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Infrastructural Sine Wave
[Image: As if a lighter-than-air geometric fluid became temporarily frozen between two gateways of masonry, it’s just a bridge over the Norderelbe in Hamburg, Germany; photograph by Georg Koppmann...
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Voids and Vacuums
[Image: Google Maps view of Mosul Dam (bottom center) and the huge reservoir it creates]. Dexter Filkins—author of, among other things, The Forever War—has a long new piece in the first 2017 issue of...
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Infrastructural Voodoo Doll
For the past few months, on various trips out west to Los Angeles, I’ve been working on an exclusive story about a new intelligence-gathering unit at LAX, the Los Angeles International Airport. To...
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Archiving “Geomagnetic Spikes” in Everyday Objects
[Image: One of the pots; photo by Oded Lipschits, courtesy NPR]. Ancient clay pottery in the Middle East has inadvertently recorded the Earth’s magnetic field, including evidence of an “astonishing...
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Many Norths
[Image: Many Norths: Building in a Shifting Territory]. Architects Lola Sheppard and Mason White of Lateral Office have a new book out, Many Norths: Building in a Shifting Territory, published by...
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The Remnants
[Image: From An Enduring Wilderness: Toronto’s Natural Parklands by Robert Burley]. Photographer Robert Burley has a new book due out in two weeks called An Enduring Wilderness: Toronto’s Natural...
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A Voice Moving Over The Waters
[Image: The Jim Creek Naval Radio Station from Popular Mechanics]. For a variety of reasons, I’ve been looking at a variety of large terrestrial antenna sites built for communicating with submarines....
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Quick Links
Some midweek reading material… [Images: Muons beneath the Alps; via and via]. I’m pretty much obsessed with muons—subatomic particles that have been used to map the interiors of archaeological ruins—so...
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Logan
[Image: Philadelphia’s Logan neighborhood, via Google Maps]. On a work trip to Philadelphia last week, I learned about the city’s semi-evacuated Logan neighborhood. As you can see in the satellite...
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Seismic Potential Energy
[Image: Photo by BLDGBLOG]. I got to hike with my friend Wayne last week through a place called the Devil’s Punchbowl, initially by way of a trail out and back from a very Caspar David Friedrich-ian...
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Parking For Gold: On the Frontlines with America’s Best Valet Parkers
[Image: Valets stretch at the National Valet Olympics in Palm Springs; photo by BLDGBLOG]. When I first heard about the National Valet Olympics, I knew it was something I’d want to see someday. The...
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Fossils of Lost Neighborhoods
[Image: Near Barren Island, Brooklyn, New York, via Google Maps]. I’ve always liked the story of Mary Anning, an amateur paleontologist who collected fossils along the cliffs of southwest England in...
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Gold Fault Laser
[Image: Drawing courtesy Geothermal Futures Lab]. In the general chaos of renovating a house here in Los Angeles, I missed this lecture and reception on Friday night, launching a semi-fictional...
View ArticleHow The City Uses Algorithms
New York City has announced the “Automated Decision Systems Task Force which will explore how New York City uses algorithms.” This makes New York “the first city in the country bringing our best...
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The Surface of a Terrestrial Sea
[Image: A sinkhole in Wink, Texas, surrounded by oil extraction and wastewater injection infrastructure]. A story I meant to include in my link round-up yesterday is this news item about a “large...
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La vie minérale
[Image: Photo by Virginie Laganière and Jean-Maxime Dufresne]. A new exhibition featuring photos, videos, and sound installations by Virginie Laganière and Jean-Maxime Dufresne looks at life...
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Metropolitan Accomplice
[Image: Photo by Jonas Roosens/AFP/Getty Images, courtesy of the Guardian]. You might have seen the news that a crew of burglars used sewer tunnels beneath the diamond district in Antwerp, Belgium, to...
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The Atlas of Natural Regions
[Image: “Saint-Valentin, Champagne berrichonne (Centre-Val-de-Loire), 2019, by Eric Tabuchi]. I’ve been enjoying the Instagram account of photographer Eric Tabuchi for quite a while now. Tabuchi is...
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Norwegian Dream Tunnels
Almost exactly five years ago, I was in the Norwegian town of Tromsø to speak at a conference called “Future North,” part of the annual Arctic Frontiers event. One of the most interesting parts of my...
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Secret Telephone Buildings
“In harmony with its residential location,” we read in a paper called “Radio Relay and Other Special Buildings,” originally published in the Spring 1950 issue of Bell Telephone Magazine, “this...
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