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Middle School Kids Design Sustainable Cities to Help Those in Distress

At 7:30 a.m. on a winter Saturday, a time when most kids are still sleeping, professional-looking seventh and eighth graders were already buzzing around pushing carts that were loaded with table-sized futuristic city models and getting them into place for a day-long judging process. The projects that these students were rushing about represent hours of thinking, designing, researching, and collaborating with mentors and classmates to create: An Affordable Living Space For People Who Have Lost Their Home Due to a Disaster or Financial Emergency.

Chasing water leaks means working backwards. Instead of using the best materials to put a project together, you must break apart a masterpiece to find a flaw. Without x-ray vision and a clear way to proceed, the job could be a real headache. A good approach to chasing water is to form a checklist of possibilities and eliminate each one until the mystery is solved. Understanding how water behaves will make working through the clues faster and more efficient.

Buffalo Township’s wastewater treatment plant is located along Buffalo Creek in Pennsylvania, beneath the State Route 28 bridge. This type of wastewater treatment plant is perfect to serve smaller communities. It supports 6,000 people with 3,100 sewer connections to homes and businesses throughout Sarver, Pennsylvania, and the vicinity. It’s an excellent example of an efficient wastewater infrastructure that uses extended aeration to treat raw sewage, without any initial sedimentation.

The New York City neighborhood of Astoria, Queens, is a long way from Hollywood and seemingly an unlikely location for a museum dedicated to the silver screen. However, the Museum of the Moving Image, which pays homage to the realms of film, television, and digital media, has occupied the area for over 30 years. A total makeover of its existing facilities and an addition, designed by Leeser Architecture, has doubled the Museum's square footage -- including a renovated lobby, exhibition space, theaters, and courtyard.

In 2008, San Francisco International Airport (SFO) began renovation of its Terminal 2M (SFO T2). While airport expansions and renovation have become commonplace, global design and planning firm Gensler aspired to nothing less than a paradigm shift with this 640,000 sq. ft. project.

Maximize square footage, get an efficient workout, and maintain the beauty of your home with these five home gym recommendations from fitness expert Karen Stoller.

Recently unveiled are plans for a new building to house the Museum of Contemporary Art Cleveland (MOCA Cleveland). London-based Foreign Office Architects (FOA) is the design firm for the project, and Westlake Reed Leskosky acted as the architect of record. Currently the museum is tucked away on the second story of the Cleveland Play House complex; the new facility will give MOCA Cleveland 44% more space as well as a commanding presence at a prominent intersection in University Circle.

Traditional farming requires huge inputs to sustain it, from water to potentially hazardous pesticides to fertilizers. After food is grown by conventional agricultural methods, it must be stored, refrigerated, and transported to the urban centers where it will be consumed, making traditional farming highly pollution-producing. Vertical Urban Agriculture has the potential to solve this problem and could lead to urban and environmental renewal on a fantastic scale for India’s cities.

What makes reclaimed wood so appealing? Its appeal is based on more than just the patina it has acquired during its years of use as a building material… the character associated with old wood started developing when it was still in the forest.

Wood utilized more than a century ago in the construction of old barns, factories, and warehouses throughout the United States is now one of the most highly desirable and sought-after raw materials in the flooring industry. Popular in both residential and commercial environments, vintage reclaimed wood flooring is appreciated by architects and designers for its history, quality, character, and environmental benefits.

If you really want to get some things done around the house, you will need power tools. Jeff Wilson shares his insights regarding which tools are must-haves.

I always loved shows like Roy Underhill’s The Woodwright’s Shop – by watching I can experience, vicariously, detailed woodworking without power tools. Folks like Roy are truly artisans, and I have tremendous respect for that kind of work.

The new Barclays Center will not only provide a home for the Brooklyn Nets but will offer the surrounding community a civic space and an architectural  icon.

Not since 1957, when the Dodgers left Brooklyn for Los Angeles, has this popular New York borough been so close to finally having a major league sports team to call its own. Despite significant public opposition, a faltering national economy, a Supreme Court case over eminent domain, and a Frank Gehry design deemed too expensive, the Barclays Center is well underway, with construction due to be completed in September 2012. Designed by SHoP Architects and the sport facility practice at Ellerbe Becket, this voluptuous mass with weathered steel skin will be the $4.9 billion home of the Brooklyn Nets NBA team.

The traditional concept of “preventive maintenance” applies to maintenance on a piece of machinery based on its quantifiable use, or the passage of a set amount of time.  A good common example of preventive maintenance is changing the engine oil in your car every 3,000 miles or 3 months, as many automobile owners’ manuals may suggest.  “Predictive maintenance” is an attempt to refine maintenance activities to only those times when they are functionally necessary, based on data collection, analysis, and (negative) trend determination from an established “healthy” base level.