official history and future of New York,” adds Unruh.
Indeed, the .nyc campaign is a marketing tool that local entrepreneurs and startups can leverage for immediate credibility while cultivating a sense of community through city pride.
But the initiative also benefits the city, which will receive 40 percent of revenue, or $3.6 million during the initial five-year contract period, Information Week reports. Creating a local extension is an easy marketing opportunity for more cities generate revenue while promoting business growth.
New York joins Paris, London and Berlin in owning a domain extension. Which U.S. city will be next?
MORE: Which States are Tops in the Open Data Movement?

How Can an Old Smartphone Be Used to Make a City Better?

Have you ever been annoyed by the amount of people fighting for position on a city sidewalk only to turn the corner and find the next block over all but deserted? Ever thought that your old smartphone could be used in some other capacity? These may seem like totally separate problems, but Alex Winter has one unique solution to solve both.
His new startup, Placemeter, has found a unique yet incredibly simple way to monitor street activity and turn it into data that cities and businesses can use — all the while putting discarded smartphones to use.
Here’s what happens: City dwellers send Placemeter information about where they live and what their view consists of. The company sends back a window mounting smartphone kit, which will allow them to use its camera to monitor street activity. The movement is then quantified using a computer program that identifies individual bodies and tracks their actions, as shown in this video. Even better? In exchange, folks providing a view get up to $50 per month for an asset that previously paid nothing, according to City Lab.
As great as Placemeter is for those with a good street view, it is even better for an urban area as a whole. That’s because the images captured through the smartphones, over time, yields valuable data for city officials. Foot and vehicle traffic patterns, as well as the use of benches and other public amenities, can all be tracked through Placemeter and used to improve everyday life.
“Measuring data about how the city moves in real time, being able to make predictions on that, is definitely a good way to help cities work better,” Winter told City Lab.
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The data is also very valuable to retailers, helping them assess what might be the best spot for a new store. Such data has been long sought after, but until now, there had not been a simple, widespread way to collect it.
For many, with this advancement comes the concern of privacy — both for those being observed on the street and those with a smartphone. Placemeter has emphasized its commitment to privacy, though, and says the device’s camera doesn’t monitor anything inside a host’s home. Additionally, a computer, not a human, analyzes all the images of the street, and once the useful data is captured, the footage is erased.
Although it’s only in New York for now, the company wants to expand to other U.S. cities.
Thanks to Placemeter, says Winter, “cities and citizens [can] collaborate to make the city better.”And who wouldn’t want that?
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Can You Green a Community Without Stealing Its Identity?

Large, elegant projects that showcase the best of the best when it comes to environmental design have made their way into cities across the country. Politicians have praised these efforts endlessly, and the press, including NationSwell, have lauded their benefits. But what if the neighborhoods that house projects such as New York City’s High Line or Chicago’s green roofs (and benefit from them) end up being hurt in the long run?
Unfortunately, that’s what seems to be happening with certain projects of this nature — an overgentrification, of sorts, that ends up driving out existing residents.
How does that happen? Well, as it turns out, by making neighborhoods nicer, they can often become too nice — driving up the cost of living and bringing in wealthier residents, according to Next City.
So, how do we make neighborhoods greener without changing the makeup of the area altogether?
One successful example is Greenpoint, Brooklyn. Home to significant heavy industry and a large Polish population, Greenpoint is a working-class neighborhood, just like it was before becoming “just green enough.”
In 2010, the polluted estuary there, known as Newtown Creek, was declared a superfund site. Instead of cleaning it up through a large gentrification project, newcomers and longtime residents alike joined forces through the Newtown Creek Alliance, winning a settlement from Exxon-Mobil (the company that leaked the oil and contaminated the creek). With that money and their elbow grease, a nature trail was created, benefitting the community.
Greenpoint resident and Alliance member Bill Schuck, explained to Next City that his fellow activists thought, “hey, wait a second.  Are we doing this to make this attractive to real estate developers? And it was, no, we’re looking to benefit people like us.” Because of those efforts, Greenpoint received some much-needed cleanup and improvements without sacrificing its cultural and economic backbone.
Though there is no one secret for success in this arena, neighborhoods in other cities can learn from places like Greenpoint.
The key is to tailor any solution to the specific neighborhood — to listen to and to learn from the community members about their lifestyle and what kind of greening could benefit them. Another step is to make sure rents are stabilized and there’s enough affordable housing. Beyond that, though, is a general focus on practicality over publicity. The large, glamorous parks that are often widely loved can often be far less useful to a community, for example, than many smaller parks.
By focusing on the needs of the people when greening, a whole lot of good can be done.
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If Another Superstorm Hits, This Dirt Barricade Will Protect NYC

