Archive for April, 2013

Re blogged from southern living click here for full post

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When container gardening, it’s important to pay attention to what’s going into your pots. A good potting mix allows roots to flourish with adequate air circulation and holds moisture without getting soggy. Here are some dos and don’ts for choosing potting soil.

Do purchase bags that contain a mix of canadian sphagnum peat moss, ground bark, and perlite. This combo is lightweight, holds the right amount of moisture, doesn’t compact, and drains well.

Do look for brands that include a small amount of fertilizer so that you don’t have to feed your plants right away. Also look for a wetting agent, which allows organic matter to absorb water easily and evenly. Potting soil without a wetting agent is hard to rehydrate once dry.

Junctioneer.ca

News: Danish firm BIG has been selected to design an 80-hectare shopping and leisure complex with a park on its roof to serve a business district between two Paris airports.

EuropaCity will be located in the Triangle de Gonesse – an area southwest of Charles de Gaulle International Airport and north of the smaller Le Bourget Airport – and themed around the diverse cultures of the European continent.

Junctioneer.ca

Full images at original blog
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This living wall vertical garden at Hotel Ushüaia de Ibiza in Ibiza, Spain was designed by Urbanarbolismo who were assisted in the construction by Alicante forestal and Alijardín, and was the first greenwall garden system of its type.

Ceramic terracotta containers are interconnected but can retain unique substrates and vegetation. and porosity of the terracotta permits exchange of humidity. Drip and hand irrigation methods accommodate varying watering schedules.

Re bogged from jetsongreen click here for full post

Junctioneer.ca

A slew of clever, funky gizmos to lighten the cyclist’s load, Savoir-Faire Bicycle Accessories from ECAL includes snow chains, a brake handle bell, a cable alternative to brake handles, a super-compact rain deflector, a no-lose valve cap, and a bunch of cable-tie style accessories: water bottle holder, bag hook, LED lights, bell, and…cable tie. It’s all from design students at the prestigious Swiss Ecole cantonale d’art de Lausanne (ECAL), presented at this year’s Milan Design Week.

Re blogged from Here

A great blog to follow – mocoloco.com

In Denmark the average person cycles almost 600 miles each year.

Packed bike parking in Copenhagen. Photograph: Marco Cristofori/Alamy

Can there be too many bikes in a city for safety? It’s not a question usually asked: the received wisdom, supported by research and backed by campaigning groups, is that the more cyclists there are, the safer the roads become for everyone.

But in Copenhagen – one of the most bike-friendly cities in the world in which 36% of its inhabitants cycle to work or school, and which has committed to increasing that figure to 50% by 2015 – there are controversial voices coming from unexpected places.

According to the Danish Cyclists’ Federation and Wonderful Copenhagen, the official tourism organisation for Denmark, the sheer success of the drive to get more locals and tourists on bikes is creating a dangerous, intimidating and unpleasant climate for cyclists in the city.

“In Copenhagen, we have quite extraordinary problems around cycling congestion,” said Aneh Hajdu, of Wonderful Copenhagen. “I don’t take my children on their bikes into Copenhagen at rush hour any more. It’s too dangerous and scary. I just wouldn’t risk it.”

Continue reading at Guardian News and Media Limited

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Parks as Green Infrastructure: How Need, Design, & Technology Can Make Better Cities

…many cities in America have taken on the challenge of managing storm surge, storm water runoff, water conservation, and water pollution reduction, increasingly through the use of green infrastructure. That challenge has become even more urgent with the advent of global climate change, and the more frequent and intense storms that have accompanied it.