Everyone — but especially New Yorkers — remember Superstorm Sandy’s seemingly endless destruction back in 2012. Costing the region billions of dollars, it was an example of what nature could do to our infrastructure and our society.
Preventing damage like what occurred is crucial — and a big part of what needs to be done to prepare for the future. That’s what the winning project of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development’s Rebuild by Design contest aims to do. And there’s no better way to do it than to also make some beautiful public space in the process.
The Bridging Berm is a new project on Manhattan’s lower east side. While there’s no timeline for completion, once it is finished, it will shelter 150,000 residents and a power sub-station from the effects of storms and rising sea levels.
The 2.19 miles along the East River that the Bridging Berm will occupy is currently a public park, though it has few entrances and is very isolated from the city. The Bridging Berm will change that — improving both access and the public space itself. Even more importantly, it will raise the riverbank to nine feet above its current level. Had this been around during Sandy, there still would have been four feet to spare.
Jeremy Barbour of Tacklebox Architecture tells Next City that “the strength of the proposal is in the way they have addressed both the vertical and the horizontal through a series of programmed berms and bridges that mediate the boundary between the waterfront and the edge of the city — defining a place for community gathering and a way to inhabit the in-between.”
And a defining place it will be, with bike paths along the water, boating and fishing areas, as well as athletic fields. Clearly, there will something for everybody.
This multipurpose space is just one of three components to the larger “BIG U” proposal in the Rebuild By Design contest; roll-down storm gates on the FDR bridge as well as a berm-and-educational facility in lower Manhattan are also part of the plan.
The Bridging Berm could have the largest impact, though. With such a dense population and the power station in the area, not to mention the improved public space, it is an exceptional urban planning vision.
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How This Nonprofit is Helping Harlem Students Eat Healthy

As summer kicks off students and teachers are escaping the classroom for some much-needed time soaking up the sun. But a nonprofit and its partnering school are instead using summer vacation to expand its organic garden program — and they need your help.
The Edible Schoolyard NYC (ESYNYC) works with public schools to build organic gardens and teach cooking and healthy eating to some of the city’s underserved areas. Kicking off this month is its crowdfunding campaign, “Rooting for Harlem,” to maintain the program in East Harlem at P.S./M.S. 7 and Global Tech Middle School.
The campaign has raised $7,700 so far, but is looking for a total of $50,000 to add new components to its 4,000-square-foot raised bed courtyard garden and rooftop garden, perched atop one of the city’s building-lined blocks. The money will be used to plant fruit trees and build a willow arbor, as well as update infrastructure like installing new wooden and metal planters for the lower and upper terraces, an irrigation system and benches. The other half of the funds will go towards supporting the teaching staff, who teach growing in and out of the classroom as well as preparing and cooking garden-fresh meals. The students also run a neighborhood farm stand as a part of an after school program that will reopen in September, bringing the same fresh fruits and veggies to their community.
This is not the first city garden ESYNYC has built. The group launched a half-acre, organic experiential garden at P.S. 216 in Brooklyn’s Gravesend neighborhood. Transforming a former parking lot into a leafy refuge, the garden also houses a greenhouse and a stand-alone building that now serves as a kitchen classroom where students learn about preparing and cooking fresh feasts from their own garden.
“Every dollar we raise brings one more edible education lesson to our kids, one more plant, one more positive, healthful, joyful experience,” said Executive Director Kate Brashares. “Every dollar makes a difference in improving a child’s health.”
P.S./M.S. 7 receives federal funding as a title I school, and 100 percent of the students receive free and reduced-price school lunches, according to Edible Schoolyard. More than one in five kids live in temporary housing or are homeless, one of the highest percentages in New York City. The diverse neighobrhood of East Harlem faces challenges similar to other urban communities, including 37 percent living below the poverty line and 30 percent in low-income public housing. The community also faces major health issues. One-third of adults are overweight, one-third are obese (the highest in the city) and 13 percent are diabetic.
As students head home for the summer, it’s important they’re taking their knowledge of cooking and healthy eating with them, and even more important that the Edible Schoolyard may continue its mission in the area. The Crowdrise fundraiser will last through July 17 and interested donors who offer $10 or up will be invited to the official opening ceremony in September.
MORE: From Garbage to Greens: How This D.C. Lot Plans To Make History

These New York Seniors Are on the Cutting Edge of Telemedicine

What happens when you take 21st century technology and adapt it to a 20th century environment? A New York City pilot program is finding out, by bringing telehealth to four senior centers around the city. Pace University and VitalCare Services partnered with the city to try telehealth with about 100 residents over the course of six months, and the response from residents and staff has been amazing. VitalCare technicians used mobile technology to modernize methods of measuring blood oxygen, blood pressure, and weight at the senior centers. Everything syncs wirelessly, improving access and records at the same time. Residents have embraced it as a weekly way to stay aware of their health status and keep in touch with their physician teams, and saving the trip from 191st Street to the Village adds convenience, helps adherence and continuity, and cuts costs. Health professionals point to benefits like the ability to log in remotely and check all of the available information, and the shared space makes it easier for teams of physicians to communicate office-to-office. And the technicians love the speed and efficiency as well as the opportunities to connect with so many patients. The pilot is proving instrumental in helping residents maintain healthy, positive lives, and it’s breaking down barriers, from budgets to languages, and building confidence for a better-connected health service system.
 

Why One Man’s Trash Is Another Man’s Fertilizer

Hello Compost, a new initiative preparing to launch in (where else?) New York City, wants to give people fresh produce in exchange for their food scraps. Here’s how it works: Hello Compost will give participants freezable bags to collect their food scraps, which can then be exchanged for credits toward buying fresh produce from local farmers. The food scraps will then be used to create compost to grow more plants. The idea is to reduce the amount of waste going into landfills, while making healthy food less expensive for low-income communities, and increasing the supply of compost to improve the quality of future crops.

You’ll Never Guess What NYC Is Turning Its Biggest Trash Heap Into

As NYC Mayor Mike Bloomberg prepares to leave office, he’s shining up the Big Apple’s green reputation (and his legacy) with a few final announcements. Check out this one about the Freshkills Park on Staten Island that is getting the city’s largest solar energy facility. What’s remarkable about this green recreational area is that it used to be the world’s largest landfill. Just goes to show what creativity and technology working together can accomplish.