Many cities face fiscal constraints that don’t allow them to build new parks, but are nonetheless obligated to manage water better—even to the point of creating major new infrastructure to protect themselves from catastrophic damage from storm surge, flooding rivers, and other damaging weather events. Parkland in U.S. cities makes up between 2.3% and 22.8% (with a median of 9.1%) of city land area. With the opportunity to build new, functionally layered landscapes that serve to process storm water, abate storm surge and serve as esthetic and recreational assets, parks and green infrastructure may be entering a prolonged, perhaps permanent, symbiotic relationship.

http://sustainablecitiescollective. Click this line

Junctioneer.ca

These images of the cash store that opened up at Bloor St. and Keele St. Next to the Keele St – Bloor Subway station – lets say somewhat over a year ago is part of an increasing amount of these businesses opening in the area.

Now that another is opening at the Dundas St. West and DuPont Ave. intersection, coupled with the one at Keele St. and Dundas St West. We have full compliment it would seem.

These is business for these companies in the area or they would not be opening. However it can begin to bring about the though of the disparity of income and living conditions that must exist with the “Junctions” of the Greater Junction Area.

The industrialization of the liquor and beer bottle collectors in the Junction.

Junctioneer.ca

500-cyclists and pedestrians an hour simultaneously traveling along the same route bordering the Regent’s Canal in north London certainly makes for one congested—and with cyclists and pedestrians jockeying for limited space, a treacherous—commute. According to BD Online, landscape architect Anthony Nelson, director at Design International, has proposed a dramatic solution that could resolve the long-standing battle between fast-moving cyclists and slower pedestrians.

Full post at ddonline.co.uk

Junctioneer.ca

This fence is made from the reclaimed boards from a Junction house renovation.

Ripped to make 4 inch boards from the large 1 foot wide original boards which were cracked and decayed in many areas the orig cache of boards yielded about 65 percent useful boards for the fence.

The blog is posting this article as many families have many more toys then furniture homes. Much of the manufacturing of toys from production and packaging and on to disposal is an environmental pit.

This article and its other parts from the greenbiz blog is about on how one large firm is using its huge purchasing power to cause its suppliers to work on the issue.

When it comes to making toys greener, Walmart isn’t playing around

Reblogged from greenbizclick here

This is the third in a series of stories about Walmart’s supplier sustainability index. An overview is here, and a story about flour, bread and agriculture is here. Today’s topic: plastic toys.

Walmart wants to improve the sustainability of plastic toys. The giant retailer isn’t playing around.

Specifically, the company wants to improve the safety of workers who make the toys. It also wants to make sure that manufacturers are taking steps to use fewer so-called “chemicals of concern” in toys. It would like suppliers to deal with any issues raised when kids outgrow Barbie or GI Joe and throw them away. If paper or wood goes into toy packaging, Walmart wants to know whether it is “sourced in accordance with a credible certification system that addresses ecosystem impacts and biodiversity.”

Some critics think Walmart is taking this too far. That’s what this story is about.

Walmart’s supplier sustainability index, which is being rolled out to thousands of suppliers, is the biggest environmental initiative in the company’s history. It likely will do enormous good, requiring companies that make consumer products to examine their environmental impacts in ways they never have done before. But the index also raises questions about how the world’s largest retailer (2012 revenues: $469 billion) is exercising its market power.

Consider, as an example, PVC, or polyvinyl chloride plastic, commonly known as vinyl. It’s a widely used plastic that shows up in toys, including such iconic plastic toys as Hasbro’s My Little Pony and Mattel’s Barbie. It can be made soft or rigid. It is rugged, moldable, low-cost and excellent at holding color.

What, if anything, is wrong with PVCs? That depends on who you ask.

Greenpeace has campaigned for a decade against PVCs. It says: “This commonplace plastic is one of the most toxic substances saturating our planet and its inhabitants. PVC contaminates humans and the environment throughout its lifecycle: during its production, use, and disposal.”

Lithuania park Clean-Up
Sat. Ap 20
Meet at 10 am
Corner of Glenlake and Keele
1 block north of Keele Subway Station
Bags supplied
Plse bring gloves and if possible a 3′ long stick
to help swap litter into the bag
Plse let as many Folks, as you can, know